Slow Internet in the evenings..

[Devastator]

This will probably require someone with quite a bit of experience to answer this one as I have never seen it before but im a newb so here goes..

My internet for the past week (or maybe fortnight) has been really slow in the evenings from about 19:00 - 21:30 which is when it just cuts out completely.

The router status page and speedtests still show I am getting 8/9 meg ish connection speed which is what my ISP keep telling me and saying this is OK so its nothing to do with them.

I rang Linksys (my router is model no. AG241) and they ran me through all the settings I needed and I had everything correct and said that as it was only in the evenings it will be a problem with my ISP.

I noticed last night in my Routers Status > DSL Connection that my "Downstream Margin" was some crazy figure like 2657302 db but in the day it 0 - 10 db kind of range. Even with this my download speed was still 8 meg.

I don't know what these figures mean exactly.. I assume this is definately a problem with my ISP/line, correct?

[glc]

If that is cable Internet, this is shared bandwidth. You are experiencing oversubscription and insufficient bandwidth on your local loop during "rush hour". The only way to fix that is get DSL instead, which won't be anywhere near that fast but it will be consistent.

[Devastator]

No I am on ADSL, I get it through my phone line.

[rjfvillarosa]

Who is your ISP?
Have you done any malware/virus scans?

[glc]

8 to 9 megs over DSL is awfully fast, and DSL speeds are extremely sensitive to line quality and the distance from the switch. I can't even get 3 megs here, and I'm less than 2 miles from the switch.

Any noise margin that's less than 10db will not give you a reliable connection. You can get away with it down to 6db, depending on modem quality, but it will not be completely stable.

[Devastator]

Well its a 8 meg service on ADSL..(TalkTalk is my ISP) the actual download speed is 800-900 k/b's.

No viruses - i'm clean. I was told to change the MTU size and have done, but it's not been the evening since the change so I can't report on that yet, although it has killed my speed a bit.