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Here in the UK, everytime you sign up to an ISP they will provide you with a router to connect at home. These are usually cheap netgear home routers (the one I'm using is a DGN-1000SP) with a basic GUI firmware. With 3 people in the flat, we usually have around 6 devices (3 PC's and 3 mobile devices) but sometimes up to 10 as more devices/guests come into play.
However, I've noticed that the network slows down massively when the number of devices get to 8 or so. Logging into my router's GUI I notice that the list of attached devices keep changing; sometimes there are as little as 3 devices connected and sometimes all 6 are shown.
Is this because the router cannot handle all the simultaneous requests (hardware fault) or because the internet connection is too slow? The connection is ADSL with 5Mbps down and 1Mbps up.
What are some ways I could fix this? Will establishing another access point with my spare router, wired to the original access point but broadcasting a different wireless channel and throwing traffic to this router help if the problem is to do with hardware?
First question - how many wired versus wireless are actually in use? For example, if you have a wired computer and a wireless phone, but are playing a game on the computer, the phone probably isn't an issue. Second - are you pulling data locally (playing a local LAN game) versus an internet based service? – Blackbeagle – 2013-10-08T01:19:31.013
@Blackbeagle we're all using wireless connections to the router and I am the one playing games (don't know what my flatmates are doing). Come to think of it, are there any programs which help me monitor usage of the connection? – Evil Washing Machine – 2013-10-08T03:19:21.023
What I'm trying to get at is to see if it is an internal bottleneck (inside the flat) or if it is external to the router. What you are doing can lead you to what is consuming the bandwidth. For example, if someone is streaming video that can cause bandwidth issues. Same thing if someone is infected, acting as a server of some sort... You need to get some idea of what everyone is doing when the slowdown hits. – Blackbeagle – 2013-10-08T11:42:48.997
@Blackbeagle are there any programs which help me monitor usage of the connection? – Evil Washing Machine – 2013-10-08T18:32:10.090