@dietpepsirocks -- I downloaded and paid for NORD VPN (one of the fastest VPNs that should achieve more than 10 Mbps upload?) I connected to servers in Canada, the US etc -- made my upload even slower,. 1 Mbps
Sorry, but that was the wrong thing to do.
Without Nord VPN, your packets go through your cable-modem, to a Shaw router in Winnipeg (since you are there), and then to other routers, on their way to the IP-address of the remote server.
With Nord VPN active, your packets STILL go through your cable-modem, to the same Shaw router in Winnipeg, and then to other routers, to the Nord VPN server, and then from that server to the IP-address of the remote server.
Compare driving your own vehicle directly to your destination to driving your car to a car-rental agency, renting one of their cars, and driving that car to your destination. Of course, the latter path will take a longer time.
> I did this because my thoughts were maybe there's a server between me and wherever that's slowing me down?
There are no "servers" between your computer and the remote server, unless you call each router (as identified by the output from any "traceroute" utility program) as being specialized servers -- that just "route" packets.
Either you have some problems in the "path" between your computer and the remote server:
- Ethernet cable between your computer and the cable-modem,
- Coaxial cable between the cable-modem and the wall-jack,
- Coaxial cables inside your walls that merge at Shaw's "demarcation-box",
- A "coaxial-splitter" inside that box, to provide coaxial feeds to your cable-modem and to your TV,
- The coaxial-cable between the demarcation-box and the nearest telephone-pole -- sometimes, this coaxial-cable is underground, instead of being visible)
- Shaw's "concentrator" box up the telephone-pole (multiple coaxial cables from multiple adjacent houses connecting into this "concentrator",
- Shaw's infrastructure running pole-to-pole up-and-down your street,
- Shaw's infrastructure running from the next street to the local Shaw Distribution Centre,
- Shaw's backbone connecting one city to the next city, e.g., Winnipeg to Toronto,
- the "packet interchange" site, where all the networks "cross-over" (Shaw and Telus and Bell and Rogers and Canarie would each run fibre-optic cable into a router at that site,
- if the remote server is connected to the Internet via Telus Business, it could be some of Telus' infrastructure that might have a problem.
Without the outputs from "traceroute" that I have repeatedly requested from you, I cannot tell where the "bottle-neck" is that causes your end-to-end "slowness".
