A congested home router can reduce your Internet bandwidth and lead to packet loss. Here’s how to turn on a hidden Windows Vista feature to clear it up.
Your broadband ISP may promise you 5-megabit Internet access and above, but if you’ve got a router prone to congestion, you may be getting nowhere near those speeds. Routers can get congested if their incoming packet buffers get full. When this happens, the router drops packets, and bandwidth suffers. In addition, streaming media such as videos may drop packets, and the video may appear jerky, or you may not be able to view it all.
Windows Vista includes a hidden feature, called Explicit Congestion Notification (ECN) that can help clear up the problem. Microsoft even claims that ECN can help speed up downloads and improve the reliability of data transfer when your router isn’t congested. ECN is turned off by default because not all home routers support it, and if you turn it on with a nonsupported router, you can cause even worse connection problems.
There is a way, however, to find out if your router supports ECN and then to turn on ECN from the command line.
To find out if your router supports ECN, you need to run the Internet Connectivity Evaluation Tool.Make sure you’re logged in to Windows Vista as an administrator. Then go to www.microsoft.com/windows/using/tools/igd/default.mspx and agree to the terms. When you agree, on the page that appears, Microsoft will attempt to install an ActiveX control. Your Internet Explorer security settings will most likely block the attempt. The Information Bar will light up yellow. Click it, and from the menu that appears (Figure), select Install ActiveX Control.
Follow the prompts for installing the software. A new web page will appear. Click Start Test. After several minutes of testing, you’ll see a results screen like the one shown in (Figure )
Scroll to the Traffic Congestion Test section. If your router passes the test, you can safely turn on ECN. If not, you can’t.
To turn on ECN, fi rst run an elevated command prompt by typing cmd at the Search box and pressing Ctrl-Shift-Enter. Then at the command line, type this command, and press Enter:
netsh interface tcp set global ecncapability=enabled
NOTE :When you turn on ECN, you turn it on only for the computer on which you’ve issued the command, not on the entire network. If you want other Windows Vista PCs on the network to be able to take advantage of ECN, you’ll need to turn it on at each of the PCs.
The command prompt will respond with an OK. ECN will now be enabled. If you notice a degradation in performance, you can turn off ECN by typing this command at an elevated command prompt and pressing Enter:
netsh interface tcp set global ecncapability=disabled
See Also
For a good explanation of how ECN works, see this “Cable Guy” article:
www.microsoft.com/technet/community/columns/cableguy/cg1006.mspx.
For an explanation of the Internet Connectivity Evaluation Tool, see this Microsoft Knowledge
Base article: support.microsoft.com/kb/932134/en-us.
Windows Vista includes a hidden feature, called Explicit Congestion Notification (ECN) that can help clear up the problem. Microsoft even claims that ECN can help speed up downloads and improve the reliability of data transfer when your router isn’t congested. ECN is turned off by default because not all home routers support it, and if you turn it on with a nonsupported router, you can cause even worse connection problems.
There is a way, however, to find out if your router supports ECN and then to turn on ECN from the command line.
To find out if your router supports ECN, you need to run the Internet Connectivity Evaluation Tool.Make sure you’re logged in to Windows Vista as an administrator. Then go to www.microsoft.com/windows/using/tools/igd/default.mspx and agree to the terms. When you agree, on the page that appears, Microsoft will attempt to install an ActiveX control. Your Internet Explorer security settings will most likely block the attempt. The Information Bar will light up yellow. Click it, and from the menu that appears (Figure), select Install ActiveX Control.
 |
| Telling Internet Explorer to install the Internet Connectivity Evaluation Tool |
Follow the prompts for installing the software. A new web page will appear. Click Start Test. After several minutes of testing, you’ll see a results screen like the one shown in (Figure )
 |
| You’ve passed the ECN test |
Scroll to the Traffic Congestion Test section. If your router passes the test, you can safely turn on ECN. If not, you can’t.
To turn on ECN, fi rst run an elevated command prompt by typing cmd at the Search box and pressing Ctrl-Shift-Enter. Then at the command line, type this command, and press Enter:
netsh interface tcp set global ecncapability=enabled
NOTE :When you turn on ECN, you turn it on only for the computer on which you’ve issued the command, not on the entire network. If you want other Windows Vista PCs on the network to be able to take advantage of ECN, you’ll need to turn it on at each of the PCs.
The command prompt will respond with an OK. ECN will now be enabled. If you notice a degradation in performance, you can turn off ECN by typing this command at an elevated command prompt and pressing Enter:
netsh interface tcp set global ecncapability=disabled
See Also
For a good explanation of how ECN works, see this “Cable Guy” article:
www.microsoft.com/technet/community/columns/cableguy/cg1006.mspx.
For an explanation of the Internet Connectivity Evaluation Tool, see this Microsoft Knowledge
Base article: support.microsoft.com/kb/932134/en-us.
