Why does my internet kind of disconnect?

September 19, 2011 5:05 PM

Why does my internet kind of disconnect?

I am a professional poker player so it is very important to me that my internet never disconnect, or I lose the pot!

I play on 4 different poker sites, and several times a day two of the four sites will simultaneously disconnect for about thirty seconds, while the other two sites will continue working without a problem.

I am living in a dorm in China, and am using the school's default supplied DSL, (which is pretty fast [downloads torrents at over 100k/sec])

A friend suggested that a noise filter may help?
It is super hot here and maybe my modem has fried?

Any ideas, ways of fixing, or any advice will be helpful!

posted by crawltopslow to technology (4 answers total)

Is that your only network connection when it drops? (I ask since bittorrent seems to know how to shred any bandwidth you throw at it. If you're also doing other things, especially bittorrent, it might be overloading your DSL modem.)

I seem to recall that a DSL noise filter only cost about $5-8 US about ten years ago, so that might pay off in spades for you. (Pun intended.)

Is it consistently the same two sites that stay on and the same two that drop? Somebody who knows more about BGP than I ever will might be able to help along those lines.
posted by kimota at 6:13 PM on September 19, 2011

I think you're approaching this from the wrong angle. If I called myself a professional poker player, I'd pay for some reliable internet and not base my job off of a college dorm based DSL line. But that's just me.

It is super hot here and maybe my modem has fried?

Not necessarily fried, but heat is a big killer of electronics. Maybe tilt the modem so it can ventilate? Point a fan at it?
posted by Sphinx at 6:18 PM on September 19, 2011

If you can get access to a computer elsewhere with a more reliable Internet connection, you could VNC/RDP in to that computer remotely to do poker. Then if your Internet connection dies, you only lose your ability to see what is going on, but then you can reconnect and perhaps keep playing. You might look into a "KVM" VPS.
posted by floam at 6:35 PM on September 19, 2011

Poker takes high prioirity in my life, but it takes second priority, to living with my friends and enjoying my life.

It is always the same two sites that disconnect.

I have a fan pointed at the modem (like, a room fan), and I use no other internet while I'm playing poker (I close bittorrent, and any program that might use internet).
posted by crawltopslow at 7:04 PM on September 19, 2011