We have 4 kids in the house and I’m increasingly finding the internet slow because they are playing games or even worse watching stupid youtube videos. I’d like them to be able to play at a decent refresh rate but have some kind of priority access for my pc when I want it – is this possible? If not, what’s the best way to work around this other than just shouting ‘get off’ when I want to use the net? Google suggests the solution might lie with a better router than the basic talktalk one I have now – any recommendations for the router if that’s the solution?

block their ip addresses at certain times of the day. Tell them that you want them to use the web between x and y?

I’m increasingly finding the internet slow because they are playing games downloading with utorrent or even worse watching stupid youtube redtube videos.

FIFY

Limit their time on it – which may be a good idea anyway. We say 30 mins for our minecrafter, then he’s chuffed when he gets more. Have fewer devices that connect?

Better routers (like a Draytek for example) will come with a QoS function which allows you to prioritise bandwidth to particular users/machines or types of data.

Thanks so far and lol @ Klunk – I suspect that might become more of an issue in years to come but I’ll be too much of an IT dinosaur by then to identify it! I don’t want to stop them at certain times as they’re not on there all the time, the problem is more when they are they seem to suck the life out of the bandwidth so I’d like to prioritise my access device or split the bandwidth to allocate more to me 🙂 I suspect a 2nd router with better control firmware or whatever might be the way to go.

@ zilog – QoS was mentioned in my google findings – is it easy to use? Thanks also re the router make, I’ll have a look at those.

Draytek are very good routers anyway, the user interfaces are very powerful but also user friendly. Plus their documentation is very thorough. Give this a read and see if any of it makes sense http://www.draytek.co.uk/support/kb_vigor_qos.html

Minecraft shouldn’t cause any issues it uses very little bandwidth, Youtube will use a bit more but if you have a good connection it shouldn’t cause any issues.

If you’re on talk-talk then that may be the cause of your problem….

Ok, am now browsing amazon with QoS in mind for a new router and will try to use the old one as an extender.

@ Drac – that’s interesting, having just asked them it’s youtube and Good game of Empire apparently more than minecraft (off to research that game now!).

alternatively check to see if any of the neighbours have open wifi networks 😉

It can’t be good when I get better access via my three phone 🙁 thanks all and will adopt the QoS route(r) as my next step in the war against kids and their ipods/phones/tablets/pcs…..

Can you get more bandwidth?

We used to have 100MB (cable) and now have 5MB (rural BT), tbh I notice no real difference even with my son X-Box-ing it and my wife watching a film through Sky on her PC.

Draytek router cheapest of the type that allows you to do what you need. Minecraft will be using a port or range of ports. Do some research along the lines of “which port minecraft” and “minecraft qos ports”. Give your computer or devices fixed ips and then assign a range of addresses for dhcp. Limit bandwidth to the dhcp addresses. You will then have unlimited “bandwidth” while the minecrafters may need to be satisfied with less. You can also limit the number of simultaneous connections with the draytek routers.

None of that will make too much sense unless you have a router that can do it though.

Just done a download speed test and it suggests 9mbs (next 2 showed 13mbs) but it still goes slow when the pesky kids are on.

sparksmcguff – thanks, my first thought was ‘what?’ but I’ll do the research suggested 😉 draytek aren’t cheap either are they? I was hoping for < £40….

A quick google suggests the cheapest way of getting a QoS router might be buying an Asus RT-N16 and then installing some software like this on it: http://www.easytomato.org/

zilog – much appreciated 🙂

DD-WRT is an open source router firmware that does QoS really well. I dont have to tell the kids to stop watching youtube any more. It just gets tired and stops working.

OP – nope draytek aren’t cheap. But the next bit of kit along that could do what the draytek routers do is twice the price (I use a draytek vigor 2830n to do something similar to what you are trying for on a shared connection). Sorry that the pointers above aren’t any clearer, I’m not a techy and had to learn it myself, found it was easier being given rough pointers and working it out from there. Isn’t nearly as complicated as it can sound/I make it. Zilog’s suggestion looks good.

One other thing, it is likely that most of your bandwidth is being used by multiple sessions active at once – eg I have loads of tabs open in opera showing all sorts of auto updating things/playing iplayer. Skype sits idol in the corner. Email automatically checks for messages. etc etc. Across a few devices it adds up quickly.