Boosting internet speed in my training room

redondo100

I'm yet to start with Zwift but doing some groundwork reveals that the only viable room that I can setup in is my outside office. This is detached from the main house and has very thick, old walls.

I'm on BT Broadband and have their top level package. With one of their repeater discs in this room, I can get a download speed averaging around 30mbps and a ping of around 120ms.

Zwift state: "If your ping time is higher than 50ms, you'll likely experience performance issues."

Does anyone have tips for the best way of increasing speed to this area? I'd rather avoid running a cable through for practical reasons so I think a powerline extender that plugs into a mains 3 pin socket might be worth a try.

Anyone have any experience with these and/or recommendations?

TIA

DeVlaeminck

My son used to use that method for his PS4 and it worked.

For zwift I did try a cheap WiFi extender (not the sort that plugs in from the WiFi hub) and that was a waste of money.

singleton

I have a 3 repeater mesh setup in my (old) house and it works great, so I've not had the need to try a power line myself, but know people who have used them with good results.

Cabled networks can be better than wifi as there is less interference - so if it were me, I'd try to plug a cable from the laptop into your current BT router and test that to see if it's any better. If it's still not good then get a power line that has both wifi and an ethernet plug.

Defblade

Powerline plugs takes my internet out to the garage for Zwifting (and around the inside of our old stone house... the wifi is not good otherwise!).
I've not done speed tests on it, but Zwift seems to run fine, and plenty of spare bandwidth for streaming Planet Rock.

thegreatdivide

Our place has old 75cm thick stone external walls and my bike room is way in the back in a sort of out building, while the master router is in the living room at the front of the house. Pre powerline installation a wifi speed test would throw out 300Mb+ front and a grizzly 20Mb or so in the back. I've now got a TP-LINK 500Mb job with a spare plug on the front and I'm streaming Zwift from an Apple TV box to a 4k TV and watching Netflix on a tablet and running the Zwift companion on my mobile via wifi and it's faultless.

First.Aspect

What effect does the ping speed have?

Mine is about 200 ms. I sometimes wonder if that's why I yo yo so badly from front to back of a group. ie no matter how I ease off when ive caught up, I blast through a group, and no matter how early I increase power as the front re catches me, I fall right through it. Exhausting.


Or is that just normal for Zwift?

redondo100

thanks for all the replies, very useful feedback.

Just to add, there *is* a BT point in the room so telecoms cable is going in there but it looks to only have the small phone connector socket. The wider socket at the bottom (where I could plugin an ADSL filter and connect that to a repeater disc) looks sealed off. Maybe that's the first thing I should investigate.

Stupid question - re: powerlinks, do you plug one into an electrical socket close to your router, then attach via an Ethernet cable? And then another into a socket near your 'deadspot' and then attach any required devices via Ethernet or wifi??


@First.Aspect I was just quoting from Zwift's website. I don't know yet how ping speed affects latency like you are experiencing but maybe worth looking into.

PMark

First.Aspect said:

What effect does the ping speed have?

Mine is about 200 ms. I sometimes wonder if that's why I yo yo so badly from front to back of a group. ie no matter how I ease off when ive caught up, I blast through a group, and no matter how early I increase power as the front re catches me, I fall right through it. Exhausting.


Or is that just normal for Zwift?

That is exactly what a high ping will do.

redondo100 said:

Stupid question - re: powerlinks, do you plug one into an electrical socket close to your router, then attach via an Ethernet cable? And then another into a socket near your 'deadspot' and then attach any required devices via Ethernet or

That’s correct, if you can it is better not to have them near any cheap mobile chargers (which often generate em interference).

First.Aspect

PMark said:

First.Aspect said:

What effect does the ping speed have?

Mine is about 200 ms. I sometimes wonder if that's why I yo yo so badly from front to back of a group. ie no matter how I ease off when ive caught up, I blast through a group, and no matter how early I increase power as the front re catches me, I fall right through it. Exhausting.


Or is that just normal for Zwift?

That is exactly what a high ping will do.

Makes every ride intervals training. Bonus.

ibr17xvii

Mesh setup will solve your problem IMHO.

I got one & it simply transformed both the speed & coverage in my house.

First.Aspect

ibr17xvii said:

Mesh setup will solve your problem IMHO.

I got one & it simply transformed both the speed & coverage in my house.

I have no idea what that means, but it probably doesn't help for a booster in a shed at the end of a 30 year old bit of garden wiring and an extension chord.

redondo100

redondo100 said:

Stupid question - re: powerlinks, do you plug one into an electrical socket close to your router, then attach via an Ethernet cable? And then another into a socket near your 'deadspot' and then attach any required devices via Ethernet or

That’s correct, if you can it is better not to have them near any cheap mobile chargers (which often generate em interference).


I have a 2020 Macbook Pro. I wonder if this would work for me, if I had a powerlink at my router then used a thunderbolt to ethernet converter directly into my Mac

ibr17xvii

First.Aspect said:

ibr17xvii said:

Mesh setup will solve your problem IMHO.

I got one & it simply transformed both the speed & coverage in my house.

I have no idea what that means, but it probably doesn't help for a booster in a shed at the end of a 30 year old bit of garden wiring and an extension chord.

Mesh setup is basically a master node that you plug into your main router & then 2 or 3 (depending on what you need) other nodes that you place around your house to cover the whole home.

Not sure it would solve your example though.

wilberforce

ibr17xvii said:

First.Aspect said:

ibr17xvii said:

Mesh setup will solve your problem IMHO.

I got one & it simply transformed both the speed & coverage in my house.

I have no idea what that means, but it probably doesn't help for a booster in a shed at the end of a 30 year old bit of garden wiring and an extension chord.

Mesh setup is basically a master node that you plug into your main router & then 2 or 3 (depending on what you need) other nodes that you place around your house to cover the whole home.

Not sure it would solve your example though.

OP already has mesh system as he has BT disc system

First.Aspect

ibr17xvii said:

First.Aspect said:

ibr17xvii said:

Mesh setup will solve your problem IMHO.

I got one & it simply transformed both the speed & coverage in my house.

I have no idea what that means, but it probably doesn't help for a booster in a shed at the end of a 30 year old bit of garden wiring and an extension chord.

Mesh setup is basically a master node that you plug into your main router & then 2 or 3 (depending on what you need) other nodes that you place around your house to cover the whole home.

Not sure it would solve your example though.

No. Still on ADSL here. Scotland's only just got running water.

They are making a right mess of the grass verges and leaving bits of plastic pipe lying around for road users to dodge, so fibre is coming.

kingstongraham

redondo100 said:

Stupid question - re: powerlinks, do you plug one into an electrical socket close to your router, then attach via an Ethernet cable? And then another into a socket near your 'deadspot' and then attach any required devices via Ethernet or wifi??

This exactly. I had some powerlink (TP-link) lying around so tried it in the shed that we've recently had power installed, and it worked fine, got a decent speed out there. No idea what ping speed it was getting, I can check at the weekend when I'm home if it might help.

redondo100

Thanks yeah, I do already have mesh in the way of BT discs.

I think I'll invest in a 2 piece power link with one to my router and one either plugged direct into my Macbook via thunderbolt/USB-C to ethernet converter, else use it as a WiFi booster in the dead spot.

navrig2

Powerline adapters here. For them to work your electrics in the outhouse must be on the same consumer unit as the master powerline plugged into the router.

itboffin

What address are you all hitting for the ping test? 120-200+ ms is hellish slow unless you’re trying to access a service in say Japan or Auz

First.Aspect

itboffin said:

What address are you all hitting for the ping test? 120-200+ ms is hellish slow unless you’re trying to access a service in say Japan or Auz

Watopia for all I know. It was measured on WiFi off a wireless extender on 4.5 mbps adsl. Surely that all contributes to it being shiit?

redondo100

Quick update for all my fans:

I plumped for the Devolo Magic 2 Wifi 6 - one wired direct to the router and one in the training room.

Some tests using Ookla
1. with existing BT mesh system (one dicsc in the room, always on Orange (sub-optimal) = avg 30mbps, ping 15-20ms

2. with Devolo device + ethernet cable + ethernet/USB-C Thunderbolt 3 to Macbook Pro 2019 = avg 25-30mpbs, ping 15-20ms

3. with Devolo device acting unconnected as a stand alone wifi repeater = avg 65-70mbps ping 8-10ms

4. same test as above with a Los Angeles based router (per Zwift's advice) = avg 50-60mbps ping circa 140ms

So 3 things of note:
- the Devolo is clearly a much better repeater in a mesh setup than the BT disc
- the intended use of ethernet direct to my device is much slower - I'm hoping this is because of using crappy old ethernet cables - I will test again tomorrow with some newer 2000mhz cables capable of fast data transfer
- I suspect whatever happens, I'll never hit Zwift's golden sub 50ms ping speed

redondo100

having just read @First.Aspect 's post above mine, it may be of note that the phone line to router goes through an ADSL filter. I don't know much about these but a cursory Google suggests there are 'fast' ones I could try

JimD666

If the server your trying to reach is in the US then don't expect a latency better than around 80ms for East Coast US areas. West Coast will be 120ms or so.

EDIT to add: https://forums.zwift.com/t/solve-connection-issues-for-european-based-users-european-based-servers/14386

redondo100

useful info @JimD666 thanks

JimD666

I didn't realise that Zwift didn't use regional servers, otherwise I'd of said something earlier. Trying to reduce latency is tricky at best. Far too many interconnecting bits that you have no control over. Plus there's the tricky thing called the speed of light

To claim you need to have a latency of less than 50ms while only having servers in one location is poor.

redondo100

It does seem odd. The daft thing is, I haven't even tried running Zwift yet (thought I'd keep that one quiet).

I'm sure it will be just fine - I don't care about occasional drop outs and lag - just don't want them to infringe on enjoying training too much.

redondo100

JimD666 said:

I didn't realise that Zwift didn't use regional servers, otherwise I'd of said something earlier. Trying to reduce latency is tricky at best. Far too many interconnecting bits that you have no control over. Plus there's the tricky thing called the speed of light

To claim you need to have a latency of less than 50ms while only having servers in one location is poor.

In fact, odd doesn't begin to cover it - it's just plain shoddy for a company worth well over $1BN. How can they fail to invest in server capacity in Europe? Admittedly, I'm not clear on market share US v Europe.

JimD666

Training shouldn't be affected. Racing may be odd if you're racing people in the US. If you're racing people in the UK/EU then they're in the same boat as you so it's still a level playing field.

Dorset_Boy

Bit late to this, but 1850's cottage, pain cave in outbuilding 20m away. Use powerline with wifi connection in pain cave. Zero issues with Zwift, and use Spotify alongside.

No idea what speeds we get though, but we are in a village, but only 250m or so to BT's green cabinet.