DSL is slower on one PC

[ForestSpirit]

Several weeks ago, I had a long post on here about reconfiguring my P2P home
network between two WinXP Pro SP2 computers and two Win9x laptops. I no
longer have access to the original thread and do not remember the name of
the person who was helping. Sorry it took so long to get back here, but I
had some noncomputer issues to deal with in my life. Thank you to whoever it
was that assisted.

The network works fine now between all four computers, except that on my XP
desktop PC, the DSL is not working at the speed that it should be. Perhaps
someone can help me find out why. I am supposed to have up to 1536k download
and 384k upload, but I am only running at about 1/2 to 3/4 of that speed,
depending on what web site it is and what else the PC is doing. The speed
tests at Broadband Reports verified this.

It may have something to do with the onboard Realtek 8139/810x LAN driver or
Windows XP services running in the background. Spyware is definitely not an
issue. Power supply is 600 watts, and 1GB of RAM should be more than enough.
Mainboard is Abit AS8 version 1.1 with BIOS 15. Firewall is ZoneAlarm Pro.

ProtoWall was installed briefly, and that slowed my PC down even more to
dial-up speeds (because ProtoWall is not compatible with the Realtek 8139
LAN unless you use the Realtek VPN driver). I do not want to install the VPN
driver without first checking with Abit, so I uninstalled ProtoWall and my
speed came back up to 1/2 to 3/4 of what it should be. I am using the
Realtek driver that came with my mainboard. It is the most current driver
for XP. The VPN driver is an older driver.

The DSL worked faster when Windows Me was installed on this PC. It is slower
with XP for some reason. Maybe the Realtek driver that came with my
mainboard has some issues with XP and SP2. Should I uninstall that driver
and try installing the Realtek VPN driver to see if my speed picks up, or
should we go over the XP services first?

 

[Hans-Georg Michna]

The network works fine now between all four computers, except that on my XP
desktop PC, the DSL is not working at the speed that it should be. Perhaps
someone can help me find out why. I am supposed to have up to 1536k download
and 384k upload, but I am only running at about 1/2 to 3/4 of that speed,
depending on what web site it is and what else the PC is doing. The speed
tests at Broadband Reports verified this.

What RWIN setting do they show for your computer?

How about upload and download speeds? Are they both affected?

Hans-Georg

 

[Jack]

Hi
May be this can Help.
Optimizing the TCP/IP Stack - http://www.ezlan.net/Internet_Speed.html
Jack (MVP-Networking).

 

[ForestSpirit]

I do not know what RWIN is. Is RWIN something that shows on the speed test
results page or do I need to take another test for that? I can tell you that
upload/download speed are both slower than they should be. Let me know which
test(s) to do or redo at Broadband Reports. Thanks.

 

[Hans-Georg Michna]

I do not know what RWIN is. Is RWIN something that shows on the speed test
results page or do I need to take another test for that? I can tell you that
upload/download speed are both slower than they should be. Let me know which
test(s) to do or redo at Broadband Reports. Thanks.

RWIN is an abbreviation for Receive Window. The default is
rather low, I think something around 18 KB. For a broadband
connection that is too low and will limit your speed.

Check www.dslreports.com and www.speedguide.net for details and
use the DrTCP program to change the setting.

Hans-Georg