I've been dealing with serious lag problems for the last few weeks that are making gaming impossible. I've been living in my place for a year without issues on my 1Gb Optimum internet connection. My speed tests show I'm getting close to 1Gb down with a ping under 10ms, but every 30 to 60 seconds, my ping shoots up to between 5,000 and 12,000 ms before dropping back down. This makes online gaming unplayable and causes live TV streams to lag, even though buffered streaming works fine.
I've tested on both my wired PC and my Wi-Fi PlayStation. I've already replaced the modem and had a technician come out who replaced the line completely. I've monitored the pings over time and they clearly show the spikes. Has anyone experienced something similar? Could it be packet loss, jitter, bad routing, or congestion at the ISP? What steps should I take or what should I communicate to Optimum?
2 Answers
It sounds like your connection is suffering from packet loss or jitter. Speed tests often don’t pick these issues up. First, try connecting a PC or laptop directly to the modem, bypassing your router completely. Then, reboot the modem and run a ping test to something like 1.1.1.1 for at least 10 minutes while you do what usually causes the lag.
If you don’t see any spikes while connected directly to the modem, it could be your router causing the issues—perhaps a bufferbloat or misconfigured Quality of Service (QoS) setting. If you're still experiencing problems directly connected, then the issue is likely with Optimum. You might have line noise or congestion on their end. When you contact them again, tell them you've tested directly and the problem persists, and insist they escalate it for further investigation! Good luck!
Maybe you've got a DNS issue—try hard coding your DNS settings. You can find various guides online to help with this. Check if the problem persists when using someone else’s internet as well; that could help narrow down if it's solely your connection or a broader issue.
Also, ensure that no other heavy internet activities like torrents or streaming are happening during your gaming. Have you made sure your network drivers are updated? Sometimes that's all it takes! It's worth a shot to see if direct connections to different networks yield different results.
I've switched the DNS and rebooted, but mostly I'm just gaming without other services running. I’ll try testing on a friend's Wi-Fi to see if that helps, especially since it’s happening on my PS5 too.