Main Area and Open Discussion > Living Room

is someone stealing my bandwidth?

(1/8) > >>

Jammo the OrganizedFellow:
For several months now, I've had some blazing fast wifi connection.
Just the other day, it began to get extremely slow. I've called my provider, and they state that there is no maintenance going on (this was the cause last time).
My wife suggested, that because it IS wifi, maybe someone is using my bandwidth?

How would I go about checking that?
I surf on a Gateway notebook running Vista (poop i know).
I was thinking there's like a small widget or app I can run that views my network ... orrr something?!

J-Mac:
Quickest way IMO, assuming that this is your network and you therefore have access to the router software, is to go into the router settings when your connection is slow and take a look at the DHCP table. Or it might be called the routing table, depending on the brand of the router.  That will show you which computers are connected at that time - any that aren't yours, disconnect 'em!

Jim

PhilB66:
I may be wrong but even if someone "borrows" your wireless Internet access your ISP gets the traffic???

J-Mac:
I may be wrong but even if someone "borrows" your wireless Internet access your ISP gets the traffic???
-PhilB66 (January 08, 2008, 03:17 AM)
--- End quote ---

Yes.  And I think that's what the OP is concerned about, among others.  If that person does something that your ISP forbids, guess who gets the boot?  ;)

Jim

Carol Haynes:
Probably the best long term solution is to ensure your WiFi is secured against outside users (WPA2 preferably as WEP is pretty weak).

If you have WPA2 enabled change the network security key/password and see if things improve instantly. Some routers use passphrases to generate a key. Make it a long one (as long as possible) with numbers, letters and other characters - save it to a text file so you can cut and paste it later if needed.

If you have a router with flashing lights look at it when your laptop is switched off - if it is still flashing someone is using it!

If you find there is no evidence of others stealing bandwidth then get back to your ISP. IME experience most ISP tech supports are run by drones in SE Asia because the services have been farmed out to cheap labour markets. Most of the time they read a script and don't know what to do if the problem isn't listed. Even when you do get someone who knows what they are doing it takes some effort to get past the inertial response "it must be your fault".

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page