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VSAT technology and installation >> HughesNet and Hughes HX VSATs >> HX50 Running Slow
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Message started by Montourage on May 8th, 2011 at 8:35am

Title: HX50 Running Slow
Post by Montourage on May 8th, 2011 at 8:35am
I have the HX 50 and 2MB down load and 512 Upload plan.  Currently my router is recording speeds of 133kbps as the steady download speed.  Upload speed is fine...

Anyone else have similar issues?  I'm not getting throttled back according to what Bentley Walker tells me.   As I have a 6.6GB download limit per day and apparently a 133 kbps connection is fast enough for the network I have to download 2-3 GB's per day.

Here is what I find a bit funny about this though.  Under there grades of service I am getting what my contract considers appropriate.  64kbps is considered the minimum speed for the modem.  Even though I could go with the lowest end package and get the exact same speed .

So currently I am debating lowering my plan to something "slower" because well it already is slow.  As long as I pick a plan that I don't go over the daily allowance I should be good....and actually because the penalty speeds on these lower end plans is precisely what I am getting.  I really have nothing to lose.

I did go over this issue with tech support and we ran three speed tests on the bentley walker website.  The first two were right where the network has been performing consistently...100-140 kbps.  The last was 500kbps but as soon as we close everything up...I let everyone back online I do another test noting other users usage and we are back to super slow again.

Tech support suggested banning P2P from the network might help but these tests were all run with no P2P on the network so they weren't taking up any bandwidth.  Not only that but I have a session limit on my network per user of 100 with an average connected clients in the range of 5-10.  Well within what is considered acceptable for the plan I have.  Only problem is sharing 133kbps with that many users...."Page can not be displayed"....refresh..."Check your internet connection"....all kinds of errors.

The Draytek I have blocks any session past the 100 limit and according to the manufacture the model I have supports up to 20,000 sessions.  Currently it runs at 3% CPU.  For some reason I don't think the 250 sessions I have on the network on average is the issue for this slow speed.

Really the only solution I can think of is to get another dish set up and see if it runs any faster and that is precisely what I am doing.  Should have it up and running tonight.

Title: Re: HX50 Running Slow
Post by James-BW on May 8th, 2011 at 9:38am
Good morning sir,

I have been following your case with your agent as you know and wanted to clarify a few points and see if we can put this issue to rest.

As per the GOS the minimum is 64kbps, however we always strive to achieve close to the average throughputs, in your case 900kbps. If this is consistently falling short then we have an issue to address.

Upon removal of the router and testing directly yesterday on an HTTP download from a UK based mirror your throughput was in the 800+kbps range for the duration of the test so there appears to be a discrepancy between the results and this is what we need to determine. Please note that whilst the speed tests will give a reasonable impression they do not necessarily represent the true performance as they are measuring a burst.

At the quoted speeds of approx 130kbps streaming constantly and without overheads would take well over two days, probably nearer three days with overheads taken into account so the numbers don't quite add up.

P2P and Torrents are a well documented cause of performance issues on networks and despite limiting the sessions on the router the individual client pc's will still be attempting to open sessions, resulting in lots of broken tcp or udp connections. Some of the forums users will no doubt add further comments concerning their impact. Whilst the router may have phyical connection limits far in excess of a few hundred, the satellite modem still has to process those queues over the spacelink and this is where the bottleneck is likely to occur.

Nonetheless the results seen behind the router do not reflect the service you should expect so I would like to propose two methods of troubleshooting.

- Re visit directly testing the performance (without the router connected) with your agent and myself in the loop so that we may monitor. This should determine whether the raw system performance is the cause of the slow speeds.

- If you are in agreement I would like to look at your router configuration. Although I understand the router was purchased elsewhere, we are experienced with retailing and configuring Draytek routers for use on these links and second pair of eyes on it wouldn't hurt. You will need to enable remote management on the router in order to facilitate this.

We want to ensure the system is meeting your expectations within the capabilities of the system and that your users enjoy problem free service. Please contact myself or your agent at your convenience to discuss the case further.

By all means setup the second system for comparison however I would recommend we run through some essential checks before you go to the effort of doing so.

I can be contacted: james at bentleywalker dot com (edited due to spam) Please cc your agent to ensure they are kept in the loop.

Best regards,

James - Bentley Walker.

Title: Re: HX50 Running Slow
Post by Montourage on May 8th, 2011 at 7:32pm
Thanks James for your fast reply and help the other night.  I discovered what was causing the bandwidth to stay constant and low and it was a setting in the DrayTek.  I was setting up QoS because I was having issues with certain programs connecting.  Inbound bandwidth was set to 124 instead of 1024 as I had intended.  

At the time I made the change I hadn't noticed it cause any ill effect because it was running slower than usual anyway.  Thus the programs not working and me trying to prioritize traffic.

If only our first two speed tests bypassing the router hadn't been precisely in that 124 range I wouldn't have been as confident it wasn't the router.  It was though and regardless I would still like to get another dish set up.  

I'm on W7 and the modem I pulled of the four I have collecting dust is on W6.  Is there any issue with mixing sats?  I can see one positive in that if one is having an issue at one moment the other one probably doesn't thus increasing reliability.  But I have a few on W7 too so either way.  Now do the modems themselves have to stay on a certain sat or can the firmware be reprogrammed?

Thanks again for your help solving this issue.

Tim

Title: Re: HX50 Running Slow
Post by James-BW on May 9th, 2011 at 1:57pm
In terms of load balancing there is no issue with mixing sats at all. Please contact your agent for activation should you want to install a second system on W6.

The systems can be reprogrammed however to ensure things move along quickly there is less admin work involved in activating f your modem is pre registered on a specific satellite as we will already have it configured on the NOC side.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

James - Bentley Walker

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