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Identifying cause of slow-slower-slowest b'band Wifi

oldbilbo
Fledgling

I've a ZTE MF286D device bracket-mounted inside a loft Velux window directly facing the local mast 1km away, giving '3 bars' of signal strength. This gave me speeds of around 35/7Mbs. It is powered through and communicates with my desktop PC 40 feet away using a pair of 'Homeplug' passthrough devices, and household 'lecky cabling.
Speeds have deteriorated markedly these past days/nights, dropping as low as ~4.3/0Mbs and varying around 7/0.3Mbs - according to Ookla/several servers dotted around.
'Tech support' trotted out the old 'lots of other users' excuse, but this is a rural area with a small potential user community. Only a few would use 3 B'band, and fewer still during the night/0230hrs. Not 'Contention', then...
Ookla's list of 'nearby me/Bath area' optimum servers seems random, with most being 60-100 miles away. Their 'optimum server' choice is always much further than nearby Blandford Forum/Bristol/Bath University.
Q: How do I choose for myself an optimum server and how does 3 choose where to feed its wifi comms into the fibreoptic/internet world?
Q: I've tried restarting via power off/on several times. Would a 'difficult' factory reset ( due to bracket-dismounting ) likely improve matters?
Q: Would addition of 'bunny ears' augmented antennae likely help?

Or is it just ropey old components in the wifi mast that 3 can't be bothered to replace?

🙄

 

1 REPLY 1
Tigger
Active

Hi @oldbilbo , If it helps, you should be able to factory reset remotely in the Device Manage of the ZTE MF286D from a web browser. The IP address is most likely 192.168.0.1 or 192.168.1.1. The login details should be on the label of the ZTE MF286D.

When I use the ookla speedtest it usualy finds the optimal server is in London, Slough etc. usualy 60 to 100 miles away from myself. It's always done that on multiple broadband providers, be it Cable, Fibre or 3G, 4G or 5G. ookla does ping-tests from your devices connection and uses the fastest ping.