Increase your Internet speed

Here’s a simple 3 minute tweak (XP Pro only) that will increase your broadband speed.

By default (even with QoS disabled) Windows XP reserves up to 20 percent of your connections bandwidth.

To override this reserve take the following steps.

Make sure you Log on as Administrator, not as a user with Administrator privileges.

* Start > Run > type gpedit.msc
* You will see [Local Computer Policy]
* Expand the [Administrative Templates] branch
* Expand the [Network] branch
* Highlight [QoS Packet Scheduler]
* Double-click [Limit Reservable Bandwidth]
* Check [Enabled]
* Change [Bandwidth limit %] to 0 %
* Click [Apply] [OK]
* Restart

Effect is immediate.

To speed up the Internet connection speed we need to configure a special buffer in the computer's memory in order to enable it to better deal with interrupts made from the NIC or the USB modem.

This tip is only recommended if you have 256MB RAM or higher.

Step #1 - Identify the IRQ used by the NIC/USB modem

Follow these steps:

1. Open the System Information tool by running MSINFO32.EXE from the Run command.
2. Expand System Summary > Hardware Resources > IRQs.
3. Look for the listing made for your NIC (in my case - a Intel(R) PRO/100+ Management Adapter). Note the IRQ next to the specified line (in my case - IRQ21).

   Step #2 - Modify the system.ini file

   Follow these steps:

   1. Run SYSEDIT.EXE from the Run command.
   2. Expand the system.ini file window.
   3. Scroll down almost to the end of the file till you find a line called [386enh].
   4. Press Enter to make one blank line, and in that line type

   IrqX=4096

   where X is the designated IRQ number we found in step #1, in my case it's IRQ21.

   

   Note: This line IS CASE SENSITIVE!!!

   5. Click on the File menu, then choose Save.
   6. Close SYSEDIT and reboot your computer.

   Done. Speed improvement will be noticed after the computer reboots.