Hi Mr PC Doctor, can I book an appointment ? 


The last week or so I find my connection slowing down a lot.  A couple of times it has cut out.  Sometimes if I pull out the wifi dongle and put it back in it starts working again.

Now today, I used my speed checker and it was like dial up, less than 1M.

So I connected it via a cable...had to reboot PC.  Then it was up to the usual 14M again.

Put in the dongle, pulled out the cable and back to 14M on wireless again.

So my self diagnosis is the dongle is nearly kaput - how long do these things last anyway ?  I have had it a good few years, probably 5 years now.

What is your diagnosis please ?

Try changing it to another channel first, you might be getting interference.   

And make sure there is no large metal object between the dongle and the router, that includes the PC case.

Another channel ?

PC case is fine...been where it is for five years - the only time that causes a problem is when the case is open and all the metal is exposed.

Yes Freddy, there are 11 channels some are better than others.

You would change the channel from the router.

Here is a bit about it:

http://compnetworking.about.com/od/wifihomenetworking/qt/wifichannel.htm

Best thing would be to google your router and see how its done.

OK thanks.  I will leave it for now and see how it behaves.  There are no other networks detected here, just mine.

Np Other things can cause interference, not just another network, a mobile phone mast for example, actually that reminds me, G4 has just been turned on, I wonder if that is anything to do with it  

Something I have found is that the lower number channels seem to be the best, channel 1 to 3.  

No masts near me as far as I know.  It's been behaving since I pulled out the dongle and put it in again - a few times before I have had to do that when I lost the connection entirely, so maybe that is on it's way out.

Since it's been okay for a few hours now, I would rule out G4, as that would surely be continuous.

Will see..

So in effect you turned the dongle off and on again and it worked. that figures 

Yeah lol