Internet slow in Mac OX but fast in Windows on Intel Mini??

Why would you expect them to be the same?

You're running Safari under OS X and Firefox/IE on XP.

They're two different things. Sure you'd expect Safari to be faster, but that doesn't mean it has to be. It's like saying "My Harley and my Corolla don't run the same even though they cost the same"... bad example...

Do you have any plug-ins on Safari that could be causing a slowdown? Saft? PithHelmet?

reality

Try pinging your router. Do you get any delays or dropped packets (icomp_seq should be sequential and time should be really low)? If that's ok, then it's unlikely to be your Mini.

Otherwise you probably have a faulty network card. (Edit: oops didn't notice it works ok in Windows, maybe a software problem then)

Edit: what do you get with http://www.dslreports.com/stest on windows and OS X?

Use Firefox in OSX. It's much faster at loading pages then Safari on a wired connection but especially on a wireless connection. Safari still needs some time to mature in OSX.

Chrispy said:

Just ran a speed test on both...

Windows XP with IE
4,710 down
346 up

Mac OS with Safari
3,649 down
343

Good speed so I don't see why there would be such a delay on Mac. I'm going to try Firefox to see if it is any better.

Click to expand...

eek. I take back my comment then. Since you said downloads were fast, I assumed you were getting pretty much the same speeds, but Safari was taking an extra second or so to render the page.

That being said... I guess I have no contribution... Uhh.. maybe your router is racist?

reality

I had a similar problem for a while, but it's cause I was connecting to a proxy server dealie in order to access files off of my campus... so that caused me problems.

I dunno if you've done anything like that, but thought I'd throw it out there.

Its not your cable connection, its the program. Safari sucks. Give Shiira a try.

I haven't done this with either firefox nor safari, but I know that IE stinks when it comes to TCP/IP communication. Not that it's slow or something else, but if you look at a trace from IE you will see that it does not close it's connections, which actually takes some time to do. So if safari and firefox does that then you will find some of the explanation there.

bursty said:

Its not your cable connection, its the program. Safari sucks. Give Shiira a try.

Click to expand...

Try using Camino in OS X. Its more optimized for OS X than Firefox (its actually made only for OS X) and its snappier than both Firefox and definitely Safari.

The difference between OS X and Windows could be system-level settings. I'm not too sure on how to adjust these, but there are many utilities to do it.

Also, make sure the speed test you're using isn't using Java and is a good, reliable website. Java is slower on the Mac, so it won't show your true speed. That sounds like it may be the issue with using Firefox (slower Java than Safari, and Mac OS X has slower Java than Windows).

So, try the speed test on SpeakEasy in both OS X and Windows. It uses Flash. Your results should be *very* similar. As far as the speed of loading pages, seriously try Camino. There are only a few real browsers for the Mac (Safari, Firefox, Opera). Most of the other "browsers" just use the Webkit like Safari and although Camino uses the Mozilla core, it is highly optimized for OS X.

I had a problem similar, but reversed: Safari/OSX ran much faster than Firefox/XP. Fixed the problem today: I deleted my Windows partition.

You might be having a issue with autodetection of your ethernet connection speed on OS X. I've had this happen to me on Windows, but my MAcs tend to live on wireless.

Go to the Ethernet tab and set it configure manually (advanced)...

B

Something sounds fishy... You shouldn't get results that are different over short time periods, especially by over 3mb!!!

This requires some additional investigation...

Chrispy said:

I'm going to contact the cable company tomorrow about this. My roommate is very upset becuase her PowerBook G4 is so slow on the internet.... and never was in the past haha. Sigh..

Click to expand...

This may be a stupid question but is anyone using Bittorrent or something? That may explain the huge changes in reported bandwidth.

FYI, internet speed tests are not accurate while anyone is using your connection, including browsing the web.

Slow here too....

Chrispy,

My 1.25Ghz imac (Tiger with all updates) is wired to a Linksys router and my wife's work PC (Dell Lap Top running XP) is wireless to the router. I get noticably faster surfiing on her machine (IE and FF). I hate to say it but this is the first time since I got my Apple (love it and will never go back ) that I've actually preferred using a PC over my imac.

Your plight got my attention for the slow surfing but also the fact that you have insightbb. I live in Rockford, Il and also have cable internet from Insight BB and I've noticed the slowdown issue since they "upgraded" their hardware. (How long have you experienced this problem?) The upgrades were finished in Northern IL last week.

(On a side note.... Insight implemented the upgrades so poorly, we/everyone had long outages for a week and a half . It got so bad that the number of complaints made the local tv news, along with interviews from upset customers. Insight ended up giving a discount for the month if you called in. Get ready for that.)

I am starting to wonder if the upgrades have something to do with the delay in pages loading. It's hard to comprehend why that would be but Insight isn't off my radar after the upgrade fiasco so they make a good outlet for my anger .
Constructively speaking,
1) I'm going to call Insight for similar customer complaints.
2) I am going to try Camino.
3) I have already tried unplugged the router and modem to no avail.
4) I have pinged yahoo.com on both the PC and the Mac and for all practical purposes get close to the same rates.

Any other ideas?