I have a 100mb/s line. I have my PC connected on a CAT 5e ethernet line, and i get around 70mb/s download, but on my fathers laptop, when he plugs in his laptop with an ethernet cable, he gets around 95mb/s download. My cable is much longer (20m), but would it really make THAT big of a difference? Is there anything I can check / do to make mine faster? Thanks
Download speeds faster on 1 computer than the other
- Thread starter centuryza
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stdragon
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- Apr 5, 2018
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Disconnect the patch cable from your PC (not the wall jack) and test with his laptop. That will tell you right there if the issue with with your computer, or the cable run.
If it's the PC, your troubleshooting starts there.
If it's the cable run, try changing out the patch cable. Alternatively, validate all four twisted pairs are terminated properly with a cable tester. Also, sometimes a really cheap switch can cause the issue too.
If it's the PC, your troubleshooting starts there.
If it's the cable run, try changing out the patch cable. Alternatively, validate all four twisted pairs are terminated properly with a cable tester. Also, sometimes a really cheap switch can cause the issue too.
- May 18, 2007
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1GBase-T is designed to operate at full speed on cat5 cables up to 328' long. Unless your cable is of horrible quality or damaged, passes close to something that generates lots of EMI or the Ethernet port in your PC/router is defective, a 20m (~64') cable should be a non-issue.
stdragon
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CAT5 is fine for 100mb/s. It's when you're linked up via gigabit (1000mb) is that it's best to use CAT5e. In fact, I don't think you can buy CAT5 anymore; I'm certain it's all CAT5e nowadays.
FYI: Under a bad termination condition, I've see NICs fallback to 100mb/s even though the switch supports gigabit.
FYI: Under a bad termination condition, I've see NICs fallback to 100mb/s even though the switch supports gigabit.
androbourne
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There are so many things to factor into this.
1. Are you both downloading from the same source? (what are you downloading)
2. Are both of you using a wired connection?
3. Is there a switch or is everything directly connect to router?
4. What type of ethernet adapters are being used in each machine?
Etc...
I highly doubt it has anything to do with the cable it's self unless its bad. It is most likely related to PC hardware, or networking\ports. It could also be related to the download source. Sometimes download links actually have multiple sources\download servers. Some download links will display this so you can choose but some don't and will try to "automatically detect" the fastest download server. That laptop could have picked a server way closer to you, then the one your PC picked, which would bog down your DL speeds etc...
Another thing to think about is Ethernet adapters\cards. Some may need more up-to-date drivers to resolve bugs found in firmware causing similar issues or one is a cheapo card with faults while the other isn't.
Also look into the internet DL speeds. Was there anything downloading or being done on the network when you picked to download the file on your PC? Something may have been using some of the bandwidth at the time of your PC download but not when the laptop downloaded the file, hence slowing DL speeds.
There are many things to put into consideration. Start testing one by one until you can narrow it down.
1. Are you both downloading from the same source? (what are you downloading)
2. Are both of you using a wired connection?
3. Is there a switch or is everything directly connect to router?
4. What type of ethernet adapters are being used in each machine?
Etc...
I highly doubt it has anything to do with the cable it's self unless its bad. It is most likely related to PC hardware, or networking\ports. It could also be related to the download source. Sometimes download links actually have multiple sources\download servers. Some download links will display this so you can choose but some don't and will try to "automatically detect" the fastest download server. That laptop could have picked a server way closer to you, then the one your PC picked, which would bog down your DL speeds etc...
Another thing to think about is Ethernet adapters\cards. Some may need more up-to-date drivers to resolve bugs found in firmware causing similar issues or one is a cheapo card with faults while the other isn't.
Also look into the internet DL speeds. Was there anything downloading or being done on the network when you picked to download the file on your PC? Something may have been using some of the bandwidth at the time of your PC download but not when the laptop downloaded the file, hence slowing DL speeds.
There are many things to put into consideration. Start testing one by one until you can narrow it down.
- May 18, 2007
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1GBase-T was designed to work over plain cat5 up to the full 328' and the reason for that is that back when 1GBase-TX was the standard, most companies didn't want to upgrade their cat5 wiring which they had relatively recently put in to support 100Base-TX with much more expensive cat6a to support 1GBase-TX, so companies came up with 1GBase-T which worked fine on good quality cat5 and 1GBase-T ultimately won.
Cat5 may have been replaced with cat5e, but that makes no difference to the fact that 1GBase-T was designed for plain cat5. Anything better only gives you more operating margin for sub-par cable condition, termination and interference.
stdragon
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Oh, I'm not saying you can't use CAT5. In fact they do as you so stated. But I've seen a major performance hit on longer runs when comparing CAT5 to CAT5e. Both will link up a 1GB, but the actual transfer rate, say might be 700-800mb/s over CAT5 where as you'll get the full gigabit over CAT5e.
In any case, centuryza will have to "divide and conquer" the issue via per-mutative troubleshooting in order to isolate the scope of the issue. Only from there can he attack the root cause.
In any case, centuryza will have to "divide and conquer" the issue via per-mutative troubleshooting in order to isolate the scope of the issue. Only from there can he attack the root cause.
I have figured it out. I went into Device Manager, chose my network adapter and went to properties, then advanced, then "Speed and Duplex" or something like that. It was set to half 100mb/s, so I set it to 1gb/s and now it's at full speed!
- May 18, 2007
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That setting usually defaults to auto and people never need to touch it. Someone must have messed with it at some point in the past.
Half-duplex is a performance killer in the neighborhood of 70% link utilization. I haven't used half-duplex since the days of 10Base-2 (coax) Ethernet, almost forgot this used to be a thing.
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