Napster & the cable modem

tomco2000 · Post by **tomco2000** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 11:14 am

Very new to the cable modem world and how it works so any help appreciated. My local cable provider installed a my cable modem and an ethernet card to access the net. I am using W95 & a Dell PII 233 with 32mb RAM.

I am pleased with the speed web pages load and most download speeds. The only problems I am having is with downloads from Napster. Speeds are extremely slow with songs taking hours to download. I have changed my Napster setting to cable from 56K but it didn't help.

If you have suggestions you can post them or email me @ tomco98@yahoo.com

Thanks in advance[email]null[/email]

blebs · Post by **blebs** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 11:25 am

Welcome to Speedguide!
Whenever you download from Napster, it is best to try to download from someone with the same type of connection you have. You'll only be able to download as fast as the other persons connection will allow. In short, set it up to connect to Cable only connections.
Have you done any "tweaking" to your present connection? If not, jump down to the tweaking forum and someone will help you there. It's possible to squeeze a little more speed out of your connection, in most cases, with some tweak help.
I hope this helps you out a bit.

I'm sorry, I missed the part about you already switching the program setting to cable! I would start asking in the software forum. Perhaps some of the DieHard Napster downloaders there can better help you out.

[ 02-28-2001: Message edited by: blebs99 ]

glc1 · Post by **glc1** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 11:28 am

Napster thoroughput relies on the upload of speed of the user you're downloading from.

tomco2000 · Post by **tomco2000** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 11:35 am

Thanks for the help. The thing that has me puzzled is that I do select cable to cable connections, look for a user who is not uploading/downloading anything else and even look for a favorable ping rate, but nothing helps. I have tried multiple users from different areas and that didn't help.

glc1 · Post by **glc1** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 11:39 am

Originally posted by tomco2000:
Thanks for the help. The thing that has me puzzled is that I do select cable to cable connections, look for a user who is not uploading/downloading anything else and even look for a favorable ping rate, but nothing helps. I have tried multiple users from different areas and that didn't help.

Not all broadband users have high upload caps. Thus, good pings and a connection disclosed as "Cable" or "DSL" doesn't necessarily mean great thoroughput.

blebs · Post by **blebs** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 11:47 am

What glc1 says is true, unfortunately. I have seen people set theirs up to say that they have a cable connection, when in fact, they're only a 56k connection! Something else to think about.

tomco2000 · Post by **tomco2000** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 11:51 am

O.K., I'm probably missing something, but last night for example, I tried downloading 15 different songs from different users and different connections (cable, 56k etc.)

None would download over 1k. I got off the cable modem and tried some of the same users with my 56K modem and got speeds of 28.8k (normal for my area).

Still puzzled

blebs · Post by **blebs** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 11:58 am

Originally posted by tomco2000:
O.K., I'm probably missing something, but last night for example, I tried downloading 15 different songs from different users and different connections (cable, 56k etc.)

None would download over 1k. I got off the cable modem and tried some of the same users with my 56K modem and got speeds of 28.8k (normal for my area).

Still puzzled

Now you have me puzzled too! Make it a point to ask some of the people on the software forum. If my son were home, (DieHard Napster addict) I'd sit his butt down here and have him talk to you.

boss672 · Post by **boss672** » Wed Feb 28, 2001 3:07 pm

hmm . i get good speeds of napster i was downloading 15 idff songs at 40 k each
i try to stick with the t1 and t3 and dsl ppl
i got up to 250/s a few times

andrewe77 · Post by **andrewe77** » Thu Mar 01, 2001 12:05 am

Have you installed the tweaks from this site?? Maybe your MTU and RWIN are set for dialup modem speeds and are hindering your cable modem.

tomco2000 · Post by **tomco2000** » Thu Mar 01, 2001 12:23 am

I have not installed any tweaks or patches; can someone steer me to the correct one(s).

glc1 · Post by **glc1** » Thu Mar 01, 2001 12:24 am

Originally posted by tomco2000:
I have not installed any tweaks or patches; can someone steer me to the correct one(s).

http://www.speedguide.net/Cable_modems/ ... ches.shtml

JamieLee2k · Post by **JamieLee2k** » Thu Mar 01, 2001 1:44 pm

I have downloaded loads of songs from Napster so try to stick with Cable/DSL/T1/T3 I have downloaded a song from a T1/T3 modem and I get 40-80kbs

cyberskye · Post by **cyberskye** » Thu Mar 01, 2001 3:59 pm

Many people on Napster list their connection as 14k so that others won't clog their pipe.

Do you have a firewall? I have heard from friends that Nortons Firewall greatly reduces download speeds.

I concur with a previous post on this thread -- ping time should be what you look for and if someone is firewalled, you may get no ping value at all.

Cheers,

Skye

tomco2000 · Post by **tomco2000** » Thu Mar 01, 2001 7:09 pm

First of all, thanks to the many who tried to help me with this problem. My cable provider is CommuniComm and after several days wait, I finally got an answer from them.

They stated they limit their available bandwidth for "Napster type sites", so if the bandwith is taken up you cannot download or will download extremely slow.

This pretty much bites and wasn't told to me when I signed up.

Thanks again to all!