My FOFC Problems Solved!

[Godzilla Blitz]

For the past ten months, this board would load awfully slow for me. I'm on cable, and most boards load nearly instantly, but FOFC would take anywhere from 1-15 minutes to load a thread, depending on its length.

I tried to solve the problem, but nothing seemed to work. Computers, browsers, security settings, firewalls, anti-virus software, XP, MacOSX, network settings, router ports, you name it and I looked at it. But nothing worked. Every once in a while, I'd come back and things would be acceptably fast for an hour or so, but within a short while they would bog down completely again.

After a while, well, I just figured it was a problem with the site for me, like I was cursed or something, and well, I just stopped visiting. Waiting minutes to open up threads was just too painful.

But today! Today I figured it out! While trying to solve some other problem, I stumbled onto information about routers, and everything clicked! My router was the problem. I updated the firmware and bingo! The site is incredibly fast again! Like magic! Crossing my fingers that it stays this way, but for the time being...

Happy.

[MikeVic]

Welcome back! I'm waiting for an XCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM dynasty. ;)

[Godzilla Blitz]

Thanks.

I tried posting a bit the past couple of weeks, but it was such a project that I was about ready to give up again. Glad I found the solution.

Ah...XCOM. I remember that. That was fun.

[Blade6119]

Missed ya buddy, glad to have ya back!

[GoldenEagle]

So, what kind of dynasty can we expect to see now? :)

[Godzilla Blitz]

So, what kind of dynasty can we expect to see now? :)
Don't know. Has to be something where I can kill Blade6119 repeatedly, though. :)

Just kidding there, Blade. Good to see you again too, buddy. :)

[Blade6119]

Don't know. Has to be something where I can kill Blade6119 repeatedly, though. :)

Just kidding there, Blade. Good to see you again too, buddy. :)

lol, speak of the devil it got me killed in the x-com warewolf...but im happy to die to quench godzillas thirst for blood, as his dynasties are always great...and i get my own revenge in my own games :D *evil laugh*

[Coffee Warlord]

We want X-Com: Terror from the Deep!

[JeeberD]

Welcome back! :)

[Fidatelo]

I have the problem you described at work. Glad to hear you have figured out the cause, I understand how frustrating it is.

Here's to hoping my network admin decides to updgrade some router firmware soon! :D

[thealmighty]

Hey GB, what exactly did you do? I am having that problem as well (hence the pitiful lack of progress on my dynasty/ies). I feel my router is also the problem. Got a wireless network and it worked great. Then one day...BAM... the site sucks but all other sites work fine (and I started playing WoW and always seem to have latencies under 100, which I am told is good).

I would love to be able to come here without watching the little green IE progress bar snail across for an eternity. As you say, too painful.

[Godzilla Blitz]

Coffee: Sorry, won't be me. That game is much longer, I've heard, and after a billion alien combat write-ups, I don't have it in me to do another one.

Jeeber D: Thanks there. I was never totally gone, probably more like 95% gone. Getting addicted to World of Warcraft didn't help my time here either.

Fidatelo: The frustrating thing about it was that the nature of the problem didn't seem to indicate that it would be something with the router. Now that I've mentioned the solution to some people, they say something like "Oh, that's the first place to look. Why didn't you check there right away?" But when I asked techie friends and posted on three boards about the problem ten months ago, I got lots of replies but no one suggesting I look at the router.

When it really came down to it, it only took about an hour of determined troubleshooting today to isolate and fix the problem, but the problem just never got bad enough that I felt like I had to fix it. Was more like a hangnail that a broken arm.

thealmighty: Your dynasty was the worst for me. It would take 15 minutes plus to load. I could click on your thread, go take a shower, and the thread would still not have been completely loaded when I got back.

As for a solution...

Isolating the problem was key for me. For example, it could be:

1. Your connection
2. Your modem
3. Your router.
4. Your computer.
5. Your browser.
6. Your internet settings, etc.
7. Bad luck.
8. Karma.
9. Other.

To see if it's your router, undo the router and hook the modem directly up to the computer. You'll probably have to turn off the modem and reboot the computer to get the computer and modem to find each other correctly, but once you get your connection back, check this site. If the problem is gone, you know the problem is the router.

I suppose you could just start by updating the firmware anyway, as well. I just found the website for my router (Netgear), then hunted around for the support page for my router. On that page there was a firmware file that I downloaded to my desktop. That web page should have directions on how to then upgrade the router's firmware using that file, but it's really easy and probably very similar for most routers. You just type in your IP address (usually 192.168.0.1) into your browser's internet address bar and that will pull up the screen to access all the features of your router. Somewhere on that screen should be an option for upgrading/checking firmware. Click on that and the rest should be self explanatory. Probably takes ten minutes, tops.

Of course, if you just did the above test to see if the problem was your router, then you'll need to hook the router back up first.

When I was hunting around for what the problem could be with my router though, there were tons of other things that could have been causing the slowdown. Something about turning off SP1 or SPI in the WAN settings seemed to be another popular thing to try, but that might have just been my router. All the solutions started with "try updating your firmware", though.

[Antmeister]

By the way, thanks for the tips. I wasn't having horrendous slowdowns on the message board, but there were a number of sites that I would have intermittent issues with. I never even thought to update the firmware and now I feel like I am really using a cable modem again. Thanks again.