EE BrightBox2 and TP-Link powerline issues

[beckett1]

Hi

I have got EE broadband at 40Mbps and a Powerline adpator to my pc
http://uk.tp-link.com/products/details/?categoryid=1...

On a wirless connection on my laptop I get downlaods speeds of about 30Mbps (upload at about 9Mbps still) which is fine but if I use the powerline eithernet I only get about 2Mbps (upload at about 9Mbps still).

The powerline is connected at 160Mbps which I checked using the Tp-Link utility.

Also when transfering files from a wifi laptop to the powerline connected PC the speed is about 4.2MiB/s which is normal.

Does anyone know if my powerline and router are incompatable or is there a setting I need to change on the brightbox?

 

Both powerline plugs are plugged staight into the walls.

I get the sames results using a core i5 laptop as well as an older linux machine

 

I tried a download test while also transfering files from the attached USB stck on the router and I got 24Mbps
but before i started this transfer I done the test and only got 1.2Mbps??????

What really puzzles me is that I get great speed transfering files accross these 2 machines?

 

[Aergan]

Powerline adaptors are entirely dependant on the quality on your internal wiring, the length of your ring circuit it has to travel to reach/retrun from the next adaptor and what other devices you have plugged in / switched on generating noise in that ring. Microwaves, TV's, vacumn cleaners, washing machines, dishwashers, electric cookers, etc can all have an effect on performance.

 

The speed stated is the total backplane bandwidth availible to all adaptors in the group, not the connection speed (same as wireless) and it's also half-duplex. Wireless to access point to homeplug to PC is never going to be a great combination I'm afraid.

 

To rule out interference/noise/shoddy UK wiring, try connecting them within the same double socket and test your throughput again. In my current house I find I can run homeplugs between certain rooms OK but not others. Typically they tend to fall over if you have an extension to your house and want to run from there to another original room (due to the way some electricians patch into existing rings).

[remixedcat]

That xxxmbps figure is total backplane speed and not the link speed from one machine to the other. that's how much the entire system supports.

 

I got around 8-10MBytes/sec direct on the wall and 5-7 on an extension lead (netgear AV600). Are you sure about bits vs bytes? if it's bits/sec that's too low if it's BYTES/sec that's average.

[+BudMan MVC]

Where did you read that powerline are half duplex? And yes the connection between 2 powerline would be total for any devices going across that connection. This is the same in any sort of switch to switch connection.

if you have multiple pc - switch then powerline -- powerline - switch - PCs

Then yes from pc to pc if more than 1 talking to each other at a time you would be limited to the connection speed of the powerline. Just like if you had this

pcs -- switch ---- ethernet ---- switch -- pcs

If its showing 160mpbs - you should be seeing close to that. And connecting a AP to a powerline should be no different than connecting to a switch. But it only has 100mbit connection, so best you could do in 1 direction is mid 90's you would think. This would be the same on a 100mbit switch connection. So lets call it 90/8 your looking at say 11MBps max..

Can you draw up how your stuff is connected - where your router is to your isp, any switches where the AP is connected - where your PCs are wired too, etc.. When you see really low speeds its possible you have a duplex mismatch issue connecting the device either to switch or to powerline, etc.

[beckett1]

Here's my set up: http://www.gliffy.com/go/publish/image/6807803/L.png

 

 

If I transfer files from the USB stick in the router to the linux box I get around 39Mbps and at the same time i get this http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/results.html?id=1418769757651204055 pushing total transfer to 60Mbps over the powerline

 

but before starting this file transfer i only get about 1.8Mbps from the speedtest

Also tonight I was able to crash the router everytime I used the Lumia Playto app on my phone to display a video or picture on the xbox360

also thanks for the help guys as this is driving me mad

[remixedcat]

Btw in windows do you have the windows media network sharing service enabled?

 

If so, disable it, as it sends.a TON of broadcast packets out and slows your network down and also causes wlan wakelocks on android phones too and drains battery

[beckett1]

I don't have a windows machine unless i bring my work laptop home, but i will get to make sure that is disabled when I do

[beckett1]

I now get this http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/results.html?id=1418772288396608455 but start a file transfer and I get http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/results.html?id=1418772381893921655

[+BudMan MVC]

Well if you can pull 39mbps over the powerline, not sure how the powerline is a problem.. Are you doing any sort of qos on the router?

That limit is prob related to usb as the source. I would plug something into you router that you can do say iperf on real file transfer vs off a usb stick, etc.

[beckett1]

QoS is turned off in the brightbox settings, i  have reset the router to defaults.

 

i understand the speed on the USB device but what really puzzles me is the internet speed

[+BudMan MVC]

It does seem odd to be sure. Do you see any errors in the tcp convesations.. You can do a netstat -s, or just look on ifconfig for errors on the connection

budman@ubuntu:~$ ifconfig

eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:0c:29:dd:02:ba

inet addr:192.168.1.7 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0

UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1

RX packets:1250607 errors:0 dropped:70 overruns:0 frame:0

TX packets:146718 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0

collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000

RX bytes:382385973 (382.3 MB) TX bytes:77419022 (77.4 MB)

I would clear them and then try a speedtest, do you see errors while doing it?

[beckett1]

karl@jediubuntu:~$ ifconfig

eth0 Link encap:Ethernet HWaddr 00:24:54:a5:8a:ef

inet addr:192.168.1.100 Bcast:192.168.1.255 Mask:255.255.255.0

inet6 addr: fe80::224:54ff:fea5:8aef/64 Scope:Link

UP BROADCAST RUNNING MULTICAST MTU:1500 Metric:1

RX packets:549528 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0

TX packets:319187 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0

collisions:0 txqueuelen:1000

RX bytes:724130707 (724.1 MB) TX bytes:91656405 (91.6 MB)

Interrupt:19

lo Link encap:Local Loopback

inet addr:127.0.0.1 Mask:255.0.0.0

inet6 addr: ::1/128 Scope:Host

UP LOOPBACK RUNNING MTU:65536 Metric:1

RX packets:6303 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0

TX packets:6303 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0

collisions:0 txqueuelen:0

RX bytes:1237638 (1.2 MB) TX bytes:1237638 (1.2 MB)

karl@jediubuntu:~$ netstat -s

Ip:

516995 total packets received

1 with invalid addresses

0 forwarded

0 incoming packets discarded

516994 incoming packets delivered

325440 requests sent out

4 outgoing packets dropped

Icmp:

8 ICMP messages received

0 input ICMP message failed.

ICMP input histogram:

destination unreachable: 8

8 ICMP messages sent

0 ICMP messages failed

ICMP output histogram:

destination unreachable: 8

IcmpMsg:

InType3: 8

OutType3: 8

Tcp:

2810 active connections openings

5 passive connection openings

64 failed connection attempts

34 connection resets received

23 connections established

507671 segments received

339986 segments send out

105 segments retransmited

13 bad segments received.

1766 resets sent

Udp:

9526 packets received

8 packets to unknown port received.

0 packet receive errors

9364 packets sent

UdpLite:

TcpExt:

117 TCP sockets finished time wait in fast timer

2114 delayed acks sent

Quick ack mode was activated 486 times

3 packets directly queued to recvmsg prequeue.

7981490 bytes directly in process context from backlog

3408 bytes directly received in process context from prequeue

434893 packet headers predicted

5591 packets header predicted and directly queued to user

8219 acknowledgments not containing data payload received

32981 predicted acknowledgments

6 congestion windows recovered without slow start after partial ack

9 other TCP timeouts

TCPLossProbes: 92

TCPLossProbeRecovery: 81

522 DSACKs sent for old packets

5 DSACKs sent for out of order packets

85 DSACKs received

143 connections reset due to unexpected data

4 connections reset due to early user close

7 connections aborted due to timeout

TCPDSACKIgnoredNoUndo: 53

TCPSpuriousRTOs: 1

TCPSackShiftFallback: 1

TCPRcvCoalesce: 134284

TCPOFOQueue: 11543

TCPOFOMerge: 5

TCPChallengeACK: 13

TCPSYNChallenge: 13

TCPAutoCorking: 7433

TCPSynRetrans: 6

TCPOrigDataSent: 68466

IpExt:

InMcastPkts: 87

OutMcastPkts: 78

InBcastPkts: 247

OutBcastPkts: 125

InOctets: 715825864

OutOctets: 88434672

InMcastOctets: 8386

OutMcastOctets: 7076

InBcastOctets: 29149

OutBcastOctets: 14386

InNoECTPkts: 555149

karl@jediubuntu:~$

[+BudMan MVC]

did you reset these before the test? I see quite a few things that point to network problems

143 connections reset due to unexpected data

7 connections aborted due to timeout

64 failed connection attempts

105 segments retransmited

1766 resets sent

While if the box has been up for a while, prob nothing to get worried about - but if just reset and just trying speed test your seeing such numbers something is wrong. I would reset them, bounce of the box will do it. And then do your speed test, do you see errors like that?

[beckett1]

Sorry I have been away for a few days but wanted to give a quick update.

 

I think it might be a problem with the router because if I try and connect to the sky box using the sky + app on the ipad the router resets it self and the same thing happens when I use the playto app on my lumia 830 to play a video on the xbox 360.

 

Just waiting on EE now