Something for all the network guru's here on the board:

Okay, I am down at my neighbour's unit right now (she's on business and I have to watch her dog and two cats) and I am trying to download a copy of Open Office for my Linux. It's been downloading for almost an hour now (the particular tarball I am downloading is 165 MB,) it's barely even 40% finished, and my Download window in Firefox is showing a throughput of 35.4kbps.

Just for the record, she is using Qwest ADSL (I am pretty sure it is ADSL, anyways) using a late-2006 model Qwest-issued "2Wire" modem box attached to a 2004 Dell running XP and Firefox.

Could I have been FAP'd? Or does Qwest even impose a fair use policy for DSL?





(By the way--I got a copy of the KDE version Mandriva "One" 2008 yesterday and that particular 698MB ISO file seemed to download just fine in about an hour and a half--very cool, if you haven't used it yet..... ;o)

It depends on the ISP. Qwest.net does not impose anything. As an ISP, they are decent, taking the common carrier bit seriously.

If the ISP is MSN, which is entirely possible given Qwest does a special deal on that ISP, there could be some TOS implications.

There are lots of ISP choices in the metro area, some are better than others.

Are you downloading via BT, FTP, HTTP, what?

Also, is that computer grabbing it's updates, have solid networking settings, running AV software, maybe have both windows firewall and some other damn firewall running?

That last one is a speed killer.

Also, test at dslreports. At least that way, you can know what peak speed is and work from there.

Oh, I just thought of something too. She could be on the cheap plan. Qwest has a 256 / 384 / 512Kbps plan, with either a 64 or 128 upload that's dirt cheap, and most often bundled with the MSN modem.

That's probably the more likely scenario. For a lot of e-mail, web only users, those speeds are "high speed" enough to work out nicely. Could just be the rate it's all provisioned at.

Hit the modem and ask it!

Do an ipconfig /all, note the gateway and point a browser at it. If the passwords are left at default, which is also very highly likely, you can look those up by model and check the status page, where the provisioned speeds will be listed on all but a few very dumb modems. (and those are most often the MSN ones too)

I like Ubuntu the best right now. Kubuntu is great as well, depending on how much one likes KDE.

I stepped off the Mandrake / Mandriva train about 10.0, and haven't looked back.

Well, punching in the gateway address I found out she's got a "2700HG-D gateway" running software version 4.25.19-QT01. (Found this in the "View System Details" page.)

"Broadband Link" page shown Incoming speed at 1536 kbps (!?!) and Outgoing at 800. I don't know if it's for the wired set (the XP box connected to the 2Wire) or if that has to do with the wireless part of it.

"Also, is that computer grabbing it's updates, have solid networking settings, running AV software, maybe have both windows firewall and some other damn firewall running?"

No to all of that, even the firewall. The lack of a firewall completely surprised/shocked me, considering it's DSL on an XP box!

The download came in via HTTP. (For reference, I am downloading from http://openoffice.bouncer.osuosl.org/?product=OpenOffice.org&os=linuxintelwjre&l ang=en-US&version=2.4.0 right now.)

She's on AOL. I'm thinking that could be part of the problem right there.....especially if they limit their broadband speeds the way they do their dialup baud rates. (I'm not going to nit-pick on that at this point; I'm a guest in her apartment and she let me use her DSL line while she's gone. ;o)

I'm not sure what her online plan is (whether it's the cheap rate or the full plan), but I am 100% positive it doesn't involve MSN.

Could be. Did you try DSL reports. Having identified that much, probably you can read the reviews and know the score.

As for no firewall, I do it ALL the time on XP. Truth is, you are behind a NAT. As long as there are no incoming connections, there isn't all that much to cause problems.

There are ways to slip traffic in past your average broadband NAT, but it's a matter of targeting and dynamic IP's. It's just not all that worth it.

Far easier to just get the stupid ones to download and use Trojans that communicate back with control machines.

Some connections are bridged. These are not a good idea without a firewall, and risky with one! that's putting a machine right onto the net, raw.

I wouldn't do that with most OSes, without first doing some serious sysadmin, and wouldn't do it on win32 period.

The only time I run the win32 firewall, is in shared network environments that are suspect. Free wi-fi, private LANs where machines could be infected, some corporate networks, dialup (which is also a RAW connection in most cases).

The rest of the time, it's off and I let the NAT do what it does.

Well, that's a modern DSL modem, and the download speed is probably 1.5Mbps. I doubt it's your DSL connection.

But you can login to the 2Wire (probably via http://192.168.0.1) and see what the rated download speed is supposed to be. I'll bet you a dollar it's 1.5Mbps. I suppose she could have Qwest's slow 256Mbps plan - and that would account for the slow speed.

A better guess is, you got dumped off to a mirror site in Sweden or something, and that's why it's slow. I'd confirm that you're actually downloading OO from a site near you.

Andrew