Slow nas uploads

Soldato
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Hello. I have a Synology 718+ with the 16gb ram upgrade.
When I try to upload something from my Surface tablet I get very slow speeds fluctuating between 70Kbps and 150Kbps. But when I upload from my PC I can get a stable 4.5Mbps. Help me work out what is throttling the Surface.

Both are connected to the nas by wifi, and the nas is connected to my router by ethernet.
Both have a VPN, and turning it off has no affect.
 
Soldato
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I assume (and hope) you mean KBps and MBps? In this context b (bits) and B (bytes) matters a lot.

The 4.5MBps from the desktop is poor. It seems a shame to spend so much on a NAS and then cripple it by using wireless connections for fixed devices. If the desktop was connected using Ethernet it'd be over 20x faster.

The Surface speed is obviously terrible, even compared to the desktop.

Some random thoughts...

How fast are the two machines on broadband speed tests (assuming your connection is fast enough to get a meaningful result)?

Have you checked that the correct and most recent network drivers are installed?

Is one connecting on 2.4GHz and the other on 5GHz?

Have you tried booting into 'Safe Mode with Networking'?

Did it ever manage a halfway decent speed?

Is the download as bad as the upload?
 
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I always get confused between bites and bytes. I've just done a speed test on both....

The PC is coming back at 13.99 Mb Download speed. 11.7Mb upload. 23 ms ping time.
The Surface is coming back at 16.47 Mb Download speed. 1.44Mb upload. 20 ms ping time.

That's low as i'm with Plusnet and it should be 66Mb download with 19Mbps upload. I'm not getting anywhere near that. And the weird thing is at the start of the year, I was told I hadn't been getting the right speeds and that it had now been rectified and then they sent me a £200 cheque. I remember checking the speeds then, and they were around the stated 66 and 19. That didn't last long!

Both PC and Surface are using 5Ghz.

Both have had Windows 10 returned to a fresh install via the reset this pc option in the last 2 weeks. The Surface was having the same problem before, which is why I did this. The PC had barely been used in 2 years, and wouldn't shutdown after updates, then after having to switch off manually would lose te update, and then the process would start over..

The nas was mainly bought so I could access my films and tv from the dialysis ward, and it does that job fine.

I'll try the Safe mode and network thing on the PC now, will then have to find out how to boot the Surface into safe mode to try that. I think its power and volume up.

Thanks for helping.
 
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Ok the PC shows similar speeds in safe mode with networking.
When I try to boot the Surface into Safe mode with networking, wifi doesn't work. It's like its just booted into safe mode. I tried by pressing 5 and F5, same outcome.
 
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The PC is coming back at 13.99 Mb Download speed. 11.7Mb upload. 23 ms ping time.
The Surface is coming back at 16.47 Mb Download speed. 1.44Mb upload. 20 ms ping time.
That confirms that it's a problem with the Surface and not the NAS.

Do you know someone who would allow you to connect the Surface to their wireless and run a speed test? That would help to narrow things down.

That's low as i'm with Plusnet and it should be 66Mb download with 19Mbps upload. I'm not getting anywhere near that. And the weird thing is at the start of the year, I was told I hadn't been getting the right speeds and that it had now been rectified and then they sent me a £200 cheque. I remember checking the speeds then, and they were around the stated 66 and 19. That didn't last long!
You may have a problem with your connection, but that's a separate issue. You should look at the connection information on the router. Also, check the line for ANY noise (dial 17070 for BT's quiet line test). Finally, make sure you haven't got internal extension wiring causing problems by using the master sockets test port.

If you're testing your broadband speed you should really use a wired connection. Wireless can be too inconsistent.
 
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It's unlikely to entirely resolve your issue, but one thing to check is that the Synology NAS is connecting at 1,000Mbps (Gigabit) rather than 100Mbps. Go to the Control Panel (on DSM), Network, Network Interface tab then click the arrow to expand the LAN interface section. If it says 1000Mbps next to Network Status you're fine, if it says 100Mbps you'll need to replace the network cable.

I found a similar issue on mine after I changed some cables around a while back, they're all CAT5e cables but the Synology NAS seems particularly sensitive to cables so I ended up buying a beefier, shielded CAT6 one and speeds went back to normal. If you're using the cable the NAS came with it should be fine as-is.
 
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It's unlikely to entirely resolve your issue, but one thing to check is that the Synology NAS is connecting at 1,000Mbps (Gigabit) rather than 100Mbps. Go to the Control Panel (on DSM), Network, Network Interface tab then click the arrow to expand the LAN interface section. If it says 1000Mbps next to Network Status you're fine, if it says 100Mbps you'll need to replace the network cable.

I found a similar issue on mine after I changed some cables around a while back, they're all CAT5e cables but the Synology NAS seems particularly sensitive to cables so I ended up buying a beefier, shielded CAT6 one and speeds went back to normal. If you're using the cable the NAS came with it should be fine as-is.

Gigabit switches should show what speed each port has negotiated at, 100Mbps = Orange, 1000Mbps = Green.
 
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Thanks for your help guys, I will work down the list when I get home. I can test the Surface tomorrow on the hospital's WiFi. And I will see what I get when I hotspot it to my phone later. My mobile connection is pretty good.

I did originally have the router connected via a powerline and it would only do 100Mbps. I connected it to the router by ethernet and then I could change it to 1000Mbps. I thought that might have improved things but no.
 
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It also depends how the access points are connected to your network, e.g. your NAS could be connected to the router via 1000Mbps, but if your access point is connected via 100Mbps then that will be your bottleneck.
 
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It also depends how the access points are connected to your network, e.g. your NAS could be connected to the router via 1000Mbps, but if your access point is connected via 100Mbps then that will be your bottleneck.

There's no Ethernet bottleneck. All of the speeds the OP is getting are well below what a 100Mbps connection will handle. Changing it to Gigabit, if it isn't already, will make zero difference.

The OP is basically getting the same speeds on the broadband speed test as he does to the NAS. That takes the NAS and its connection to the router out of the equation.

For some reason, the Surface has a massively underperforming wireless connection. So it's either the Surface itself or the wireless router it's connecting to. Testing the Surface on a different wireless network will help to narrow it down.
 
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Also try switching to 2.4Ghz Wi-Fi and see if that makes a difference.

Tried that, same results.

There's no Ethernet bottleneck. All of the speeds the OP is getting are well below what a 100Mbps connection will handle. Changing it to Gigabit, if it isn't already, will make zero difference.

The OP is basically getting the same speeds on the broadband speed test as he does to the NAS. That takes the NAS and its connection to the router out of the equation.

For some reason, the Surface has a massively underperforming wireless connection. So it's either the Surface itself or the wireless router it's connecting to. Testing the Surface on a different wireless network will help to narrow it down.

I tried connecting the Surface to my phone by hotspot and got... 10Mbps download 8.9Mbps upload on the mobile and 9.9Mbps download 8.2Mbps on the Surface.

So the Surface is capable of better speeds than I've been getting from Plusnet. I'm gonna call them now, but know they will just say connect to the router by cable, and I don't have a compatible cable go do so. But at least they can tell me what I should be getting.
 
Soldato
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You have to test using a cabled connection to get a meaningful result.

Your speeds from both devices to the NAS over wireless are terrible. You can't use connections like those to test your WAN speed.

What router do you have? Is it the current 'Hub One' that Plusnet supply? If so it's not the greatest router in the world (also not the worst). I replaced my mother's with a BT Home Hub 6. It was about £15 from eBay and is an improvement (it's a generation newer technology).

Install a wireless scanner (example) on the Surface and see what's going on with the wireless channels in your area. You may find that you should be on a different wireless channel (on 2.4GHz stick to channels 1, 6 and 11).
 
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It's the view showing all of the local networks (lots of humps) you should be looking at. By looking at that you can see what other local networks are on the same channel and if you'd be better on a different channel.
 
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