Changing Modem/Router

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I have just installed a the Billion 8800NL modem/router on Windows 7. It works fine.

My question is, how do I now get the new download speed with this upgrade. My previous Netgear modem/router gave me 108Mbps. The Billion indicates in the settings my connection speed is now Downstream (Kbps) 17102. But my speed has not changed and stays exactly what it was with the old modem/router.

Do I need to ask BT to alter the profile for me to get this upgraded speed. It has adjusted to the old router to its maximum.

Any advice would be very much appreciated.
cornfield

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The speed has stayed the same how? measured?

Through your wifi connection? Using what protocol? G, superG (which would have been 108Mbps), N or AC. Single or multiple antenna transmitter AND receiver?

Through your Ethernet port? Is it a Gigabit port?

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The speed has stayed the same how? measured?

Through your wifi connection? Using what protocol? G, superG (which would have been 108Mbps), N or AC. Single or multiple antenna transmitter AND receiver?

Through your Ethernet port? Is it a Gigabit port?

Inside the router settings it says the speed is Downstream (Kbps) 17102.

If I download through a wired ADSL connection the speed is exactly the same as with the prvious router, at its maximum speed. This is with downloading a large file, like the Ubuntu ISO file.

My question is, will it take BT time to adjust to my new possible speed? Or do I need to contact BT and ask them to reset my profile?

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To check your real-world speed, go to http://www.speedtest.net and run a speed test there. To compare that with the previous speed, reconnect your old router and run the test again.

It won’t take any time for BT to adjust to your new possible speed. But you probably need to call and request a faster speed.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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To check your real-world speed, go to http://www.speedtest.net and run a speed test there. To compare that with the previous speed, reconnect your old router and run the test again.

It won’t take any time for BT to adjust to your new possible speed. But you probably need to call and request a faster speed.

Thank you. The speed test gives 14.64Mbps, which is what BT say I should be able to get. But the actual speed I get is 1.7Mbps, which is the maximum speed of my old Netgear moderm/router.

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Thank you. The speed test gives 14.64Mbps, which is what BT say I should be able to get. But the actual speed I get is 1.7Mbps, which is the maximum speed of my old Netgear moderm/router.

Just how are you measuring your “Actual Speed”? Against what download location?

You have to remember that the Net download speed has many variables, e.g. Location of download host, time of day, internet congestion, download host traffic load, etc.

HTH :cheers:

May the Forces of good computing be with you!

RG

PowerShell & VBA Rule!
Computer Specs

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Just how are you measuring your “Actual Speed”? Against what download location?

You have to remember that the Net download speed has many variables, e.g. Location of download host, time of day, internet congestion, download host traffic load, etc.

HTH :cheers:

If I download Ubuntu ISO as a torrent file Utorrent gives the speed. If I download from the web I can measure the extact speed with BitMeter OS.

I also apreciate that my speed is limited by the old router to up to 1.7Mbps, which is its maximum. Obviously my line has plenty os spare capacity, so I can always get that maximum speed in the old router.

But why is it not higher speed in the new router? Is this because BT has to reset the ISP profile for my line, which has adjusted to the old router for a long time?

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Note what the Downstream Attenuation is in the Netgear and compare that to the 8800NL

I have a 7800N (now just a spare) and that always gave mine as around the 50 mark, whereas the newer TalkTalk router (D-Link 3780) has it around the 44 – 45 mark.

The TalkTalk router gives me a better ADSL speed than the 7800N ever did – probably because of the chipset and less “resistance”.

I put this down to the Broadcom chipset in the 7800N and because of the electronics, this would equate to more resistance on a line which would reduce the sync speed.

If you have any problems with your 8800NL then you can register on the Billion forum at http://www.billion.uk.com/forum where the forum’s liaison – billion_fan will answer any queries.

You may also want to go to http://www.billion.uk.com/esupport to check for any firmware updates under the Downloads tab.

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I’m a bit confused about the numbers you are giving.

Can you do a speed test at http://www.speedtest.net then post for each router.

You can do this by clicking on Share this result then on Copy then paste it in the reply box.

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I’m a bit confused about the numbers you are giving.

Can you do a speed test at http://www.speedtest.net then post for each router.

You can do this by clicking on Share this result then on Copy then paste it in the reply box.

Well, I am puzzled too! Both routers give the same for speed tests – 14.64Mbps, somethimes slightly more, up 16.60Mbps. But an acrual download goes up to 1.7Mbps on both routers.

I have read elsewhere that when you change to a higher speed router the ISP has to adjust your profile over several days. I only changed router this afternoon, so maybe I need to wait for it to settle in with the ISP profile.

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Well, I am puzzled too! Both routers give the same for speed tests – 14.64Mbps, somethimes slightly more, up 16.60Mbps. But an acrual download goes up to 1.7Mbps on both routers.

I have read elsewhere that when you change to a higher speed router the ISP has to adjust your profile over several days. I only changed router this afternoon, so maybe I need to wait for it to settle in with the ISP profile.

Are you sure you aren’t looking at download vs upload speed? Upload will always be a lot slower than download. 1.7 Mbps upload is a realistic number if you have 14.64 Mbps download.

speedtest.net gives you a much more accurate number than any other source you have mentioned, because it tests the actual speed from your computer to whichever location you have selected for the test.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Are you sure you aren’t looking at download vs upload speed? Upload will always be a lot slower than download. 1.7 Mbps upload is a realistic number if you have 14.64 Mbps download.

speedtest.net gives you a much more accurate number than any other source you have mentioned, because it tests the actual speed from your computer to whichever location you have selected for the test.

Right, my Download this AM is the full 5Mbps I’m paying for and Upload is 2.05Mbps. Frequently the Upload will be half and maybe somewhat less.
http://pcmag.speedtest.net/?mailingID=9FB7DBC3A9F3CEBA0024EEB57A52F51B
https://www.speakeasy.net/speedtest/

Before you wonder "Am I doing things right," ask "Am I doing the right things?"

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For those asking about my speeds, see my previous post with images.

cornfield

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What do you mean by the accrual download and did you see the links I’ve posted in Post #5 ?

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Looks like the download speed is in MBytes per second and the router speed is in Mbits per second.

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I am sorry if I am not making things clear.

Here is the situation. If I do the speed test on the page you suggest, I get a reading for downloads of 14.64Mbps. This is the same for either router. That speed is also what BT say I should be able to get – between 8Mbps and 16Mbps.

I have been told that the speed test tells you the speed you can get on your line. It is not the speed you actually get unless your equipment can handle that speed. My old router could no get this high speed and the ISP profile had adjusted to my actual speed – which was 1.7Mbps.

It was because I had previously done speed tests that I decided to get a new router, so that I could take advantage of the higher speed that was possible.

The maximum speed of my old Netgear DG834GT is given as 1.7Mbps. When I do a large download, either from the web or with a bit torrent, the speed creeps up to 1.7Mbps and stays there till the download is finished. With the old router this is fine and shows it works perfectly. But exactly the same happens with the new Billion BiPAC 8800NL. I still get up to 1.7Mbps.

But the new modem router is meant to run as high 300Mbps. So why does my actual download speed stay the same with this new router?

Is it because BT have to adjust the ISP profile for the new speed? That is my actual question.

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I am sorry if I am not making things clear.

Here is the situation. If I do the speed test on the page you suggest, I get a reading for downloads of 14.64Mbps. This is the same for either router. That speed is also what BT say I should be able to get – between 8Mbps and 16Mbps.

I have been told that the speed test tells you the speed you can get on your line. It is not the speed you actually get unless your equipment can handle that speed. My old router could no get this high speed and the ISP profile had adjusted to my actual speed – which was 1.7Mbps.

It was because I had previously done speed tests that I decided to get a new router, so that I could take advantage of the higher speed that was possible.

The maximum speed of my old Netgear DG834GT is given as 1.7Mbps. When I do a large download, either from the web or with a bit torrent, the speed creeps up to 1.7Mbps and stays there till the download is finished. With the old router this is fine and shows it works perfectly. But exactly the same happens with the new Billion BiPAC 8800NL. I still get up to 1.7Mbps.

But the new modem router is meant to run as high 300Mbps. So why does my actual download speed stay the same with this new router?

Is it because BT have to adjust the ISP profile for the new speed? That is my actual question.

I’ve seen this confusion before.

The 300Mbps is the data transfer rate from one machine to another and not your actual broadband speed.

The 8800NL has a Gigabit port which if your LAN is a GBE adapter would take advantage of that and transfer the data up to 1GB.

The training period you are talking about is usually done when you first get the line set up, although if the newer router has a different chipset which alters your Downstream Attenuation, then it may have to go through another training period which is usually just a 10 day period – but BT may take a bit longer.

Billion routers have a facility when on ADSL to tweak the SNR Margin which can result in higher sync.speeds, but BT’s Line management will override that and put you back to the profile it has set for you.

The fact that you are getting the same speeds on both routers would suggest your profile hasn’t changed.

A newer router doesn’t automatically equate to faster broadband sync speeds – it’s what’s inside them compared to a previous router which can determine that and which I’ve already explained.

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I’ve seen this confusion before.

The 300Mbps is the data transfer rate from one machine to another and not your actual broadband speed.

The 8800NL has a Gigabit port which if your LAN is a GBE adapter would take advantage of that and transfer the data up to 1GB.

The training period you are talking about is usually done when you first get the line set up, although if the newer router has a different chipset which alters your Downstream Attenuation, then it may have to go through another training period which is usually just a 10 day period – but BT may take a bit longer.

Billion routers have a facility when on ADSL to tweak the SNR Margin which can result in higher sync.speeds, but BT’s Line management will override that and put you back to the profile it has set for you.

The fact that you are getting the same speeds on both routers would suggest your profile hasn’t changed.

A newer router doesn’t automatically equate to faster broadband sync speeds – it’s what’s inside them compared to a previous router which can determine that and which I’ve already explained.

Thank you. I made a mistake quoting 300Mbps as the ADSL speed. 10/100Mbps.

From what you say, it is clear I must wait for the BT Line profile to adjust to the new modem/router. My old Negear one is 8 years old and very slow compared to newer ones, though it has been very reliable. Hopefully as it adjusts I will be able to take advantage of the mush higher speed my BT line is capabale of.

Thank you for taking trouble to expain everything to me.
cornfield

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Here is the situation. If I do the speed test on the page you suggest, I get a reading for downloads of 14.64Mbps. This is the same for either router. That speed is also what BT say I should be able to get – between 8Mbps and 16Mbps.

I have been told that the speed test tells you the speed you can get on your line. It is not the speed you actually get unless your equipment can handle that speed. My old router could no get this high speed and the ISP profile had adjusted to my actual speed – which was 1.7Mbps.

The maximum speed of my old Netgear DG834GT is given as 1.7Mbps. When I do a large download, either from the web or with a bit torrent, the speed creeps up to 1.7Mbps and stays there till the download is finished. With the old router this is fine and shows it works perfectly. But exactly the same happens with the new Billion BiPAC 8800NL. I still get up to 1.7Mbps.

But the new modem router is meant to run as high 300Mbps. So why does my actual download speed stay the same with this new router?

Is it because BT have to adjust the ISP profile for the new speed? That is my actual question.

The 300 Mbps figure you quote is the maximum speed your wireless devices can connect to the Billion IF the wireless adapter(s) in your device(s) support Wireless-N. Your old Netgear DG834GT was capable of connection speeds up to a maximum of 108 Mbps between itself and other wireless devices. If the wireless adapter(s) used by your device(s) does/do not support Wireless-N then you will not see any increase in connection speed between your Billion and your device(s). (You also have 4 ethernet ports – 3 x 10/100 Mbps and 1 x Gigabit… although LAN 4 port may be in use by your incoming connection depending on what type of broadband service you have.)

This is different to the connection speed from your ISP to your home. The 14.64 Mbps figure you quote for this is likely the maximum connection speed possible dependent on either the distance between your house and the nearest telephone exchange (if your broadband service is via phone line) or nearest ISP cabinet (if your broadband service is FTTC – Fibre To The Cabinet). This speed cannot realistically be increased by the ISP as it is dependent on distance/electrical resistance. You can usually check the maximum available speed to your home by inputting your phone number (best) or postcode into something like the BT Broadband Availability checker.

To answer your specific question, if your broadband service is via a phone line then broadband connection speed between your ISP and your home will vary at first but automatically stabilise over a few days in order to supply the best possible connection speed versus the least number of dropouts. If you’re not sure what broadband service you are using, look on the back of the Billion. Your incoming broadband connection will either be connected to the port marked DSL (i.e. phone) or the ethernet port marked LAN 4.

44210-billion8800nl
Click to enlarge

Please clarify whether the 1.7 Mbps figure you quote is for the wireless connection speed between your Billion and one (or more) of your devices. If so, please give more details of the device(s), distance from the Billion and whether there are any obstructions between the two (or fish tanks, radiators, etc.).

Hope this helps…

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The 300 Mbps figure you quote is the maximum speed your wireless devices can connect to the Billion IF the wireless adapter(s) in your device(s) support Wireless-N. Your old Netgear DG834GT was capable of connection speeds up to a maximum of 108 Mbps between itself and other wireless devices. If the wireless adapter(s) used by your device(s) does/do not support Wireless-N then you will not see any increase in connection speed between your Billion and your device(s). (You also have 4 ethernet ports – 3 x 10/100 Mbps and 1 x Gigabit… although LAN 4 port may be in use by your incoming connection depending on what type of broadband service you have.)

This is different to the connection speed from your ISP to your home. The 14.64 Mbps figure you quote for this is likely the maximum connection speed possible dependent on either the distance between your house and the nearest telephone exchange (if your broadband service is via phone line) or nearest ISP cabinet (if your broadband service is FTTC – Fibre To The Cabinet). This speed cannot realistically be increased by the ISP as it is dependent on distance/electrical resistance. You can usually check the maximum available speed to your home by inputting your phone number (best) or postcode into something like the BT Broadband Availability checker.

To answer your specific question, if your broadband service is via a phone line then broadband connection speed between your ISP and your home will vary at first but automatically stabilise over a few days in order to supply the best possible connection speed versus the least number of dropouts. If you’re not sure what broadband service you are using, look on the back of the Billion. Your incoming broadband connection will either be connected to the port marked DSL (i.e. phone) or the ethernet port marked LAN 4.

44210-billion8800nl
Click to enlarge

Please clarify whether the 1.7 Mbps figure you quote is for the wireless connection speed between your Billion and one (or more) of your devices. If so, please give more details of the device(s), distance from the Billion and whether there are any obstructions between the two (or fish tanks, radiators, etc.).

Hope this helps…

Thank you for looking into this in so much detail.

First, I am using DSL connection on the Billion modem/router, from the phone line, through the splitter from the wall-socket.

The download speed (1.7Mbps) I gave are from the wired connection to my computer. I am not worried about the wireless connection at this times as I rarely use WiFi.

Here is the result of the BT Wholesale test you suggested:
44215-speed-test-1
Here also is an image of downloading Ubuntu ISO file as a torrent download.
44216-download

Here also is an image of Ubuntu being downloaded directly from the website.
44217-web-download

The speeds are the same and consistent in either case – always, at any time. The same speeds also come out the same for other downloads, though some can be slower, never faster. The ceiling is always the same.

I expect, as you say, the speed will increase as the BT line profile adjusts over the next 10 days or so.

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First, I am using DSL connection on the Billion modem/router, from the phone line, through the splitter from the wall-socket.

The download speed (1.7Mbps) I gave are from the wired connection to my computer. I am not worried about the wireless connection at this times as I rarely use WiFi.

Thanks for clarifying. The Billion is an ADSL2+ device capable of a theoretical 21-24 Mbps connection from ISP to you… on a sunny day and if your house was next door to the local telephone exchange.

Your BT profile shows a theoretical connection speed of 15.05 Mbps, i.e. assuming all phone cabling is in top-notch condition and taking the distance from the local telephone exchange into account. The BT profile also shows that you’re actually getting a download speed of 14.59 Mbps from the local telephone exchange to your house during the test. In my opinion this is still a respectable speed for the type of service.

Your PC is connected to the Billion using an ethernet cable (not wireless) so, depending on the capability of your PC’s NIC, the quality/CAT rating of your ethernet cable and whether it’s connected to the Gigabit port on the Billion, the connection speed between the Billion and PC is either 10, 100 or 1000 Mbps.

Your torrent download shows a download speed of 1.7 MB/s (not Mbps). Plugging this into a converter equates this to 13.6 Mbps… fairly close to the 14.6 Mbps shown during the BT profile test.

44220-MB-to-Mbps
Click to enlarge

From this you can tell 2 things:
1) Your PC’s NIC is not operating at just 10 Mbps.
2) BT doesn’t appear to be throttling your P2P connection.

Looking at it the other way…the BT profile test shows a ‘best’ of 14.6 Mbps. Plugging it into the converter again shows that this equates to 1.825 MB/s.

44221-Mbps-to-MB
Click to enlarge

This is still very close to the result shown for your torrent download speed, especially as the ADSL connection speed will vary (and you may also be downloading other stuff in the background… it’s unlikely that your torrent client is the only inbound connection).

All in all, in my opinion you have nothing to worry about and you appear to be downloading very close to the maximum possible speed of your broadband service.

Hope this helps…

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Thanks for clarifying. The Billion is an ADSL2+ device capable of a theoretical 21-24 Mbps connection from ISP to you… on a sunny day and if your house was next door to the local telephone exchange.

Your BT profile shows a theoretical connection speed of 15.05 Mbps, i.e. assuming all phone cabling is in top-notch condition and taking the distance from the local telephone exchange into account. The BT profile also shows that you’re actually getting a download speed of 14.59 Mbps from the local telephone exchange to your house during the test. In my opinion this is still a respectable speed for the type of service.

Your PC is connected to the Billion using an ethernet cable (not wireless) so, depending on the capability of your PC’s NIC, the quality/CAT rating of your ethernet cable and whether it’s connected to the Gigabit port on the Billion, the connection speed between the Billion and PC is either 10, 100 or 1000 Mbps.

Your torrent download shows a download speed of 1.7 MB/s (not Mbps). Plugging this into a converter equates this to 13.6 Mbps… fairly close to the 14.6 Mbps shown during the BT profile test.

44220-MB-to-Mbps
Click to enlarge

From this you can tell 2 things:
1) Your PC’s NIC is not operating at just 10 Mbps.
2) BT doesn’t appear to be throttling your P2P connection.

Looking at it the other way…the BT profile test shows a ‘best’ of 14.6 Mbps. Plugging it into the converter again shows that this equates to 1.825 MB/s.

44221-Mbps-to-MB
Click to enlarge

This is still very close to the result shown for your torrent download speed, especially as the ADSL connection speed will vary (and you may also be downloading other stuff in the background… it’s unlikely that your torrent client is the only inbound connection).

All in all, in my opinion you have nothing to worry about and you appear to be downloading very close to the maximum possible speed of your broadband service.

Hope this helps…

Thanks for going to all that trouble – and working out the numbers! It would seem I am getting the fastest speed available on my line. So I should have stuck with my 8 year old Netgear which got the same speed. The only difference with the Billion as that the WiFi speed as much faster, so that is an advantage.

Best wishes,
cornfield

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The only difference with the Billion is that the WiFi speed is much faster, so that is an advantage.

Plus it has a much faster processor and larger internal data buffer and better support for VPN over ADSL (we used them in work for remote workers) and a 1 Gigabit ethernet port and the wifi is not only faster but covers a greater distance.

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Your download speed is dependent on several things, none of which are under your control.
1. Line speed. This is the speed the modem connects to the ISP, in your case 1702kbps downstream.
2. The speed of the site you are attempting to download from. If the site is busy it will be slower.
3. The amount of traffic on the net. Downloads very early on the morning are lkely to be faster as more people are asleep.
4. Problems on the internet / broken connections. A link may have gone down and the and traffic is being routed through several, now busier, links.

As your modem seems to be connected at the maximum line speed, I can’t see how you can further improve your download speed.

cheers, Paul

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Thank you again for your responses.

But none of your replies address my actual question, which is why does my new router run no faster than my old one.

I have looked on the BT forums and the answer is there. When you change equipment your BT line has to readjust your profile. This profile was set up when you originally sign up for your broadband. It takes about 10 days for this to find the best speed between the box, your phone line and your router, so that there are no drop-outs.

If you buy a new and faster modem/router, this profile has to be reset. Evidently this will happen automatically if the modem/router is left running continuously for up to 30 days. This will then establish a new maximum speed you will get with the new faster equipment.

Also, I found out that doing the on-line speed tests does not tell you your connection speed. It only tells you the speed you could get as measured on the BT line to your dwelling. This test does not involve your modem/router. You would get the same result if you used the slowest possible modem/router to test the speed. Your actual speed is set by the BT profile, which finds a compromise between the possible speed (the one the on-line speed test shows) and the speed that works without drop-outs on your actual equipment.

It is very strange that few people know anything about this. One buys a new faster modem/router and finds it is no better than the old one. On Amazon you can see that people find this happens and send it back for a refund. None of the literature on setting up your new modem/router mentions this profile that BT sets up for each individual line.

So the answer to my question is that I must wait for my new modem/router to settle in and the BT profile will eventually change automatically over a month or so.

I am surprised that this question has not been raised on this forum before. It is a simple question: What happens when you upgrade your modem/router to a faster one?

With thanks to all,
cornfield

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I think you have a misconception about what a router is capable of doing. Put at its simplest, if the server you are receiving your download from is only sending data to your router at 1.5Mbps, it doesn’t matter what your router is theoretically capable of, it can only receive the data at the speed the server is sending it and no amount of tweaking at your end can alter that.

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You can see what your current IP profile is by clicking here

After it does the initial speedtest, click ‘Further Diagnostics’, enter your phone number and click ‘Run Diagnostic Test’

Note that the results are in Mbits per second and uTorrent by default reports in MBytes per second (the upper case ‘B’ is important!)

Your router may be capable of 300Mbps but it can only transfer data as fast as it receives it, which in this case is your internet connection.

Partial result from my PC

44211-Capture

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Your images show different measurements that you need to get your head around.
The BT test shows Mega bits per second. This is what you would expect from an ADSL connection when you live a middling distance from the exchange.
The other tests show Mega Bytes per second. This is the speed of file downloads across the web and is influenced by the things I mentioned earlier.
You cannot directly compare the two measurements.

cheers, Paul

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Your images show different measurements that you need to get your head around.
The BT test shows Mega bits per second. This is what you would expect from an ADSL connection when you live a middling distance from the exchange.
The other tests show Mega Bytes per second. This is the speed of file downloads across the web and is influenced by the things I mentioned earlier.
You cannot directly compare the two measurements.

cheers, Paul

Yes, but you can convert them.

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Yes, but you can convert them.

Of course they can be converted if we know what the units are!

In post #11 I suggested that bits and bytes were being mixed up and you continued doing so in post #12 onwards.

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Of course they can be converted if we know what the units are!

In post #11 I suggested that bits and bytes were being mixed up and you continued doing so in post #12 onwards.

How does this help me solve the problem? I am asking for help because I am not knowlegeable of these things. I can only supply the information asked for, which I have done. I don’t mind being corrected, but please try to help, too.

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Well cornfield,

There are two things here to keep in mind.

1. With BT do you mean British Telecomm? That would explain a lot…

2. Many of the “old salts” here on the WS forum live in the US of A. I believe that “adjusting of a profile” that you mention as if it were the most natural thing in the world may be for the US crowd something of a specialty of BT. Your last post at least indicates something like that. Correct?

And then, you found the answer and we all are grateful that you told us the details in post #15. It always is a good idea to do one’s home work before asking questions and ignoring questions from people who want to help but need more background information.

Well, we all live and learn; naturally YMMV.

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Well cornfield,

There are two things here to keep in mind.

1. With BT do you mean British Telecomm? That would explain a lot…

2. Many of the “old salts” here on the WS forum live in the US of A. I believe that “adjusting of a profile” that you mention as if it were the most natural thing in the world may be for the US crowd something of a specialty of BT. Your last post at least indicates something like that. Correct?

And then, you found the answer and we all are grateful that you told us the details in post #15. It always is a good idea to do one’s home work before asking questions and ignoring questions from people who want to help but need more background information.

Well, we all live and learn; naturally YMMV.

Just a bit more on the Profile – this a Signal to Noise Ratio Margin (SNRM) setting where the higher – possibly up to 18dB but typically a max of 15 would give the slowest speed but stable connection.

TalkTalk my ISP usually start you off on a 12dB Profile then after about a week the Dynamic Line Management (DLM), which is auto, having monitored your line will drop that to a 9 which will give you a slightly better sync speed if you haven’t had any disconnects.

This will eventually be reduced to a 6dB Profile after 9 or 10 days which is considered the lowest for a stable connection.

However, a Billion router has the facility to tweak the SNRM and lowering can give you a faster speed, but that could be at the expense of stability and any tweaks to a British Telecom line will be overridden by BT’s DLM back to the profile set by BT.

I have a Billion 7800N – now just a spare, but often tweaked my 6dB down to 4.5 but eventually because of the distance I am from the exchange, I would often get disconnects so decided to just leave it at 6dB.

However, that tweak could increase my sync speed from a low 6meg to a little over 7.

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Sudo15,

That’s target noise margin you are describing, confusingly referred to as a profile as well!

IP Profiles are somewhat different. Kitz has a good description here.

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That is what TalkTalk use.

Given whatever it is set at, that will show as the Up and Down SNRM in the router.

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The OP is with BT who use the profile system.

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Your new router can only run as fast as your line is provisioned. I think someone gave you some bad information about what the SpeedTest site does. If the SpeedTest site says you are getting about 16Mbps then that is your actual speed, not your possible speed.

If you buy a new router there is nothing that requires an ISP to do anything to support faster capabilities. That is something you have to negotiate with your ISP and it may cost you more for a faster speed.

Also, as you may have discovered, you will need to pay special attention to the units that different sites or programs display. Your router said your maximum was 17102 kbps which is roughly equivalent to 17 mbps which is close to what you are seeing on the SpeedTest site. Some places display mbps (megaBITS per second) and some display mBps (megaBYTES per second). Note the case of the letter “b”. There are 8 bits per byte. Also, some places define a megabyte as 1000 kilobytes and some define it as 1024 kilobytes. This is especially true in the world of hard drive capacity.

As others have said your “actual” speed you get trying to download particular files will vary based on a number of criteria. I have a 60mbps connection speed and some sites are very slow at downloading and some are fast. That is just the way their server, your connection and the internet is at that moment.

It sounds like there was some confusion about what a new router would provide for you and that is unfortunate. A new router might help if you had multiple devices on your router and you wanted to transfer files between devices faster but when you have to get out to the internet you are still limited by your modem and your ISP. The speed you are provisioned for by your ISP is something you will have to discuss with them.

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