One of the drawbacks of working from home is that you will inevitably be called upon to serve as your own IT specialist! It’s horrifying, I know, so I’ll try to empower you with some tips and tricks. First up, your home network.
It’s a Network, not The Matrix
It’s more fun to think of a network as a bunch of 0s and 1s permeating the air like a scene from The Matrix, but a network is much simpler than that! Every home network consists of the following basic elements:
- An internet service provider (ISP). Xfinity (Comcast) and CenturyLink are the most popular in the metro area, but there are several others depending on where you live.
- A modem. This is the device that translates the signal coming from your ISP and creates the “pipe” for you to download and upload data. If your ISP is Xfinity, you have a cable modem. If your ISP is CenturyLink, you have a DSL modem.
- A router. This is the device that manages access to the network and so is sometimes also called an access point. It lets you connect to the network by broadcasting a network name (technically, an SSID) and determining whether you provided the correct password (also called a passphrase or key). Once you’re connected, the router directs data traffic, serving as the intermediary between the modem and your device.
- Devices. These days, almost anything can be connected to a wifi network: TVs, security cameras, refrigerators, garage doors, lights, and more. And that’s on top of more traditional devices such as computers, phones, and printers! Devices can also be connected via an ethernet cable, but that’s less common these days.
Troubleshooting
Now that you know the basic elements of a home network, it’s a little easier to understand how to troubleshoot. When there’s a problem, I like to start at that device and work my way back to the ISP. For this example, let’s say I’m at my computer and notice an app slowing down or a page loading more slowly than normal in my browser.
Troubleshooting Steps (in order)
- Try to isolate the issue. Open the same site in an incognito window and see if the slowness persists. An incognito windows allow you to visit a site with a clean slate because it doesn’t save information from prior sites. It’s similar to clearing your browser cache, but I find it faster to open an incognito window. If pages load quickly in an incognito window, you probably just need to restart your browser. If the pages are still slow, you know the problem is a little bigger in scope.
- Try rebooting your computer. Your computer also has a cache that can get cluttered. Rebooting gives your computer, your network adapter (can be wireless or wired), and your browser a fresh start. If you’re still experiencing slowness, it’s time to start looking at your network.
- Try rebooting your router. Just pull the power cord, count to 10 to let any residual power fade, and plug the power cord back in. Routers hold a lot of information about devices on your network and can sometimes get confused about which are still active. If you’re still experiencing slowness, it’s time to look at your modem.
- Try rebooting your modem. As with a router, pull a power cord, count to 10, plug back in. Modems take a long time to reset, so wait a good 10 minutes before testing. Modems often receive control data from “the mother ship” for things like determining your IP address, how much bandwidth you should have, usage for billing purposes, etc. They also get a lot of “noise” from the network beyond your home. For me personally, an Xfinity user in Golden, the modem has been the problem 4 out of 5 times. Reboot and I’m back online.
- If you’re still experiencing slowness, it’s time to call your ISP. I know, it sucks.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I measure the speed of my internet service?
Open a browser, go to speedtest.net, click the big GO button. When the test is complete, you should see a screen similar to this:
The ping is a measure of latency in milliseconds. When you ask a question, how quickly do you get an answer - that's latency. Generally, anything under 60ms is normal and totally fine for most applications. Online gamers like to see it under 15ms.
The download speed is a measure of how fast data can be pulled to your device in megabits per second. If you're streaming HD video, you should have at least 10mbps of download speed. If that video is 4k, you should have at least 25mbps.
The upload speed is a measure of how fast data can be pushed from your device, also in megabits per second. The most common use here is video conferencing because you are pushing video from your webcam to other people in the call. Since webcams are lower resolution than anything you're watching on Hulu or Netflix, you only need a fraction of the bandwidth. If you have even 2mpbs of upload speed (and 10mbps of download speed), it's enough to support video conferencing.
My numbers seem good enough, but I'm still experiencing slowness. What else might the problem be?
Think of a network as a pipe with data moving in both directions. Once it fills up, the data can't move as quickly. So what might be filling up your data pipe?
Most often, it's another device or combination of devices. For example, a TV pulling a 4K video from Netflix would use a big chunk of your data pipe. But it could also be a combination of devices. In my household, my wife and I both have computers and phones, both of my boys have iPads and Chromebooks. We've also got a Ring, and video doorbells are notorious bandwidth hogs.
Security
Now that you’re an IT specialist, one of the things you’ll need to be aware of is security. When we had an office, you saw me change the network password quarterly. What you didn’t see was me rebooting the modem to clear its cache after those password changes and then monitoring the network as new devices joined. It helped me understand whether there were any freeloaders trying to take advantage of our wi-fi. Granted, you probably don’t have a guest network running at home, but it’s still possible for a neighbor to learn your wi-fi password and start sucking up your bandwidth. It’s easy to change your wi-fi password – just do it so you don’t have to think about it every time you feel like your internet access is slow!
Thanks, Rick!