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Security for 3G/Wireless Broadband connection

How secure do we think broadband wireless is? Should I be willing to do online banking over a mobile connection? I assume that it's more secure than, say, WEP, but I'd love to be pointed towards any information about how easy cellular connections are to crack.

Will a standard wireless router support 12 wireless users?

I'm having a fantasy football draft in a couple of weeks, and without thinking, I said we could do an online draft if everyone brought their laptops. So, will my poor little Dlink G band router be able to keep up with the demand of 12 machines using it?

I'm assuming I will be telling the people to refrain from hitting Youtube, but assuming they are all playing nicely, does anyone know for sure if I'm fine or for sure if I'll have issues?

I've got Time Warner Cable 7.0Mbit in case that makes a difference.

Why is dial up so slow?

On a dial-up Internet connection, why is the speed is limited to 56 kbits/s compared to a broadband Internet connection which may carry 10 times as much as dial up through that same telephone line?

Is it because the dial up is limited to 56 kbits/s by the ISP? Does the ISP amplify the speed when you order broadband?

What is an "Insertion Fault"?

I'm having internet connection issue and after a long and painful phone call the engineer from my ISP (Virgin Media in the UK) has diagnosed that my Modem (Virgin SuperHub 2) is generating 2000 "Insertion Faults" (per day/minute/second? she was unclear on the rate, only the quantity) and that this is causing the loss of connectivity.

So, what is an Insertion Fault?

I realise this might be company-specific lingo, a quick Google for Insertion Fault didn't give me much (not that I know what I'm looking for).

Update
More Googling leads me to Insertion Loss which makes more sense. I'm guessing she meant an Insertion Loss of 2000db. I'm guessing a loss of 2000 is bad, so a follow up question, what would be an Ok Insertion Loss? Bonus points for expanding on the subject with usual levels etc.

How do I prevent my broadband connection from resetting my MTU?

I'm using an old PC as a Linux-based firewall, running Ubuntu and Shorewall among other things. It has 3 discrete network cards in it: one for the internal network, one that connects to a cable modem, and one for a DMZ. Every once in a while, my IP address will change. That's fine. After a lot of fooling around, ddclient will update DynDNS and OpenDNS with the new information. However, in the process, the MTU on the NIC connected to the cable modem will get renegotiated down to 576. I can easily reset this with ip link set eth0 mtu 1500, but I only realize the need to do this after I find that I can't connect to Xbox Live again. Is there any way to prevent this renegotiation with my cable modem, or is there any way to make sure that Linux won't accept anything less than 1500? Or, rather, am I stuck writing some sort of watchdog script that will reset it if it gets changed?

Win 8 / 10 - Slow internet unless using Safe Mode

I have a completely clean install of Windows 10 Pro 64bit (Installed and fully updated via Windows Update today), and when in Usermode I can see 46-47Mbit transfers (Speedtest.net, MS Iso downloads, Steam, www.thinkbroadband.com/download/ ) but when in Safemode with Networking I see 105MBit/s

(I also have a Win 8.1 machine exhibiting same, as well as a laptop, but let's focus on the desktop for now)

I have tried:

• 3 NICs (Onboard Intel, Onboard Realtek, PCIe Intel 1000)
• Windows Firewall on/off
• Windows Defender on/off
• Windows update disabled / P2P distribution off
• Windows telemetry disabled
• Telemetry hosts blocked
• Reserved Bandwidth QoS Policy set
• Duplex settings set to 1Gbs bidirectional
• Default windows-update NIC drivers / Latest NIC drivers from Intel
• Jumbo frames to Off/9k
• Large Send Offload Enabled/Disabled

None of the above has made any difference.

Safemode: 105MBit/s Normal Mode: 46-47MBit/s

Prior to the download test I checked the network utilisation to ensure it was 0. During the speed tests no processes spike the CPU other than the browser being used. I've tested downloads in Edge, IE11 and Opera 40.

Motherboard is an ASRock Extreme 6, with an Intel I218V NIC onboard. 32Gb RAM, i7 4790K with SSD drive. It is literally a virgin Windows 10 installation, with only Opera and mIRC installed, along obviously with device drivers.

Router is a Linksys WRT54g, however I'm not convinced that has anything to do with it as the Safemode speeds are fine.

I am aware others have asked this in 2014, but their threads were never resolved - I was unsure of the etiquette for reviving zombie threads on SU, forgive me if I should have simply replied to one of those :(

Update

Removing the WRT54g from the loop gives me 105MBit/sec in Usermode. This means that something in Usermode is freaking out the WRT54g which doesn't happen in Safemode. Could be dynamic MTU, framesize, etc etc... but without Wiresharking it I won't know.

The solution for now may well be to just upgrade the venerable WRT54g, though I'd love to know exactly why Safemode behaves itself...

Why does my Time Warner IP address change depending on device?

I currently have Time Warner Cable Wideband Internet service. This uses a SMC Cable Modem (Model SMCD3GN).

If I plug my MacBook directly into the cable modem via Ethernet and restart it, I get an IP address in the 72.227.xxx.xxx range.

If I plug my AirPort Extreme router into the cable modem via Ethernet and restart it, I get an IP in the 24.193.xxx.xxx range.

Why does Time Warner change the IP range depending on which device I plug in, and how does the cable modem know that a different type of device has been connected to the cable modem?

Also, I seem to get much better performance on the 72.227.xxx.xxx range than 24.193.xxx.xxx - I can only speculate that perhaps a different set of routers/switches is handling each range?

My AirPort Express 802.11n is slowing down my broadband connection

I just upgraded my broadband connection to 64mbps. When I connect my MacBook Pro laptop directly to the router, SpeedTest.net reveals my downstream speed to be around 61mbps, which seems reasonable.

But when I try the same thing over my Wi-Fi network, through my AirPort Express 802.11n router, my downstream slows down significantly to 21mbps. Now, this is still quite fast, but its not what I'm paying for.

Note that I also have an Apple Time Capsule on the same network, and it's configured to extend the network. I would hope that this would not result in a 50% reduction in speed.

What could the problem be here? My Wi-Fi connection reports that it is at full strength.

edit: By request, here is the info provided on the wifi connection:

PHY Mode: 802.11n
BSSID: 90:27:e4:5e:32:53
Channel: 2 (2.4 GHz)
Security: WPA2 Personal
RSSI: -64
Transmit Rate: 117
MCS Index: 14

Why is my ADSL download speed lower than my upload speed

I seem to be getting ~400 Kbps download speed here, and ~700 Kbps upload (yes, they're both rubbish). Does this seem wrong to anyone, and what could be causing it (apart from the 'acceptable' things like distance from exchange etc.)

Edit #1:

To Clarify, my sync speeds are: Downstream Rate : 432 Kbps Upstream Rate : 756 Kbps

I am currently plugged directly into the test socket on my BT my master socket. I have no other devices except my PC connected.

Edit #2:

Spoke to O2 last night and have ended up switching my current Linksys router for O2 wireless box (which doesn't allow ASCII WEP keys, grumble grumble). Strangely, just switching the router for the O2 boosted my download sync to ~550 Kbps. Anyway, the man on the phone adjusted my noise threshold (apparently to make it make it match a 2meg profile) and I'm now getting ~1100 Kbps. I have been advised to check the line stability over the next few days though.

I'm still being told that 1100 Kbps is acceptable for a 2 meg quoted line - apparently an actual speed of 30% the quoted speed is the official start of when a line is 'unacceptable' and warrants remedial action. Seems a bit low to me!

Edit #3:

Finally spoke to BT who performed the line noise check, but couldn't find a problem. They arranged for an engineer to visit. The Engineer has confirmed there is a problem with the line that originates outside the property, and wandered off to the exchange. 'It'll just start to work sometime over the next few days and someone will call to confirm'. Someone called that evening. Am now getting 806 Kbps upload and... 595 Kbps download! BT are simply fantastic at times. Thanks for all you suggestions and tips. All of them were right in their own way, but unfortunately I can only mark one as the accepted answer, so I feel it's probably best to mark COTW's one as I believe this should have the most significant impact in the long term. My advice for anyone following this to resolve their own issues: try everything. It all helps!

Can I use my modem's ethernet and USB simultaneously, to connect two computers?

I have a Netgear broadband modem. I use a desktop and a laptop.

I have connected the modem to the desktop by using their ethernet connectors. But I need internet on my laptop too.

There is another connector on the modem, which uses a USB cable. Can I connect the laptop and modem with a USB cable, and then simultaneously use the internet on both the desktop and laptop?

How can I share one internet connection between two laptops

I have what appears to be a cable modem plugged into the wall with only one ethernet port on it. Therefore I can only connect one computer to it. Also, the modem has no wireless capability.

I have to dialup the connection and enter a username and password on my laptop. But how can i share this internet connection between two laptops running Windows 7 Ultimate? I have spare ethernet cables. Would that help?

Upload speed needed to Skype in 720p

I want to buy an HD web camera to Skype with family and friends. My current laptop cam is terrible, but I want to make sure that before I buy a new cam my connection can handle it.

So - what is the minimal upload speed needed to broadcast in 720p?

Is there any other question that I'm not asking myself?

Shareing two internet connections on my laptop running Windows XP

I have two internet connections, one is internet via our organization's corporate LAN network, and the other one is mobile broadband via a USB modem

Is there anyway I can share internet connections and use them simultaneously? I want to use the corporate LAN network for normal browsing and connecting my email client, and I want to use the USB modem for establishing a VPN connection.

• Will I be able to maintain both the connections simultaneously?
• Can I have parallel downloads, one using our corporate network, and the other one using the mobile broadband?
• Will I be able to switch my browser between these two connections?

My laptop runs Windows XP Service Pack 2.

internet bandwidth measurement?

How the internet speed is calculated, and how does it differ from other speed measurements (like CPU speed)? For example, what does it mean if somebody says, "my internet speed is 512"?

How to limit broadband speed in my flat?

I need help with limiting broadband speed in my flat. There are 13 people living in my flat and there's only 20GB of broadband data cap to use each month. I was wondering if there is anyway to limit the speed from a user like me? 20GB is very small amount to use for 13 people and usually it lasts about 3 days the most cos people keep downloading alot of youtube video and other videos.

I am not an admin of the modem or anything, i'm just one of the user in the flat but i'm really sick of using dial up everyday. I want to limit the speed to about 10 or 15kb/s so they nobody can download any video or watch youtube video, therefore it would probably last long for a 20GB data cab.

Please guys, is there anyway at all i can limit it?

Thanks in advance guys!