Cable Modem- Macs Slow, PC Fast
- Thread starter zaxcom
- Start date
After reading all the postings on all the different sites (and there are ALOT) about the Macs being slow and PC fast, I have noticed that there are differences and similarities.
1. I noticed that it is NOT a modem manufaturer specific issue.
2. I noticed it is NOT provider specific, but it seems to be regional within the provider.
3. There have been reports of success with certain modems from RCA and Motorola, and some others.
The reason I looked all over for this research was the fact the my brother had contacted me with this same issue. He is on a Comcast connection in SE Pennsylvania and was running a Linksys "All-in One" WCG200 modem/wireless router. He did all the tests (Mac vs. PC) and tried all the fixes suggested to no avail. Referring back to my observations earlier, I found that there was only 1 common factor with all the modems that "fixed" the speed issue. That is All the modem that works had TurboDox in them. I had him go out an buy a Motorola SB5120 modem (TurboDox enable) modem and have it provisioned by Comcast. His speed went from and average speed of 1Mbps to 12Mbps directly connected to it.
So my logical conclusion would be that the Cable Providers are doing something with TurboDox and for some reason the Macs don't play nice if a TurboDox modem is not in line. I live in Central Delaware and I have a Motorola 4100 series (I believe) and a Netgear FWG114P router and get 8Mbps. At a site in Northern Delaware (on a different system) My PowerBook speedtests at 1.5Mbps while the PCs get 8-12Mbps. This is where the Regional observation comes into play as this site was also Comcast.
So, If your are have the slow speed issues, It may be worth trying a TurboDox capable modem. Either buy one or try to get the Cable Company to replace yours with a newer model that has TurboDox.
Good Luck to anyone that has the speed issues and I hope that my experiences help someone (even if it helps one person reading this, It was worth all the effort).
1. I noticed that it is NOT a modem manufaturer specific issue.
2. I noticed it is NOT provider specific, but it seems to be regional within the provider.
3. There have been reports of success with certain modems from RCA and Motorola, and some others.
The reason I looked all over for this research was the fact the my brother had contacted me with this same issue. He is on a Comcast connection in SE Pennsylvania and was running a Linksys "All-in One" WCG200 modem/wireless router. He did all the tests (Mac vs. PC) and tried all the fixes suggested to no avail. Referring back to my observations earlier, I found that there was only 1 common factor with all the modems that "fixed" the speed issue. That is All the modem that works had TurboDox in them. I had him go out an buy a Motorola SB5120 modem (TurboDox enable) modem and have it provisioned by Comcast. His speed went from and average speed of 1Mbps to 12Mbps directly connected to it.
So my logical conclusion would be that the Cable Providers are doing something with TurboDox and for some reason the Macs don't play nice if a TurboDox modem is not in line. I live in Central Delaware and I have a Motorola 4100 series (I believe) and a Netgear FWG114P router and get 8Mbps. At a site in Northern Delaware (on a different system) My PowerBook speedtests at 1.5Mbps while the PCs get 8-12Mbps. This is where the Regional observation comes into play as this site was also Comcast.
So, If your are have the slow speed issues, It may be worth trying a TurboDox capable modem. Either buy one or try to get the Cable Company to replace yours with a newer model that has TurboDox.
Good Luck to anyone that has the speed issues and I hope that my experiences help someone (even if it helps one person reading this, It was worth all the effort).
Just a FYI for anybody that might have been reading this thread. I kept doing
more reading and I read about the dlink dcm-202 cable modem, you can buy it at best buy. It's got turbodox on it. I upgraded the firmware on the modem (requirement for comcast users) then I plugged it in, called comcast. I had them register the mac of the modem, it took them 15 minutes to get the modem registered and connected, got on the internet. Gees what a difference this modem makes. I went from a average download speed of 256kb/sec to 850kb/sec on my imac. My pc and mac peaked at 1.2mb/sec when downloading files. I haven't run a speed test yet on dslreports but I will soon.
more reading and I read about the dlink dcm-202 cable modem, you can buy it at best buy. It's got turbodox on it. I upgraded the firmware on the modem (requirement for comcast users) then I plugged it in, called comcast. I had them register the mac of the modem, it took them 15 minutes to get the modem registered and connected, got on the internet. Gees what a difference this modem makes. I went from a average download speed of 256kb/sec to 850kb/sec on my imac. My pc and mac peaked at 1.2mb/sec when downloading files. I haven't run a speed test yet on dslreports but I will soon.
![]Michael[](/data/avatars/m/78/78599.jpg?1155186096){kind=avatar}
]Michael[
Registered
Same here.
Download Speed: 12419 kbps (1552.4 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 356 kbps (44.5 KB/sec transfer rate)
I'm going to be very afraid to run the next update for fear it will revert to the 50-150 KB/s I was getting for the last 5 months.
Go get one and hang on to your old one till you're happy.
With the volume they purchase modems at one month's subscription probably pays for the thing. They don't really care.
I am on Shaw Cable in Western Canada, therefore it fixes other systems too. I wish Apple would have made it clearer in the release... like say something such as a fix for performance issues on some DOCSIS modems.
I have a Motorola DOCSIS modem and Shaw Extreme (10Mbps/1Mbps)
Well its almost a full fix, but not really. I went down to Time Warner and picked up a brand new modem. Its an Ambit, much smaller than my 4 year old Ambit. This new Ambit uses the same Broadcom chip set as the Motorola. Brought it home and ran several speed tests on several sites.
With my old Ambit I can max out at my cap which is 5mb. Testmy.net and the local RR test all hit me at 4.99mb.
I put the new modem on next. In the past the best I could do with this modem before the Apple fix was 3mb. Now with the fix it maxed out at 4.5mb. While this is a huge improvement over the old speed, it still falls short of my old modem. I ran the tests many times to make sure it was not a momentary thing.
I put the old modem back on and was right back at full speed. So I am going to stick with the old modem.
While Apple has solved most of the problem Motorola and Broadcom have both admitted on other sites (and in an internal memo to Time Warner I had privy to) that there is a bug in the design of the chip that only affects Apple computers. Motorola says they are working on a fix. Motorola did suggest turning off Delayed ACKS as one fix, but that did not fully solve the issue either.
With my old Ambit I can max out at my cap which is 5mb. Testmy.net and the local RR test all hit me at 4.99mb.
I put the new modem on next. In the past the best I could do with this modem before the Apple fix was 3mb. Now with the fix it maxed out at 4.5mb. While this is a huge improvement over the old speed, it still falls short of my old modem. I ran the tests many times to make sure it was not a momentary thing.
I put the old modem back on and was right back at full speed. So I am going to stick with the old modem.
While Apple has solved most of the problem Motorola and Broadcom have both admitted on other sites (and in an internal memo to Time Warner I had privy to) that there is a bug in the design of the chip that only affects Apple computers. Motorola says they are working on a fix. Motorola did suggest turning off Delayed ACKS as one fix, but that did not fully solve the issue either.
I'm having a similar problem...Slow web page loading, however, I get fine speed tests.
The issue is just a terribly long delay on OS X before the page begins to apprear in the browser, and then when it finally begins, it seems to come in bursts, and takes forever to finish the whole page.
I have the Motorola SB4100 running on Charter cable. My XP machine works fine. All upload/download tests are fine on both XP and OS X. It's just the slow web page loading (long delay before start). I even downloaded the latest FireFox, to test it, but no help.
I'm running OS X 10.4.8 (the ltest update did not fix my problem, as reported by others with the slow upload/download spped problem).
This is a strecth, but it worked: I loaded WinGate Server on the XP machine, and assigned the HTTP proxy on the Mac to point to the XP/Wingate Server, and boom! web surfing is now fine. But, I do not want to keep my home network set up that way.
A Linksys router sits between the machines and the cable modem. The performance is the same on OS X even if I remove the router and go direct to the modem.
It sure seems like that stupid Motorola modem. Some say 10.4.8 fixed the problem of upload/download overall speed, but I don't know about this slow web browser surfing problem. It hasn't fixed it for me. The XP box is always fast, but the Intel iMac is usually slow.
Some people named this DOCSIS thing in the Motorola SB 4100 as the culprit and say that a D-Link DCM-202 modem will fix the problem, but it seems to be DOCSIS also, so I do not know if I should buy one just to find out. Plus, how can I know is that modem will work on Charter cable. Is there a chance it will not?
Any advice will be greatly appreciated.
The issue is just a terribly long delay on OS X before the page begins to apprear in the browser, and then when it finally begins, it seems to come in bursts, and takes forever to finish the whole page.
I have the Motorola SB4100 running on Charter cable. My XP machine works fine. All upload/download tests are fine on both XP and OS X. It's just the slow web page loading (long delay before start). I even downloaded the latest FireFox, to test it, but no help.
I'm running OS X 10.4.8 (the ltest update did not fix my problem, as reported by others with the slow upload/download spped problem).
This is a strecth, but it worked: I loaded WinGate Server on the XP machine, and assigned the HTTP proxy on the Mac to point to the XP/Wingate Server, and boom! web surfing is now fine. But, I do not want to keep my home network set up that way.
A Linksys router sits between the machines and the cable modem. The performance is the same on OS X even if I remove the router and go direct to the modem.
It sure seems like that stupid Motorola modem. Some say 10.4.8 fixed the problem of upload/download overall speed, but I don't know about this slow web browser surfing problem. It hasn't fixed it for me. The XP box is always fast, but the Intel iMac is usually slow.
Some people named this DOCSIS thing in the Motorola SB 4100 as the culprit and say that a D-Link DCM-202 modem will fix the problem, but it seems to be DOCSIS also, so I do not know if I should buy one just to find out. Plus, how can I know is that modem will work on Charter cable. Is there a chance it will not?
Any advice will be greatly appreciated.
One thing that can be considered is the placement of a router, even a wireless router, between the computers and the cable modem. Since all immediate communication would be between the computer and the router, the actual cable modem should not enter into the issue (other than the router-cable communication issue, which has not semed to be much of an issue for me to date).
I have used cable modems in the past, and the use of the router not only permitted multiple computers to seamlessly share the internet connection, it significantly reduced the connectivitiy issues. These days I am using DSL from a Canadian phone service supplier, but the wireless router still isolates the computers from the specifics of the DSL account, and I am running at full speed (subject to network traffic).
I have used cable modems in the past, and the use of the router not only permitted multiple computers to seamlessly share the internet connection, it significantly reduced the connectivitiy issues. These days I am using DSL from a Canadian phone service supplier, but the wireless router still isolates the computers from the specifics of the DSL account, and I am running at full speed (subject to network traffic).