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

Chrispy

Chrispy

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Dec 27, 2004
2,270
524
Indiana
Hello. I have noticed that ever since I got my mac mini, the internet seems to hang when I try to go to websites. Once the website starts to actually load it goes quickly again. Also, downloads are pleanty fast. I have cable internet and thought it may just be the cable company.

However, I installed windows on the mini (runs GREAT by the way) to do some "backups" of DVDs and when I get online I don't have the problem anymore. Web pages load quicly and don't really hang up anymore. I am using Safari and I have all updates installed. Any idea on what would be causing this or if there is a setting I need to change in OSX.

Oh, and the connection is cable internet through a router (tried two different ones as well as a direct connection to the model and all have this problem). The mini is hooked up directly to the router with an ethernet cable. My roommate has a G4 12" powermac and her wireless performance from the connection is just aweful. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks :)
 
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.
 
realityisterror said:
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
Click to expand...

Well, they should be close. If windows has a MAJOR gain in speed over mac OS then there must be a problem. Otherwise, OSX needs a lot of work.

I will try out some of the other suggestions soon. Thanks for the tips so far everyone.
 
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.
 
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? :rolleyes:

reality
 
I just ran the test again on the mac with FireFox

790 down
343 up

77.2% worse than an average user on my connection....
 
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.
 
Windows is still BLOWING the mac away in internet speed.... I think I may return the mini as it is not functional for me at these speeds :(
 
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.
 
OK, I just ran the speakeasy test on windows and mac... here are the results

Windows XP
DOWN 9,073
UP 349

Mac OS 10.4.6
DOWN 5,417
UP 345

The mac is clearly slower, but the different in real world use is FAR greater. I can count to 10 before the yahoo homepage comes up. When I type in macrumors.com in the address bar it can take up to 15 seconds to load. The delays is only 2 or 3 seconds in windows... I'm so confused. I never had this problem in the past :(
 
Just ran the test again in Camino and Safari and got about 1,100 for the DOWN on both... it just gets slower!
 
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
 
Well, the connection is still crap :( I changed the advanced settings and everything. I even connected directly to the modem and it was still slow. I did get this message on Insight's website.

"Early morning hours of Tuesday, June 6 in: Bloomington, Greenwood, Evansville, and surrounding Indiana areas will have an update to Insight Cable Internet."

I am going to call tomorrow to find out if that is supposed to address this issue.
 
Something sounds fishy... You shouldn't get results that are different over short time periods, especially by over 3mb!!!

This requires some additional investigation...
 
crazzyeddie said:
Something sounds fishy... You shouldn't get results that are different over short time periods, especially by over 3mb!!!

This requires some additional investigation...
Click to expand...

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..
 
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.
 
crazzyeddie said:
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.
Click to expand...

That is a good observation. However, nobody was using the connection at the time I did the test. My roommate has all but given up on even trying because it is so slow. It got even worse later last night... down to almost a complete crawl grrrrrr.
 
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:eek:.

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:mad: . 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 :D .
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?
 
They are updating my area tomorrow :( I had better not be out of a connection as I NEED it for work. There will be hell to pay if they expect me to be offline for that long. Even worse, if your connection got slower after the update I'm really screwed if the same happens to me. It takes almost 30 seconds to load a page now! That is just not acceptiable for $40 a month :mad:
 
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