Slow download speeds

[thomaaaaaaaaas]

I am in the process of downloading Destiny 2 on my PC. However, the time it is taking to download is much longer than I expected. At first, Steam was saying that the download was going to take about 22 hrs. to 1 day. I then followed troubleshooting tips such as changing the download region, setting the bandwidth limit to no limit, and clearing the download cache, none of which seemed to fix the problem. However, ending certain tasks (ending adobe acrobat seemed to help) in task manager reduced the download time to as low as 13 hrs. However variations in download time and speed in MB/s after has fluctuated within minutes from 1.0-1.3 MB/s speed with 1 day times to 1.5-1.7 MB/s speed with 13-16 hr times. Barely any progress has happened with the download if it has even happened at all. My wifi adapter is a TP-Link USB Adapter N150. Download speed according to online test is 3.39 Mbps. Any help is appreciated.

[crunchyfrog]

That speed sounds pretty good frankly. You need to remember that Steam reports speed in MEGABYTES per second, whereas ISPs use typically MEGABITS. So any quoted speed from Steam's download page you need to multiply by 8.

Next is that you're using wifi, which can be a big problem as it's awful for interference. If possible you can change the frequency to 5GHz and see if that helps. Otherwise, try to download with a LAN cable connected and see if the speed differs.

Then if problems still persist, make sure you're changing download region to ANYWHERE in the world. Most make the mistake of thinking it's like online gaming, where you pick servers close to you. That is not the case, as ping isn't really relevant. In fact, the closest servers to you are likely ALSO getting congestion if you are. Best practice is to Google which countries are currently asleep at the time and choose any of them. Tweak it a little by picking countries less populated or spread out.

Lastly, understand that games behave differently. Some games just basically download conistsnetly in one long stream. Others, like Ark, download a chunk, appear to stop while it unpacks and writes the data, then resumes again. IIrc, Destiny 2 does some odd things too, so that might be a factor.

[B o b n i k]

I had the same problem. I changed region/country and it helped for me.

[StankBanger]

phhht, I get 300Mbs speeds, I normally D/L at around 8.5, on steam I get WAY LESS. I am a Computer Person(40 years), it's not my connection, it's steams problems.

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by StankBanger:

phhht, I get 300Mbs speeds, I normally D/L at around 8.5, on steam I get WAY LESS. I am a Computer Person(40 years), it's not my connection, it's steams problems.

Again that's not how it works whether you claim to be a computer person or not is a logical fallacy.

You can still be wrong.

The fact remains Steam downloads don't work like other downloads - please read what I explained above. It's not JUST you connection but most of your hardware that's relevant.

So check the things I suggested as you're downloading to find out where the issues lie.

And don't forget also that Steam by defualt reports in MEGABYTES per second and not the usual MEGABITS so you might need to multiply the speed reported by 8.

[JimmiBTW]

Originally posted by crunchyfrog:

Originally posted by StankBanger:

phhht, I get 300Mbs speeds, I normally D/L at around 8.5, on steam I get WAY LESS. I am a Computer Person(40 years), it's not my connection, it's steams problems.

Again that's not how it works whether you claim to be a computer person or not is a logical fallacy.

You can still be wrong.

The fact remains Steam downloads don't work like other downloads - please read what I explained above. It's not JUST you connection but most of your hardware that's relevant.

So check the things I suggested as you're downloading to find out where the issues lie.

And don't forget also that Steam by defualt reports in MEGABYTES per second and not the usual MEGABITS so you might need to multiply the speed reported by 8.

there's a button in download settings that allows you to display download rates in bps instead of Mb/s

[crunchyfrog]

Originally posted by JimmiBTW:

Originally posted by crunchyfrog:

Again that's not how it works whether you claim to be a computer person or not is a logical fallacy.

You can still be wrong.

The fact remains Steam downloads don't work like other downloads - please read what I explained above. It's not JUST you connection but most of your hardware that's relevant.

So check the things I suggested as you're downloading to find out where the issues lie.

And don't forget also that Steam by defualt reports in MEGABYTES per second and not the usual MEGABITS so you might need to multiply the speed reported by 8.

there's a button in download settings that allows you to display download rates in bps instead of Mb/s

Yup, that's why I said to pay attention to it, as you can change it, but by default it tends to be in MEGABYTES.