I've recently switch broadband provider due to my new providers entertaining TV spots and the promise of ridiculously fast broadband speeds.
My previous provider maintained a constant download service of ~12-14Mb throughout the 6 years I was with them. The new providers advertisements promised DOUBLE this at a minimum. On top of this the provider promised to DOUBLE the speed of their whole network by April ( in my area ) for FREE.
I'm not greedy.. so I switched and as promised speed tests on joining showed download speeds in the region of 24Mb (max'd at 32Mb).
April came and went. Recently I began to notice that all Internet services especially pages with embedded video where beginning to take a very long time to load. It became intolerable mid May.
Could it be the provider's network upgrade? Download speed test produced some shocking results. I'm now achieving a maximum download speed of only 0.3Mb. What the heck! Has my router become a bonded K56flex modem?
My provider was not reporting any faults. Turns out the culprit is this wonderful invention called Wi-Fi and the default channel it seems most routers choose.
Did you know that on a Mac you can get detailed information about WiFi networks by hold down the option key (alt) and clicking the WiFi menubar item.
In the list almost all the WiFi networks are on channel 1 & 11. My router was set to auto but still quite dumbly selecting channel 11. Manually setting my channel restored my providers blistering speeds.
I can only feel sorry for all the other WiFi network's users who's routers have selected channel 11 and are thus experiencing abysmal network speeds while also hoping they never resolve their issue.