[iMacYouMac]

Hello,

I love my Mac but downloading on my PC is at LEAST 2x faster when downloading things such as programs and movies. On my Mac I'll start at about 100kb/s then average at around 60-70. On my PC I'll start at about 250kb/s and average around 150-200. Why is this? I installed the broadband tuner and tried the config stuff in Cocktail to no avail. Thanks.

[ghporter]

Interesting issue, but you haven't told us enough about your setup. Assuming you're talking about the iMac in your signature, what sort of broadband connection do you have? What network hardware? How is all of this configured? These details make a huge difference in what might be your problem and what to do about it.

[iMacYouMac]

It is both machines that are in my signature. I have DSL which comes into a modem, that modem goes into a wireless Linksys Router, from there it connects to a 5-Port switch in my room and then to the iMac and PC. Everything always downloads much faster on my PC, that's why I usually just stick to web browsing on the Mac.

[ghporter]

Which Linksys router? And how does the switch connect-does it have an uplink port, and is it going directly to one of the Linksys' LAN ports? It's possible that there are too many devices in between the modem and the Mac for it to automatically determine the correct MTU setting, which should be no higher than 1492 for any DSL connection, instead of the default 1500. An MTU that's just a bit too high (like 1500 when you need 1492) WILL give you really slow connections because almost every packet will be fragmented.

You can check to see whether changing it fixes things like this

You can manually set the MTU value for en0 or en1 by doing "/sbin/ifconfig en0 mtu 1492" (or en1, depending on your interface). The MTU will be reset on the next reboot. See Mac OS X 10.2: How to Set the MTU Value During Startup.

Note: If difficulties persist, try the following list of values, one value at a time, in this order, until the problem is solved: 1462, 1400. See MTU Ping Test for information on determining the optimal MTU.

You can also try Apple's Broadband Tuner, Broadband Optimizer, or [url=http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/8916]IPNet Tuner X[/url} to tweak this and several other values.

But where to start? Check your PCs' net settings first, so you know what's working with those. "Dr.TCP" is a great utility that gives you all these values and lets you adjust them, too.

You can also (and I recommend this) use DSLReports' "Tweak Tests" to see what your Mac and your PC are doing. This will tell you a whole lot about what's going on between each computer and the rest of the world. Read the recommendations the tests provide and post them here. I'm curious what comes out.

And don't feel bad. There are a huge number of Internet discussions that are all basically "why is my Mac slower online than my PC?"

[iMacYouMac]

I've tried the Broadband Tuner. I can try the other one. I'm not at home right now but I believe the router is a WRTGS54, or something like that. The last month or so I had to assign a static IP on my Mac because it was no longer receiving an address from DHCP. I know Linksys sucks majorly and will probably get a Netgear soon but my PC is connected to the same switch which is connected to the same router and modem and it always performs great and uses DHCP just fine. The Mac seems like it optimizes its NIC for CPU speed and not overall throughput.

Schematic:
DSL Line > DSL Modem > WAN Port of Linksys Router > One Port to Netgear FS108 Switch (Auto-Uplink) > Cables from that switch go to my Mac and my PC.

I'll check the MTU thing but I know I assigned that through Cocktail's preferences. I'd like to get the new Airport Extreme but it's a bit expensive. Think it'll ever go down in price?

[ghporter]

I'm the wrong person to assert "Linksys sucks majorly" to-I'm a fan of theirs. But there ARE problems with some Linksys products and some firmwares on others. The WRT54GS is a superior product to the WRT54G because it has more RAM and ROM and a faster processor. You might want to just reload the current firmware on the router-that's been a help rather frequently, particularly when DHCP issues (even specific to one computer) come up.

There are other things than MTU (which was the first thing to come to mind) that could be a problem. The RWIN could be too small, for example. Run that Tweak Test and see what it suggests-and run it on your PC to see what's different, too.

No, I don't think the new Extreme will come down in price-at least not until Apple gets ready to release its replacement. But there's no guarantee that all Macs will run fine with an Extreme, either. Try the Tweak Test and let me know what it says.