I've gone from 13/3 to .5/3 wireless speeds. Help?

[Gorilla]

I'm using a netgear WNR834B v2 router with a netgear WNDA3100 v1 wireless adapter. For the last few days things have been peachy. I got the adapter to work with Windows 7 64bit and have had steady speeds with comcast of about 13 down and 3 up. However, starting last night my down speed has dropped immensely. I'm now downloading at around .5 -1 according to dslreports and speedtest.net. My up speed has stayed the same. There has been no change for any of the computers connected via ethernet to the router, nor has there been any change for the various laptops in the house. Is it possible that my refurbished wireless adapter has just simply crapped out on me? I still get good reception and have no problem connecting to the network, but the down speeds just suck. I was trying to download a game from steam earlier and got speeds of around 90 KB/s.

Any suggestions?

 

[Engine101]

Are you torrenting? Comcast could be shaping your traffic. They've done it in the past.

Also, since your on cable, your speeds are not guarenteed, as your sharing bandwith with other users on that same line with comcast. If a few of your neighbors are all downloading a lot, then that will eat into your bandwidth.

 

[Gorilla]

Have I torrented in the past, yes, but not for a while and definitely not right now, and this issue has not affected any of the other computers in the house. Or does comcast shape the traffic for individual computers?

I am well aware of the problems with cable and shared service (I plan on switching to FIOS if they ever decide to install it in my neighborhood), but again, none of the other computers that are using this network have slowed down. I just ran up to my brothers room and tried his laptop. He got about 11/3.5 speeds. I also tried the family desktop that plugs directly into the router and got speeds of about 13/3.8.

 

[Engine101]

I have no idea to what extent Comcast shapes. It could be based on the MAC of your PC, or on the MAC of your router, not sure.

Wireless connections are unpredictable. There are so many factors to consider. Did someone move a piece of furniture in the house? Did you move to a new spot in your room? did you turn on a new electronic device on the same frequency? Wireless pretty much sucks for anything other than browsing and email.