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Really Slow Web Browsing with DSL

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3 replies

by daragh.mcloughlin

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I have a Dell Dimension 3000 with 256MB Ram and a 2.66GHz Celeron Processor using Windows XP Home Edition v 2002. I have a 50MBs DSL connection.

My problem is that browsing the internet (using IE6, Firefox, Opera) is very very slow whereas using any other program connected to the internet is very fast.(i.e. Bearshare, Gnutella, Outlook...). Any web browser is slow all the time - even when all other programs using the internet are off.

The problem is just when going from page to page, I mean, if I download something from a website (i.e. right-click-save-as) I get really fast download speeds but if I click a link to another page I'm left waiting for up to 45secs.

I have tried ALL the spyware/anti-virus products available(Spybot S&D, Ad-aware, Spyware Doctor, Clean up, Spybot DSO) and tried a number of suggestions regarding spyware but all without success. I've tried downloading different web browsers with no luck. If I connect my laptop to the same connection I don't have any problem with it (laptop is pretty much the same spec as the PC).

On the status of my connection on my PC when browsing only, the number of packets received is just slightly higher than the number sent, whereas on my lap top the number received is about 6 times higher than the amount sent...... if this helps/makes sense.

I've had this problem since the computer came out of the box 3 months ago. Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

3 replies

by bfilmfan

I sincerely doubt that you have a 50 MBps DSL connection. This would exceed the network bandwidth of a TS-3 which is 43.232 Mbps. A OS-3 circuit would be 155 Mbps, which would be the same as 84 T-1 connections.

Typically, extremely high speed DSL is about 4-5 MBps. So unless you have 10 DSL lines pulled to your house, you have 10 commercial-guaranteed DSL lines routed to your location, you are most likely on a TS-1 speed line, which would 1.544 MBps.

You can test the speed of your DSL line with this test:

http://bandwidthplace.com/speedtest/

Based on the information you have supplied above I would suspect the DNS information in not correctly configured or the speed of your network card is not set properly. Check the NIC to see if it matches the speed of your hub (typically 100 megabit full duplex these days).

I would also download and run the Microsoft Anti-Spyware Beta and let that check the system also. I've seen that formerly Giant product catch some that AdAware missed.

by daragh.mcloughlin

Yeah that was a mistake with the connection speed.

Just figured out the problem there but your answer was right - changing the DNS Server has fixed it. The funny thing though is that the laptop uses the same DNS and has same settings as the one causing problems with the PC but it never had any problems.

Thanks for the reply.

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