Massive Speed Fluctuations o2 Broadband

ok so i have just signed up for o2 broadband, they hooked me up with the wireless box 2 and changed my phoneline over on thursday. i have one PC and my 360 hooked up via ethernet to it and one laptop and a wii using the wireless, first off the PC, the wii and xbox are absolutely spot-on. I never connect with a speed under 10 mb, downloads are great and i'm happy with the service.

However the laptop is a different story. If i run a speed check (Speedtest.net - The Global Broadband Speed Test) while simply browsing the web i got a very similar reading to ethernet (10mb roughly). this is great but when downloading a file i can barely break 50kbps, often between 10 and 20. Then if i run another speed test afterward the marker seldom hits 1 meg. Sinse i signed up for the 16mb service and have been told by both BT and 02 that my line should achive between 10 and 12. Something is definitely wrong.

I suppose there could be many things wrong, first off the laptop is vista so i know a little less about how things work. The o2 wireless box is my first router, sinse the laptop is brand new i never needed one before sinse my line is right behind the PC, so this is all new to me anyway (i didn't have any problems running an ad-hoc network between the PC and the laptop prior to signing up to o2). Plus the laptop is always in the same place , just downstairs from the router, and the signal strength is stated as excellent.

I have not yet contacted o2 about my problem, seeing as there is supposed to be 10 days where they can't do much to help due to the line settling down or whatever, plus their online troubleshooter is: as most troubleshooters are, very unhelpful. However why would i get a great connection through ethernet, and one which fluctuates through wireless (but not on the wii). I have been through the motions, the broadband assistant etc. which always states there is nothing wrong with my connection.

Can anyone shed some light on this? Any help would be much apreciated.

[matthew]

Well The Source Where You Are Downloading The File From Could Be Slow, And You Can Only Achive That Speed, What Time Of The Day Do You USe Your Laptop? If It Is In Peak Times, You Will See A Slower Speed, And If You Live In A Built Up Area That Could Be The Problem, Lots Of People Are Using The Internet, The Speed Is Reduced For All.

It Could Be That The Line Is Just Settleing Down Leave It A Few Days And See If There Is Any Inprovement, But You Should Be Able To Get Aleast Half Of What Your Line Can Support.

If your downloading using P2P it is more then likely your windows vista firewall restricting your speed, i was getting download speeds of between 60 and 90kbps on a 16meg connection. I turned of the firewall and any other windows defender cr*p, restarted the computer and also checked to make sure my ports were open on the routers settings page
192.168.1.254

After doing that I average 1.2 meg download speeds, no issues since. Installed avg afterwards just so I have got some security active.

If it is just normal downloading using firefox or internet explorer that your having problems with then I have no idea....

[matthew]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

If your downloading using P2P it is more then likely your windows vista firewall restricting your speed, i was getting download speeds of between 60 and 90kbps on a 16meg connection. I turned of the firewall and any other windows defender cr*p, restarted the computer and also checked to make sure my ports were open on the routers settings page
192.168.1.254

After doing that I average 1.2 meg download speeds, no issues since. Installed avg afterwards just so I have got some security active.

If it is just normal downloading using firefox or internet explorer that your having problems with then I have no idea....

I wouldnt advise myself turning of the firewall, there is no need to, all you need to do is allow the p2p program access to the web.

I would advise anybody looking for a free anti-virus program to use AVG, ive never heard anything bad from them, been using there free program for years.