Up to 200 Mbps download speed....I'm getting 40-45 Mbps MAX even in off peak times now...what gives?

I posted an event log above that has registered events with dates/times for them going back to AT LEAST June 15th on it. 

I started noticing a LOT of 'time outs' even before this speed drop.

When I've checked other connections in my area the list of Wifi signals alone is pretty large anymore. Though I don't know if that could affect a wired connection. I would think not but you never know.

Time Priority Description

I'm now seeing speed tests of between 28 and 33 Mbps down at 4 o clock in the morning on an 'up to 200 Mbps' line. What gives? And is anybody going to reply with a potential solution BEFORE I hit cheapo DSL 'fast' internet speeds? Because these kinda speeds are NOT worth the portion of the $155 a month bill we're paying now. 

Back up to 45-50 Mbps (but not on every test) for download speed while upload is still in the 4-6Mbps range. So there's still a loss of about 100Mbps in download speed compared to a month or two ago.  Not bad when using the connection just for streaming but downloading any patches on the PS4 (especially multi gigabyte ones) is a chore at the moment. 

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@BruceW wrote:

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If the tech finds bad coax, splitters, amplifiers, or connections in your home (even if Comcast originally supplied them) you'll probably have to pay for the visit unless you have their Service Protection Plan (https://www.xfinity.com/support/articles/service-protection-plan, closed to customers that don't already have it). If the trouble is due to a faulty Comcast rental device, or anything outside your home, you shouldn't be charged.

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That's all they'd have to do is charge us for the visit because we're beyond fed up with this company as it is already. If not for the fact they have a monopoly in this area we would've been done with this company a long, long time ago. 

The thing is their "solution" every time we had some sort of issue was to run a new line. So as of now we have no less than 3-4 lines coming in from the pole since they never removed any of the inactive lines after running new ones. I have to imagine that with that many lines eventually you'll end up with interference of some sort.

Either way I'm still waiting for a response on my own thread about the sudden loss of speed (was getting 150+Mbps, now getting 40-50Mbps on a good day).

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@Richwalk wrote:
I had the same issue last month. I found that deleting some of the devices even the ones not connected and putting a pause on other devices I m not using boosts the speed. I average around 48 to 52 that's all. I stopped trying to get answers. I also found using a repeater boosted it to round 70 but we had issues with someone trying to hack in. Hope u get handle on it.

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It's weird that it went so low for me. The only thing I could think of is that whatever the tech did a month or two ago when they coupled together a newer line coming into the house with a new section of line he ran upstairs to try solving the CL-17 errors we kept getting on the On Demand on the legacy box may have disturbed something.

Up till then only my PC (7 years old) showed the slower speeds while my other devices would show 125-150 Mbps download speed virtually every time. Pretty much every device in the house (except our cell phone from Comcast) is hard wired into the gateway (that I own). It could also be that they pushed a buggy firmware out like the one time where we kept having connection disruptions (thankfully in the middle of the night). It took them 3-6 months to finally roll back to the old firmware until the new one was bug tested and rolled out again.

I just hope it's something simple and easy because it sure isn't awesome going from 125-150 down to a THIRD of that while paying the same amount for the service.😁

OK. We're at the two week point with this thread with NO official replies from a moderator on the forums. I've tried the usual unplug the gateway, wait X amount of time and plug it back in thing. I even left it unplugged overnight the one night and it is STILL not giving me anywhere near the speed I was receiving before. 

So how about it?

Also, why was my one reply to a post from BruceW moved into THIS thread from the "Re: Sudden extremely slow internet speeds (<5MBPS)" one? There wasn't even a notification that it was moved. I just figured it got deleted.

We're nearly at the THREE week mark here and NO response yet, huh? Such high quality customer service.

@CheapestGamer 

1. These forums are staffed by volunteer and employees (like myself), and are not fully staffed by the Digital Care team (who are backlogged) - something every ISP is facing right now (I know because I've spent time in your shoes on the phone and chat with other service providers recently). It'd probably help to put pinned posts at the top of every subforum page reminding folks who didn't read the initial forum ID creation disclaimers.
2. Please follow the forum guidelines and don't repost the same post elsewhere, that's why they were removed by the volunteer team here.

Let's inventory where the issue could potentially be:

1. Your cable modem.
   1. The SBG6580 has known issues (read the Amazon reviews) of eventually degrading.
   2. Have you done a hard reset on it? A "powercycle" which usually doesn't do much. Firmware issues happen and are tricky as they require manufacturers to coordinate with multiple ISPs, the manufacturer modem forums are full of comments about revisions, e.g. Netgear is transparent on what the latest firmware is, but not communicative on what's coming out, motorola makes it hard to find, arris is cryptic.
      
   3. Have you tried purchasing another brand (e.g. Netgear or Motorola ones).
      It doesn't hurt to buy it, and return it if it doesn't make a difference.
   4. I checked your signal levels and everything is within normal ranges
      1. Tx power level is 50.5dBmV
         1. (25-54dBmV is the healthy range)
      2. Rx power is 5.3 dBmV
         1. (-8 to 10dBmV is the healthy range)
      3. Downstream/Upstream SNR is 37.5dB/36.2dB
      4. You can check your signal levels yourself via http://192.168.100.1 in the Status page
2. Your ethernet cables
   1. Highly unlinkely in your scenario given you already have CAT6 cables, but others on the forum viewing may consider using this as you did to isolate potential wifi issues.
3. Your in-home wiring / drop or aerial 
   1. They seemed to have run multiple cables in for you from the tap (they should have removed the extras but coax is shielded from interference of other cables including similar coaxes so having them there should not be an issue as long as they aren't parallel with power lines, which they probably aren't). As long as the other coax cables are disconnected at the tap they should be fine.
4. Node / Plant
   1.  I just checked your node health and it's healthy with utilization in the 30% range. 

Given everything stated, it really sounds like your modem. Given your speed tier and needs, something like the Netgear CM600 or the MB7420 would do the trick if you're looking for a modem standalone (you could buy another combo system but they are more a mixed bag and less futureproof).

"Tx power level is 50.5dBmV

1. (25-54dBmV is the healthy range)"

FWIW, I disagree with that one. That's high and doesn't factor in that it may be intermittently fluctuating even higher out of spec (a very very common issue seen around here) ! We see it every day where connectivity problems begin at 51 dB.

YMMV.

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@ComcastJonathan wrote:

@CheapestGamer 

1. These forums are staffed by volunteer and employees (like myself), and are not fully staffed by the Digital Care team (who are backlogged) - something every ISP is facing right now (I know because I've spent time in your shoes on the phone and chat with other service providers recently). It'd probably help to put pinned posts at the top of every subforum page reminding folks who didn't read the initial forum ID creation disclaimers.
2. Please follow the forum guidelines and don't repost the same post elsewhere, that's why they were removed by the volunteer team here.

Let's inventory where the issue could potentially be:

1. Your cable modem.
   1. The SBG6580 has known issues (read the Amazon reviews) of eventually degrading.
   2. Have you done a hard reset on it? A "powercycle" which usually doesn't do much. Firmware issues happen and are tricky as they require manufacturers to coordinate with multiple ISPs, the manufacturer modem forums are full of comments about revisions, e.g. Netgear is transparent on what the latest firmware is, but not communicative on what's coming out, motorola makes it hard to find, arris is cryptic.
      
   3. Have you tried purchasing another brand (e.g. Netgear or Motorola ones).
      It doesn't hurt to buy it, and return it if it doesn't make a difference.
   4. I checked your signal levels and everything is within normal ranges
      1. Tx power level is 50.5dBmV
         1. (25-54dBmV is the healthy range)
      2. Rx power is 5.3 dBmV
         1. (-8 to 10dBmV is the healthy range)
      3. Downstream/Upstream SNR is 37.5dB/36.2dB
      4. You can check your signal levels yourself via http://192.168.100.1 in the Status page
2. Your ethernet cables
   1. Highly unlinkely in your scenario given you already have CAT6 cables, but others on the forum viewing may consider using this as you did to isolate potential wifi issues.
3. Your in-home wiring / drop or aerial 
   1. They seemed to have run multiple cables in for you from the tap (they should have removed the extras but coax is shielded from interference of other cables including similar coaxes so having them there should not be an issue as long as they aren't parallel with power lines, which they probably aren't). As long as the other coax cables are disconnected at the tap they should be fine.
4. Node / Plant
   1.  I just checked your node health and it's healthy with utilization in the 30% range. 

Given everything stated, it really sounds like your modem. Given your speed tier and needs, something like the Netgear CM600 or the MB7420 would do the trick if you're looking for a modem standalone (you could buy another combo system but they are more a mixed bag and less futureproof).

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@ComcastJonathan 

First off, I do understand that there may be a backlog. I do feel bad for any employees like you who may be in a rush to work the queue to try and eliminate it. The company as a whole though....not so much. I'll leave it at that.

Second, the post that was moved to this thread from the one I made it in was in response to that thread. But I guess just like other customer service forums discretion about such posts are left up to the people moderating and it was decided it was not "on topic".

As for my gateway "degrading" it was working perfectly fine up until either the tech visit (2 or more months ago) or just thereafter. Around that same time we got new neighbors who also have Comcast/Xfinity service as the connections list when I scan for wifi AP's on my gateway is quite full now. So something they did likely caused the issue as I have changed nothing save for running the long Cat 6 line to my device upstairs. Even then though it was fine and I was getting 125-150+ Mbps until fairly recently. 

I do have a different standalone modem (from Arris) I could try on our line to see if that would resolve the issue, but the main reason I have this gateway is to avoid having to use a modem AND router like I did before when we had DSL. An all in one solution is just less work/hassle for us, especially for what we only use the connection for (web surfing, YouTube, gaming).

The last time we were having issues (disconnects) it was due to a faulty firmware that was pushed to the gateway by Comcast/Xfinity. It took 3-6 months before they opted to roll it back to the previous one to wait for a fixed version of the new firmware. I have a distinct feeling it's likely something along those lines again that's causing the issue we're having now. Either that or when the neighbors moved in and had their service hooked up it made something on our end worse.

I will try fully resetting the gateway since it's not that much of a hassle to reset a new log in and password for the gateway or set up wifi again. Though, again, I have this distinct feeling that it's not something we did that caused the issue.

Any ideas on the OTHER issue we've been having ever since getting this X1 box (interruptions in TV service for 2-5 seconds each time)?

Folks like myself at in HQ and are salaried, and forum work is not in our job description, but we care about the customer experience especially during COVID, so we hop on and answer questions on top of our 8-6 day jobs. So it's all volunteer work on our end same with our experts who are also part of our community of enthusiasts.

I checked with some techs I know, and while we'd like the US tx in the 40's, the 51 shouldn't be a red flag.

If any neighbors have loose coax connectors that could cause ingress and signal degredation. 

On the modem/router front, I'm sorry to hear the frustrations on the firmware, I'm not as close to those folks but did recently reach out to them since they work with the hardware manufacturers around issues.

All-in-one modem/router combos are convenient because there's only one device, but the routers in them typically aren't the best. What's the other Arris model that you have?

I'm not sure about the video issues, let's PM and we'll take a look. 

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@ComcastJonathan wrote:

 

I checked with some techs I know, and while we'd like the US tx in the 40's, the 51 shouldn't be a red flag. 

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"Shouldn't be" is the operative word ! Seems it still is in most areas. If you are not familiar with *extended upstream power* you should research it. The techs are probably not familiar with it. You should talk to headend / CMTS techs and DOCSIS engineers to find out more. Seems that it hasn't been implemented in most (if any) areas, otherwise we wouldn't see what we've been seeing happening. 

Reference: https://www.excentis.com/blog/docsis-extended-upstream-power

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@ComcastJonathan wrote:

Folks like myself at in HQ and are salaried, and forum work is not in our job description, but we care about the customer experience especially during COVID, so we hop on and answer questions on top of our 8-6 day jobs. So it's all volunteer work on our end same with our experts who are also part of our community of enthusiasts.

 

I checked with some techs I know, and while we'd like the US tx in the 40's, the 51 shouldn't be a red flag.

 

If any neighbors have loose coax connectors that could cause ingress and signal degredation. 

 

On the modem/router front, I'm sorry to hear the frustrations on the firmware, I'm not as close to those folks but did recently reach out to them since they work with the hardware manufacturers around issues.

 

All-in-one modem/router combos are convenient because there's only one device, but the routers in them typically aren't the best. What's the other Arris model that you have?

 

I'm not sure about the video issues, let's PM and we'll take a look. 

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@ComcastJonathan 

Again the issue with the download speed reducing by 2/3's from what it was only started fairly recently and within the past 2-3 months was when the new neighbors moved in and their service was hooked up. 

Either way it's kind of annoying to find out that a loose cable on someone ELSE's end may actually be able to affect MY service. 

Anyway the other modem (stand alone) that I have that could be hooked up to the service is a CM820A. I bought it from a third party and didn't even receive a power cable with it. However it appears to run off of a similar connector to that of a Playstation 2 fat model console with the two pronged power cord with one half being square and the other round. I have a TON of those so I used one of them to check to make sure it powers on once I bought it.

I also had the people at the local Comcast office run the information off of it to be sure it wasn't a stolen device and that I could use it on this account should I need or want to switch to it. It came back clean and not attached to any account.

I also do have another gateway that I bought from another third party for cheap. It's a Hitron CGNM-2252. Again I bought it and received no power cable/adapter with it. But finding a replacement for that would be fairly easy I imagine.

Though I have NOT asked the people at the local office if I could hook that one up to my service. That one appears to be a 24 x 8 versus mine (and the CM820A), which both appear to be 8 x 4. 

I cannot find a sale listing for that one on Amazon, though the CM820A does appear to be available from multiple sellers there.

So I do have at least several options should troubleshooting this current gateway fail to resolve the issue with my speed reducing by 2/3's. 

As for the cable service itself, it cuts out for a couple of seconds every so often. Not all the time, but sometimes it definitely can be troublesome if it's at the end of a program and during the resolution of any storylines. Yes. We finally have On Demand back and could use that to see the ending(s) thanks to being switched from the legacy box, yet I have not used it in a long time now because the setup of it is rather annoying to use compared to the bright and easy to read (on an SDtv here) menus on the legacy box.