BigFlyer

I assume it is a combination of more people with laptops, and more bandwidth-heavy uses (streaming video and, to a lesser extent, voip), but has anyone else noticed that hotel internet connections have gotten slower and slower (not to mention more latency/higher ping times)?

I am in a hotel now that I last stayed in exactly one year ago. One of the reasons I returned to this hotel is that it had very fast, consistent and free internet. Now is is so slow that webpages frequently time out and don't load.

linsj

I don't buy high-speed Internet often (only when I have to do a lot of web work or receive/send huge files). I haven't noticed much slowness, but I have noticed the signal dropping a lot more. In fact, it was so bad at the last Sheraton I stayed in that the desk clerk comped it for me.

thegeneral

They're probably trying to get away with fewer hotspots and a smaller pipe and thus lower cost. It's just like most gyms and pools you see in hotels. They're put there to add a checkmark to travelocity/similar for marketing purposes. Nobody asks if a hotel has good wireless, only if they have it. Make them move you to a different room, get it for free and if you still can't get connected and actually need it for work, push them to give you a reduced room rate. For a business traveller, internet is necessary.

BNA_flyer

Hotel internet has gone from free, fast and wired in many locations to expensive, slow and wireless--so much so that I finally threw in the towel and got a Sprint broadband card (at my own expense). It's a revenue center for a lot of them (now that almost no one uses their inflated long distance service), and making it wireless must reduce their maintenance overhead.

BigFlyer

I got a Sprint card to for that reason, but I'm in Europe right now, so the Sprint card is of no use.

Also, because of latency, the Sprint card is not great for Skype and VOIP.

Given that DSL lines are rather cheap these days, it really wouldn't cost the hotels all that much to expand their bandwidth. I suspect that in some cases it is ignorance on the part of the hotel owners, I would assume that the demand for bandwidth has more than doubled within the last year.

bdesmond

Alot of them have DSL. DSL is not much bandwidth, especially out in podunk and huckerbuck where the CO is a long haul so you can't get any of the newer ADSL variants which are speedy. Also at some hotels (at least the Courtyards I've visited lately), the DSL is split into two ATM PVCs and part of it is dedicated as a connection into Mariott's corporate network so you're already sharing a potentially small pipe.

OutOfOffice

Really interesting thread! I just came to assume that hotel wifi = slow connection. I really miss staying at hotels with hardwire connections, the switch to wifi has been so quick.

cordelli

Now this is a funny thread for me tonight.

I'm in a Hampton in Austin where I have both wireless and DSL. When I was here last year the DSL was over a meg in speed, earlier tonight it was hovering around 200k

Switched to the wireless and it's over twice as fast as the wired is.

In another place I was at a couple weeks ago, I had the router in my room (it was one of those wireless router mounted on the bottom of the phone) and had incredible speed.

I think it's all over the place. The hotel we are doing the meeting at has totally unusable wireless coverage in the public areas, and they supposedly offer their coverage and t-mobile, but both disconnect you constantly (and you have to pay separatly). In the rooms the wired works, but the wireless is the same.

I don't think they have the coverage they should, I think in many cases they have routers that have shut down they don't know about, or there's just too many people streaming tv shows from the networks or whatever and it's slowing everybody down because they are usually dsl.

evilroot

I've encountered this same problem more and more frequently over the last year . . . oddly enough more frequently at larger, nicer, more expensive properties.


I have two ways to deal with it:

1: My Sprint A900m EVDO phone with the SERO offer rate plan (which includes unlimited data, there are plenty of forums with info on how to get this). I disabled Modem NAI (google for this, its very easy) so that the phone won't report tethering, and simply bluetooth connect to it from my laptop to get internet. Not the best connection around, but more than sufficient for work. In some areas I've even gotten DSL speeds.

2: A real wireless card for my laptop, with a decent external antenna. Look on eBay for "wardriving" kits that include a nice 802.11b card and omnidirectional antenna. You won't BELIEVE the difference!

Seahawk_6

Yup, I've noticed very similar issues...I've experienced it at facilities with both wired and wireless access. I too have gone with an EVDO card (Verizon) and that's done the trick for the most part. But I do go places where EVDO isn't available and I have to rely on the hotel.

I'm not sure I'm ready to blame masses of hotel guests streaming audio/video and utilizing VOIP. To these eyes, most hotel guests look like they have trouble tying their shoes...I'm can't believe they're responsible for saturating bandwidth. I suspect it's hotels trying to get away with smaller broadband pipes and poor WiFi coverage. I've also stayed in a couple of Marriotts that offered very low bandwidth connections (think just above dial-up) for free and charged for "faster" connections. And I suspect there's more and more proxying going on...if the proxy machine is painfully slow or overburdened that's going to effect things as well.

*BTW...be a good steward of the pipes yourself. Sprint and Verizon actually prohibit utilizing streaming audio/video with their aircards (they don't stop you but do reserve the right to terminate your service) because it does saturate the limited bandwidth. Be mindful that when you're a bandwidth hog others end up suffering. I once watched a radiologist take down an entire hospital's Internet access because of a poorly managed network and his insistence on listening to streaming audio.

redbeard911

I had free Wayport at my HI last night. After about 20 minutes on tech support, they needed to send someone from maintenance. Thirty minutes later I gave up and told them not to bother. I got my free internet comped for the night.

Previous HI properties have had wireless that was very good.

JustinIND

Yes. That's why I use a 3G laptop card from my cellphone company. It is usually faster than the hotel's internet and I dont have to pay a daily fee (I save money). Also, once I connected to a hotel's wireless router and there was a conflict connecting with my laptop's on board wireless network card. The conflict was so serious it cause a fatal error on my computer and I was unable to use my laptop if I connected to their router. I would get the 'blue screen of death.' It was weird.

shiner

I've also gone to the broadband wireless card. Hotel internet really has tanked. I blame it on lack of necessary maintenance, upgrades, and even knowledge of the network they have installed.

GodOSpoons

I admit it. I stayed at all of your hotels and spent the whole time watching Slingbox.

Timothy

No... really. I'm sure that it has something to do with it. When I bring that sucker up, it'll suck every ounce of bandwidth it can find and normally settles in around 600 kbps.

Tummy

A few years ago, when WiFi was new and exotic, I usually got really great performance. Now that the hoi polloi has it standard on their $399 walmart laptops, it's gone down the tubes except in the early morning when I assume most people are sleeping.

For the last 2 years or so, I've been staying at a Hyatt with paid T-Mobile WiFi @$20 / month. It was reliable and generally fast. Now, I've switched hotels and while their service is now "free" it's so unusable that I will probably have to get an datacard. No more slingbox for me I guess.