Extreme network slowdown Due to Windows 7

2

I was able to get fairly good speeds and steady video/gaming. However, after I upgraded to Windows 7 64-bit, I am now unable to get more than 5% traffic, no matter how hard I push the system. I am on a wireless network (no hardlines available), using a D-Link WDA-2320 with manufacturer's drivers.

Video is extremely slow (cache pausing a stream takes almost 30min to get 5min from youtube) games are out of the question (autobounce for bad connection) and even firefox is slow. There is also an issue with port forwarding that I posted separately which may be related.

Nothing about the internet set up changed between before and after this problem started besides the change in OS. Does anyone have any idea what could be causing this and how to fix it?

Elliot

Posted 2009-12-18T23:31:35.573

Reputation: 353

Answers

2

Apparently Windows 7 was throttling the wireless! Windows couldn't tell what the proper speed was and took over, dumping me in dial-up land.

This CMD command lets you override windows overriding you: netsh int tcp set global autotuninglevel=disabled. I now get normal speeds.

Port forwarding issue appears to be unrelated.

Elliot

Posted 2009-12-18T23:31:35.573

Reputation: 353

this took 4 hours online with MSFT tech support – Elliot – 2009-12-19T17:51:31.253

1

Windows 7 comes with some rubbish stock drivers - especially ones for Wired or Wireless cards based on a Realtek Chip. You have not mentioned what chipset/card you have.

I recommend that you try to find out not what the manufacturer of the card is (Acer, or other etc.) but find out who makes the chip on board (Intel, Realtek or Via amongst many others) and go to their website and try to download and use the latest version as this should improve things a lot.... especially if you knew it worked on a previous operating system on the same hardware.

William Hilsum

Posted 2009-12-18T23:31:35.573

Reputation: 111 572

I am using A D-Link WDA-2320 with manufacturer's drivers (technically Vista). – Elliot – 2009-12-18T23:42:18.610

"Windows 7 comes with some rubbish stock drivers" ... care to elaborate on this? got some documentation? – None – 2009-12-18T23:43:58.233

No documentation - but I have several Realtek Wireless USB and desktop PCI cards here, when I plug them in to any Vista or 7 machine, it cannot connect to ANY AES based WPA2 network and anything else only gets around 5Mb/s, the moment you upgrade the drivers, it works and gives full speed... so, no documentation, just experience. – William Hilsum – 2009-12-18T23:49:59.250

It has an Atheros chipset. I am having trouble finding an updated driver from them (or any, for that matter). – Elliot – 2009-12-18T23:50:22.027

What Wil is describing sounds very similar to my problem. – Elliot – 2009-12-18T23:51:24.193

i know of certain Ralink WLAN adapters performing particularly poor, but that's hardware in general, not drivers, can't really complain about RT adapters in Windows 7. – None – 2009-12-18T23:54:12.113

@Elliot, try looking here - http://www.atheros.cz/ Unlike some other ones, Atheros only really make for other bigger brands and there is usually trouble in trying to find their drivers.

– William Hilsum – 2009-12-18T23:55:21.860

@Molly, well don't comment then!!! I am telling you that I get rubbish speeds out the box and after a driver update, I am able to get near 99% utilisation, so it is 100% certainly a driver issue and not hardware!... I did not say all Windows drivers are rubbish, but I am saying that some are... and some are even dangerous - the stock one for my laptop Realtek 10/100 port causes a BSOD until I updated it with the latest from Realtek website - now again, I can get 95-99% speed and no problems – William Hilsum – 2009-12-18T23:57:39.763

As far as I can determine I have atheros' most recent driver already installed. – Elliot – 2009-12-19T00:37:26.423

v8.0.0.171 is what I have on here. – Elliot – 2009-12-19T00:38:15.003

Asked: 2009-12-18T23:31:35.573

Viewed: 840 times

Active: 2009-12-19T17:51:10.240