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Improving Wifi while full time Youtuber is living with me? (alien.top)

submitted 11 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Hey everyone, first post here and a bit short but I had a question for you all;

For context, my roommate is a full time Youtuber so whenever I'm gaming or talking with friends over Discord, etc the connection is really comically bad when they're recording and uploading.

I was wondering if anyone had any advice or a solution for this, if any.

Thank you in advance

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 11 months ago (2 children)

I think you first need to see what the actual full speed (the bandwidth) you can get from your ISP is, and compare that to what is being used by you and him.

I don't know the tools that can show you that though, sadly, as I've never faced issues like that.

If it's simply that your using all the bandwidth your ISP is giving you, then there really isn't a whole lot you can do. Enabling QOS, as another user said, can help to balance the bandwidth, but that will just mean that you and him will (still) have crappy service.

However, if it turns out your household is not using all the bandwidth the ISP can provide, then you can start to pinpoint what the limitation is. Most home routes are not really that powerful, and thus can slow things down. But that usually only happens with more devices, not just someone using a lot of traffic from one or 2 devices.

Upgrading the router to a WiFi 6 or something better than what you currently have might help as well.

Better placement of the router for optimal signal could also be something to look into. This honestly would be my first step depending on your home configuration.

Another thought is going wired, if you aren't already, as I've been assuming so far that your using WiFi. Wired connections do remove a little overhead, but in most cases it's such a low hit that users don't notice. But if you are hitting the bandwidth limit of your ISP, or your router, that could be a way to try to optimize things with the hardware you have already.

If you REALLY wanted to go all out, and make sure it's not something on your internal network, you can build your own router, as in using an old computer. Opnsense is very popular in that area. I've never used something like that personally, but I'm gearing up to. Routers are just purpose built computers, that usually have low end hardware to do so many things. Building your own could mean any possible bottlenecks due to the router could be eliminated (depending on what hardware you have, and how far you want to take that). I don't know your experience level, but id only advise that if you are REALLY comfortable experimenting and have some money to burn on the project. Otherwise I'd advise to use all the other methods before this one.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago (1 children)

I don't know the tools that can show you that though, sadly, as I've never faced issues like that.

The Internet speed can be checked by going to any number of speed test websites. Using a site recommended by the ISP is often, though not necessarily, the best choice.

As to measuring the bandwidth usage of each device, there are really only 2 options:

Check if the router maintains traffic statistics per device. This is uncommon on consumer grade routers.
Check traffic statistics on each device. Windows and MacOS can show instantaneous network usage as well as aggregate packets and bytes. AFAIK, Android and iOS only provide aggregate data usage, not instantaneous. No doubt the streamer is using a computer, so this may not be an issue.

/u/MapleDrinkinCanadian, the streamer may be using a lot of upload bandwidth. Many Internet plans have less upload bandwidth than download bandwidth. You may need to upgrade to a faster Internet plan if you two are, indeed, using up all available bandwidth in either direction.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 months ago

Older versions of docsis (cable modem protocol) would choke download speeds if the upload was saturated. I doubt any ISP is still on those but...