Gigabit versus 500 Gbt

[TechmanagerMal]

Router Statistics

System Up Time: 139:04:45

Port	Status	TxPkts	RxPkts	Collision Pkts	Tx b/s	Rx b/s	Up Time
WAN	WANoE	35992998	98939898	0	13488	17148	139:02:19
LAN	Up	173326418	286194650	9	825580	13650857	139:04:45
WLAN (2.4 GHz)	Up	4072602	296163	0	19727	379	139:01:35
WLAN (5 GHz)	Up	591167590	283828485	0	0	0	138:24:50

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Broadband Link	Downstream	Upstream
Connection Speed	999900 kbps	115000 kbps

Usual story, why is the Wifi measurement so slow on this package at around 200 when it was much nearer 500 Gbt on my previous package?

Any pointers gratefully received.

[JimM1]

@TechmanagerMal Are you direct on the SR203 hub 5Ghz band, no booster's or sky Q hotspot's messing with the Hub, usual 5Ghz not showing you the stat's but wan packet's may help to see! What you using to wirless wi-fi speed test! Just checked my Asus router wireless wise bit roppy at present but the Ethernet is rock solid on the FF500 feed!

[TechmanagerMal]

@JimM1 

Sorry about the error, should be 500 Mb/sec

I use Speedtest.net

[JimM1]

@TechmanagerMal No longer got the SR203 on the system Asus only attached FF500 and zero speed issues wired/wireless, you may just have to see what band you are latched onto, at the 200Mb/s you may be on the 2.4Ghz band! Are you band split with the hub?

[TechmanagerMal]

@JimM1 

Never quite got the band splitting right, guess its an age thing.

[TechmanagerMal]

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@TechmanagerMal wrote:

Router Statistics

System Up Time: 139:04:45

Port	Status	TxPkts	RxPkts	Collision Pkts	Tx b/s	Rx b/s	Up Time
WAN	WANoE	35992998	98939898	0	13488	17148	139:02:19
LAN	Up	173326418	286194650	9	825580	13650857	139:04:45
WLAN (2.4 GHz)	Up	4072602	296163	0	19727	379	139:01:35
WLAN (5 GHz)	Up	591167590	283828485	0	0	0	138:24:50

---

Broadband Link	Downstream	Upstream
Connection Speed	999900 kbps	115000 kbps

Usual story, why is the Wifi measurement so slow on this package at around 200 when it was much nearer 500 Gbt on my previous package?

Any pointers gratefully received.

---

To correct - nearer 500Mbps

OR just visitted, theres an issue but likely WiFi related.

They  will ask Sky to attend, although on FF 500 everything was ok for the duration,

any thoughts?

[Chrisee]

Hi @TechmanagerMal havent seen you posting for sometime. Sorry to hear you are having issues and you are right wifi speeds shouldn't drop if you switch from 500Mb/s to 900Mb/s . With the SR203/Hub 4 you are never going to get 900Mb/s over wifi as we have discussed in the past but it should get to around 600Mb/s in the area near the hub.

I believe the speeds shown in the connection stats are a cut and paste as a place holder not an actual value it is better to look at the figures in the Service Checker in the My Sky app or website which are actual speed tests run from Sky's end. We are beginning to see issues with contention on some full fibre lines as up to 30 share a 2.48Gb/s connection to the exchange but that should only impact customers rarely as statistically few connections use the bandwidth they buy more than occasionally.

I notice you have a few collisions on the LAN do you have Sky Q boxes as they can cause issues and slow the network quitecwhy is unclear but thecsystem was developed way before gigabit speeds were a thing.

[TechmanagerMal]

@Chrisee Hi, still doing good work I see.

Bit of a pain when an offer that seems too good to be true turns out to be exactly that.

It was offered with a promise of double the speed during a recontracting session, but no mention of average expected speeds being so low

I am stll on Sky Q boxes until I need a new TV.

Its been a long time since I did IT so had forgotten Sky could not see the router like OR can.

Replacement router coming in the next couple of days just in case, OR Engineer had no idea when he visitted yesterday.

How much will a Wifi Max hub help if its offered? I see BT offer minimum attainable speed 700Mbps as apposed to Sky at only 600 Mbps , not a good starting point.

Thanks again for your valued input.

[Chrisee · Accepted solution]

@TechmanagerMal Not 100% certain but I suspect your issues sre related to Sky Q's ageing networking system but while you have the TV boxes keep the older SR203 hub which supports the Q mesh. The newer Sky Max hub is imcompatable with Sky Q so Q minis cannot be connected to the hub's wifi instead they either have to be connected by ethernet or to a closed WiFi signal from the main Q box. You also lose the ability to use the Q box's wifi hotspots to connect your devices. Q was designed in the mid 2010s and simply is not suitable for high speed networks the product has a limited life expectancy as satellite broadcasting in the UK has around 5 years left as the satellites are unlikely to be replaced. 

The WiFi Max pods are limited to WiFi5 speeds and use a closed 5GHz signal for backhaul which is great if your home is WiFi friendly but a pain if you live in a home with solid internal walls. It works well in US homes with partition walls but less well in traditional UK homes.

The reason Sky can offer a "doubling in connection speed" so cheaply is that in practice few if any users actually ever use that speed  except while running tests. If they did there would be horrendous contention issues as Openreach's fibre system could not cope. The headline speeds can help if you download huge files and the server allows extra bandwidth which isnt a given but beyond that are pretty useless for the average customer. The fact BT/EE offer a 700Mb/s guarantee and Sky 600Mb/s is meaningless as both use Openreach's GPON network so you get whst speeds you get which depends on what the other customers on the distribution point serving your line use who will be customers of whatever ISP they want.