[QuickQuestion]

Hello, as the name suggests, I have a quick question. I am trying to download a program from a very large, well-kept, commercial website, but it is literally taking days. However, I have a cable internet plan capable of 4 times the current download speed. What could be possible causes and how would I solve them?

Plan speed: 1.2 mbps

Speakeasy speed test:
Download Speed: 744 kbps (93 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 249 kbps (31.1 KB/sec transfer rate)

ACTUAL download speed: 192 kbps!

Computer: Macbook Pro running OSX 10.4.11

Router: Airport Extreme

If any other info needed please let me know how to find out, that's all I know. I really appreciate your answer in advance! I'm going nuts at this thing!

[QuickQuestion]

Correction, my last speedtest 2 seconds ago now says:
Download Speed: 1344 kbps (168 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 249 kbps (31.1 KB/sec transfer rate)

That's over 6 times faster than what is downloading!!

[Elvandil]

The speed of the download has little to do with the speed on your end when it is high enough. Most commercial sites throttle download speeds to save bandwidth. Network congestion and amount of site access also affects the speed.

In other words, it sounds like things are fine on your end but slow on theirs. There is not much you can do, except, perhaps, to increase the number of connections you make to that site. This is one of the reasons I didn't switch to broadband for a long time--the speed of surfing was the same on broadband. It was only videos and downloads that eventually got me to switch.

Are you using a browser to download or something else?

[QuickQuestion]

Wow thanks for the quick reply! Good to know it might not be my end, but that just makes me even more frustrated haha.

How would I increase the number of connections? Just keep refreshing their site on my browser?

I downloaded the install file/app thing with my browser, and it's downloading the program from the site.

It's actually a highly popular game, but I'm ashamed to admit which one. At this hour, is it actually likely for their network to be so congested?

[Elvandil]

Some advice here, including increasing the number of HTTP connections. Don't go over their suggested limit. It already violates internet protocols, and if you use too many, the site may refuse a connection. So do what they say.

http://www.speedguide.net/read_articles.php?id=2448

Hard to say when congestion is going to be high. The Asians are just getting into the evening, remember. School just got out a short while ago.

You might try the TCP Analyzer and Optimizer on that site, too. Though XP and Vista change their settings dynamically and that is usually the fastest, sometimes a manual setting actually works better. I about doubled my speed with some settings changes because PPPOE is not one of the more common connection types and the optimal MTU was never set.

[QuickQuestion]

Thank you! This download has moved up 2% in the last 2 hours to a whopping 8%. Thanks for your help, and I suppose I'll just have to wait for it. Do you know if perhaps tomorrow when more people use the site if it might speed up? Or is it most likely to stay at this speed until it's done?

Thanks again for your help, and have a good day!

[Elvandil]

The settings aren't going to change anything until you reboot, so the download would need to be restarted. But the speed will probably go up and down during the day. More people using the site will slow it down.