Comcast XFINITY → [Speed] slow download speeds in State College, Pa on weekends

You can see my test history here: »/testh ··· 28/42d24 it's obviously nothing compared to everyone else it seems in town who are sustaining far higher downloads.

Things are still very slow! Upgraded to 16/2 a week or two ago. Things were good for a few days, now, it's worse than Adelphia ever was (downstream)! Anyone know what's going on?

Just wanted to add:

»/tweak ··· a=normal

klrskir: I did run speedtests about 6 am this morning and my speeds to NJ test were 9652/704 and to NY test were 11753/685. I am still set up for 6000/768 and have not upgraded to 16/2 speed. I just did a speed test at 730 am and the speeds are 11616/703 (NJ test), and 19163/687 (NY test).

Still having intermittent problems here. I was out all tuesday and thursday night. Now I am getting pretty low speeds. Anyone else still experiencing problems?

psincubus: I have not seen any problems this week here in my area (near State College High School) and I have good speeds this week and even downloaded 2 4.7GB iso files relatively quick on Tuesday. I just did a speed test to NJ which showed 12000/700. I am not sure if the problem I reported originally when I started this post is resolved since most of the Penn State students are still out of town and do not know if the problem will return when they come back. Are you still seeing trouble? Just curious if you called in to Comcast when you were completely out on Tuesday and Thursday and if they said anything was wrong?

Anyone having trouble again today?

Things have been pretty good for a few weeks but I'm seeing intermittent complete loss of downstream which makes playing CS:S and DoD:S very difficult.

Upstream looked congested last night but connection was at least stable, now I'm getting disconnected for 5-10 seconds at a time which makes it impossible to play and enjoy.

To rant for a moment, even though it has been good the last few weeks it still isn't as good as it was with Adelphia. Not only are they raising rates but we're not getting a commensurate increase in content on the cable side or stability/speed on the data side.

It was inevitable that we were going to get a price increase. Even with Adelphia, we were paying below average. Most of Adelphia's network was paying $42.95 a month. we were lucky. Now we are paying the same as everyone else.

As for speeds:

I think you miss my point, the problem isn't speed, it's stability. Loss of downstream for 5-10 seconds at a time.

Even though I can't get a speedtest to show me anything much over 6 Mbps I did get 16+ Mbps on a Gentoo build a few weeks ago so speed has been fine, that isn't my problem now.

As to pricing, I don't really care what "average" is or was, that's merely an excuse to raise rates which in turn raises the average which continues ad infinitum. In my personal opinion we're not getting commensurate value from the rate increases, that is to say the increase in rates does not come with a corresponding improvement in service on either the data or cable tv side. If I want broadband, however, I am stuck with Comcast. I had DSL before but Verizon won't install it again right now. I tried to get it when Comcast screwed the pooch on the Adelphia take over but no one could tell me what the problem was as to why it wasn't turned up.

Well it looks like the problems I had before are coming back. Anyone else?

STudents returned today! Any coincidence?

Guess what? State College has been plagued with issues for quite a while. These are issues that began with Adelphia and remain since the re-branding of Comcast. Why do you think Comcast could wave a magic wand and instantly clean up what Adelphia couldn't?

Actually, in some circumstances yes. They wouldn't have purchased this area if they didn't intend to make a profit on it somehow. I think in some consumer's eyes, like mine, their name means "better service" than Adelphia, and hopefully upgrades that would keep us in line with the rest of their growing services. I'd love to see HD FOX, for instance. Adelphia here had no plans on adopting it. But Comcast is apparently "ready to deploy" that and HD CBS in the upcoming months. So...yeah. I guess the magic wand would be nice.

slykens: Just returned from being away this weekend and I am seeing a slow down in the download speeds (the highest download speed I am seeing is 2M down, I was normally getting anywhere from 10M to 19M down for the past three weeks). I was not sure if Comcast had fixed the problem that I had originally posted on this post with slow download speeds but when my speeds returned in mid December (when the students were taking finals and leaving town) it was hard to complain when it was working I guess everybody that is seeing the slow download speeds again should start calling Comcast again so that they might investigate this problem.

Johkal: I disagree that the issue that I reported when this post first started was with Adelphia because it did not occur until two weeks after I was switched to Comcast. I have had this cable high speed internet service for several years and had no problem with download speeds for a solid year before I noticed the slow download speeds in mid November. I know it could be just a coincidence that the problems started two weeks after being switched to the Comcast network.

I usually lose all connection tuesday and saturday nights from about 7 pm til morning. When I wake up the next morning, everything is fine. Now when everyone else is having problems, my connection is fine. If it goes out again this week I am going to give comcast another call.

I also live near the high school and am the only person in my building with comcast (the building is bulk D&E.)

yea the problems have definately come back for me, now other people that i know in my area are having problems with the internet.

as to the notion that the problems began with Adelphia, i beg to differ. the only problem i ever had with adelphia was the time when the servers went a few years back, other than that i had 3+ years without any problems.. they all started the night the transition happened.

i also called them to tell them about the problem and they planned on sending someone out but i told them everything on my end had been replaced with the last 7 visits to my house, so dont bother. just make sure the rest of you call in!

psincubus: I have not noticed any connection lost in the last three weeks and was running fine until tonight (I was out of town on Saturday Jan 13 and came back Sunday Jan 14 afternoon) and now am noticing the slow download speeds and even noticing web pages not loading as quickly (usually seemed the page would load on clicking and now seems to between 4 to 10 seconds after clicking). Your disconnects sound like a tough problem to isolate since it is intermittent. Has Comcast been any help on the disconnects when you have called in if you called in?

In past Adelphia trouble threads for State College, you have been lucky with little problem, but others in your area have not. Don't you recall?

Johkal: I still disagree with you about this was an ongoing issue with Adelphia in State College. I reviewed other older posts that I have replied to in the last year and the issues with them were the complete disconnects, trouble with staying connected to IM's, and losing sync and not exactly the same as having slow download speeds on a weekend. Now I could have missed some posts that specifically mentioned slow download speeds on weekends. Again I say I know it can be just a coincidence that I started noticing this problem two weeks after I was switched to Comcast network.

Well speed tests are showing good download speeds of 8M this morning (maybe the students are still asleep) but not as good as the 10M to 19M I was seeing for the prior three weeks.

When I contacted comcast (about a month ago), the first thing they told me was to get a new modem, so I did. Then when I called again to say that didn't work they sent out a tech. When he came out, he said the cabling in my building was bad. So then he replaced the cable from the node in the basement to my apartment. But I am still having problems. From these boards, it seemed to me that every place comcast took over adelphia, there are problems. So I am sitting tight and hopefully it will be fine when they resolve it.

I wouldn't mind slow speeds if it was only for a while, but losing total connection is a pain. When it happens again, I am going to give them another call.

"From these boards, it seemed to me that every place comcast took over adelphia, there are problems."

Are you sure?

psincubus: Did you own the modem that you replaced and have to buy a new one? What model was the cable modem that was replaced and what did you replace it with? Are you familiar with how to check the cable modem signal levels? Usually you can check cable modems by going to »192.168.100.1 and see if your levels are borderline even when working and you can see what is acceptable levels at this FAQ »(FAQ #7124 no longer exists) . So when the technician was out and replaced the cabling in the building, did he say that your signal levels improved or not, or did he just say he replaced the cable so that he could prove he tried something to fix your problem?

I had good download speeds over the weekend but I am again seeing slow download speeds in State College, Pa at 6 PM on Tuesday evening. The best download speed I can get at this time is 2 M. Over the weekend I was seeing download speeds of 10 M. Just wondering if others in the State College area that were having slow speeds are seeing them again?

I lease the modem, so I just had to switch it up at the depot. When I am running fine, my signal levels are at 30 dB. However, when it isn't working, it mysteriously drops off to 26 dB. Replacing the cable didn't cure the problem, even though the technician claimed that at the node, the signal was excellent. However, I think he tested that while it was at a high point and tested the signal in my apartment when it was down.

However, in the past few weeks, the internet has not gone down at all. (knock on wood). However, now my VOD doesn't work at all. But I'd rather live with that then a shifty internet connection.

i get good speeds all the time no matter what time of day. you might be on a heavy node now which you can call into comcast for tech support and ask them to see how heavy your node is maybe they can send a tech out and switch nodes.