Forum Discussion

Rebecca1250's avatar
Rebecca1250
Joining in
2 years ago
Solved

Inconsistent speeds

Hi 

I’m not sure if what I’m looking for is akin to a mythical creature. 

We recently moved into a 3 bed bungalow. All rooms are on the ground floor. 
Virgin came in January and fitted the broadband , we have a hub 4 and were on the 125 package. However , we were struggling with coverage /speed slowing significantly.. to the extent I was losing connection via VPN to my work , kids were having buffering on their fire sticks and on their PS4/Switch, on occasion our phones were also switching to mobile data. I rang up and was recommended to increase the package to 250 which we did and we have had a pod put in.

However , we are still struggling. We’ve done the realtime Sam speed tests, I’ve checked speeds on the app etc and generally they are good at 100+ when they are good, but there are times when it’s dropping significantly to 20 ish and that’s when the games are lagging , Netflix’s or fire sticks are buffering etc. I don’t know if I’ve just got expectations that are too great but it doesn’t feel “stable” if that makes sense. I’m talking issues multiple times in a couple of hours.

I’ve done all the checks, no issues in local area, done re - boots etc etc. At the moment our old BT service is looking really attractive.

Am I wanting the impossible in constant , consistent coverage/speeds? I’ve rung customer services twice, the answer was a pod but it’s not made any difference and when they check the speeds are good - which I’m not denying - but then there are consistently periods of time that drops significantly.

Any help or words of wisdom appreciated!  

  • Create a BQM and post the live link.

    We need to determine if you have a good noise free line before spirting out generic phrases like "You need a better wifi router with 1Gb ports and put hub in modem mode".

  • legacy1's avatar
    legacy1
    Alessandro Volta

    You need a better wifi router with 1Gb ports and put hub in modem mode

  • carl_pearce's avatar
    carl_pearce
    Community elder

    Create a BQM and post the live link.

    We need to determine if you have a good noise free line before spirting out generic phrases like "You need a better wifi router with 1Gb ports and put hub in modem mode".

    • Rebecca1250's avatar
      Rebecca1250
      Joining in

      Thanks I have tried to do this but it’s not showing up anything on the monitor, I think I may need to do something to the hub settings and then I will report back

  • Adduxi's avatar
    Adduxi
    Very Insightful Person

    Again the VM tactic " upgrade your speed to fix the Wifi" .....   Never upgrade to fix a problem, you need to get the problem fixed first.  Anyway, the horse has bolted.

    Following on from carl_pearce  advice, if you get your issue sorted we can turn to the Wifi.   As you live in a bungalow, you are in the best position to fit proper PoE Wifi Access Points on the ceilings.  These are small units like smoke alarms and get powered from a PoE switch.  PoE is Power over Ethernet.  Easy to install, and you can place them where you need them with little to no disruption as all the wiring is in the roof space.  I have 3 of these and I have no Wifi issues anywhere in the property, including the garage and garden.  -   Food for thought?

    • Rebecca1250's avatar
      Rebecca1250
      Joining in

      Definitely, I am going to look into this as it’s all getting very frustrating. 

  • Hi Rebecca1250 

    Welcome to our community forums and thank you for your first post.

    Sorry to hear you have been having connectivity and speed issues since joining us in January. We can understand the frustration caused and we want to best help. I can see you recently had a WiFi pod added to your set up https://www.virginmedia.com/help/booster-and-wi-fi-pods Can you let me know if service has improved since? Do you need any further help?

    Thanks,

    • Rebecca1250's avatar
      Rebecca1250
      Joining in

      Hi, unfortunately no improvement at all. The router is definitely showing good speeds but whilst we may get good speeds on devices every now and then it is consistently dropping. 

      • Adduxi's avatar
        Adduxi
        Very Insightful Person

        I suspect the "Intelligent" Wifi setup is moving your devices between channels and this will cause dropouts in the Wifi, albeit a miniscule moment.  Unfortunately you have the Pods, so you can't disable this on the Hub, as the Pods need it to work.  Otherwise you could have manually split the Wifi bands and set the channels not to move.  Really it's best to use cable where possible, as Wifi, as handy as it is, is also a minefield to setup properly.