Calling all IT nerds... I need some advice/help...

[Bronn]

Long story short... When either myself or my wife are streaming Netflix on my old PS3, it bogs down our bandwidth so bad that my Roku 3 in the living room barely works, if at all.

I've got TWC internet, 30 down/5 up, and speedtests usually end up averaging ping about 40ms, download speed at 24Mb, and upload somewhere around 6Mb.

Everything in my house runs through my older Belkin N wireless router (the Roku is run with an Ethernet cord.)

I have two laptops, an iPad, the Roku 3, the PS3, and two iPhones that connect to my network. It is a secured network.

The PS3 doesn't show up on the DHCP client list (I don't think it is supposed to, actually)

Also, another odd thing I noticed, it seems like our phones, even if they are simply just plugged in and charging and nobody is messing with them, send ACKnowledge messages to the router at random points, but sometimes multiple times within a matter of 10 seconds. I have no idea why this is happening. I've read that in order to "flush" the DNS cache for the phones we just turn them on Airplane Mode for a minute or so. I will try to do this tonight. I also need to look into flushing the PS3 if possible I suppose.

I've have done the following so far:

Changed the PS3's DNS to Google's public DNS. I also set the PS3s IP address into the router's DMZ. I put it in the DMZ hoping it would allow it to run with less regulation on the network, in case that restrictions on my secured network were causing it to work harder and consume more bandwidth.

My router has a QoS (Quality of Service) On/Off toggle, but I don't see a way to set any hierarchy or limits. I did toggle QoS "on" though.

I thought this was going to fix things last night, but as soon as the PS3 starts up Netflix, it still totally hogs my network, so much so that Roku pretty much loses connectivity completely.

Any ideas on what else I can do or what may be causing it?

The only other weird thing I have noticed is that somehow my router assigned two different IP addresses to my Roku. When I started dealing with the issues, the Roku was 192.168.2.2 and after restarting and such and working on things a bit last night, it was assigned 192.168.2.8. I thought once my router assigned an IP address, it would remember and associate the MAC address of the device it assigned it to?

Any further help or advice on what could be causing this issue or how to fix it would be greatly appreciated.
 

[The_Light_Brigade]

A similar thing has been happening to me recently and apparently, the network for the area I live in has been upgraded?  The way it was explained to me is that the network was upgraded and the modem that we received from TWC is obsolete as it cannot support the new speeds?  It doesn't really make sense to me but they're sending a new unit.  Hopefully it works out after that.  I honestly thought it was my router or something pulling bandwidth as well but on a whim I decided to call TWC and see.  I live Johnston County if that does anything for you.  Maybe something similar has happened in your area?  I'll try to remember to update this after I set up the new equipment.  

[Bronn]

A similar thing has been happening to me recently and apparently, the network for the area I live in has been upgraded?  The way it was explained to me is that the network was upgraded and the modem that we received from TWC is obsolete as it cannot support the new speeds?  It doesn't really make sense to me but they're sending a new unit.  Hopefully it works out after that.  I honestly thought it was my router or something pulling bandwidth as well but on a whim I decided to call TWC and see.  I live Johnston County if that does anything for you.  Maybe something similar has happened in your area?  I'll try to remember to update this after I set up the new equipment.  

LOL GD you might be my neighbor. I am in Joco too.

I own my own modem. It is a Motorola Surfboard 6121. After your response, Google turned up http://forums.timewarnercable.com/t5/Connectivity/Motorola-SB6121-and-TWC-100-mbps/td-p/21115

I did get a notice in the mail a few weeks ago that our speeds would be upgrading at no extra cost. I was paying for 30/5, which supposedly was going to increase to 200/20?!?!?

I wonder if that is the source of my problem? It doesn't make any sense though, unless their speed is so much now that it is causing a downstream logjam on my current modem? I hate to shell out the dough for my own new modem if this won't fix things. I might have to deal with TWC customer service... (ARRRRGGGHHH!!)

Thanks for the response... I didn't even think about that it could be starting at the modem itself, and thought I had isolated it to the router.

[The_Light_Brigade]

LOL GD you might be my neighbor. I am in Joco too.
I own my own modem. It is a Motorola Surfboard 6121. After your response, Google turned up http://forums.timewarnercable.com/t5/Connectivity/Motorola-SB6121-and-TWC-100-mbps/td-p/21115

I did get a notice in the mail a few weeks ago that our speeds would be upgrading at no extra cost. I was paying for 30/5, which supposedly was going to increase to 200/20?!?!?

I wonder if that is the source of my problem? It doesn't make any sense though, unless their speed is so much now that it is causing a downstream logjam on my current modem? I hate to shell out the dough for my own new modem if this won't fix things. I might have to deal with TWC customer service... (ARRRRGGGHHH!!)

Thanks for the response... I didn't even think about that it could be starting at the modem itself, and thought I had isolated it to the router.

Lol Small world. Hope you're not my neighbor, I hate that fuging guy. Been there my whole life.  

If you're my best friend from grade school I would freak out. 

It didn't make much sense to me either but I basically know enough about IT to get by and that's it.  My family thinks I'm an IT god and all I do is turn poo on and off again.   

[Bronn]

I think I've figured out something else that might be my issue. I think my router only operates on the 2.4GHz band, so when the PS3 (a G network device) connects, it pulls the speed down on most everything else (N network devices)

I actually called TWC and they confirmed my speed should have been boosted, and part of the problem is likely my current modem not being able to handle the speed increase. I think I am going to have to go ahead and get a new modem and a new router while I am at it.

[The_Light_Brigade]

Do you connect your PS3 through wireless? That may be one difference if you have to ability to make a wired connection.

[CLTPanther]

If your PS3 isn't wireless.. do this.. log into your router, disable the wireless network temporarily.. start streaming something on Netflix.. on a computer with a wired connection.. go to speedtest.net and run a speed test while the streaming is going on and see how much bandwidth it gets

[Bronn]

My PS3 is indeed wireless.

Last night, I did everything else I could think of to remedy the problems I am having. I even reset my router to factory settings and started a new network with it. I cut power to the cable modem for a while to let it reset and update. I went back through the PS3's network settings and adjusted them. I went to Netflix's site and set my data rate to Medium instead of auto.

But, every time I fire up Netflix on the PS3, the Roku 3 (wired connection) pretty much becomes unresponsive from a network standpoint.

I think I have narrowed down the problem to either one of two things:

1. The PS3 (via PS Network) is bullying the single band transmission of the wireless network, in effect causing problems with the wired networked Roku (which wants it to operate faster, or at the speed it registers on the network when the PS3 is off.)

2. There is a bottleneck of traffic starting with my modem due to the recently increased speed from TWC. My current modem is supposed to accept and be supported by the ISP to broadcast speeds up to 50Mbps, but I am only getting about half that on any device on a good day. The modem could be transferring that packet issue, or whatever you want to call it, onto the router.

 

I suppose there could also be some sort of issue with the Roku3 not playing nice with my router (since it is the only thing that has a wired connection?) but I am not sure, since it works fine any other time that the PS3 is off.

Anyway, today I went ahead and ordered a new modem (Motorola/Arris SB6183) that is supposed to be supported by TWC up to 300Mbps. I also ordered a new router, the TP Link Archer C7 AC1750. It is a dual band router that should allow me to allocate the PS3 to its own channel (the 2.4Ghz one) and set everything else to the 5Ghz band... or something like that. Maybe this will fix my problem AND give me a huge speed boost everywhere. Do you all think it will?

[Zaximus]

I think I've figured out something else that might be my issue. I think my router only operates on the 2.4GHz band, so when the PS3 (a G network device) connects, it pulls the speed down on most everything else (N network devices)

I actually called TWC and they confirmed my speed should have been boosted, and part of the problem is likely my current modem not being able to handle the speed increase. I think I am going to have to go ahead and get a new modem and a new router while I am at it.

I was going to post this.  Most likely your modem can't handle the speed, and it does happen.  This happened to me a few years ago, I started having some latency issues and called TWC up.  They said "oh your modem is old, and it can't handle the new speeds".   They actually sent someone out (lol) to hook up a new modem (I could have done it) that took 5 minutes and fixed it.   So I got the dude a drink and we watched the Cubs game that was on TV lol.  

Would be nice if TWC was proactive.  I also own my own modem now after this insane rental fees went up.