3TB Time Capsule 4th Gen halves connection speed

Yes, there is a general issue with WAN speed on the Apple routers.. it plainly doesn't hit everybody but for those it does hit.. there seems like a hard problem to fix. The exact cause might vary depending on what you are plugging into.

A speed that is very close to half would indicate to me an issue with duplex and half-duplex somewhere.

But before we start down this rocky road.. I need to know.

What firmware it is running? What airport utilities version you use to do the setup?

What modem? Is the modem working as router?

What mode is the TC when you plug it in?

What speed are we talking about? Actual rate in Mbps can help.

There is another thread I am working away to takle the issue of Gen 4 running or has run 7.6.4 which has made it slow.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5412423?tstart=0

The issue is not just wireless as per the titile.. this is similar at least to yours.

I am trying to scrape myself off the floor..

You must be in heaven.. gigabit ethernet via fibre link to the internet. Half the ISP in the world have lower speed links than yours. Heck it is probably more like 80%. You need ISP grade equipment to do this.

The TC is not capable of WAN to LAN throughput that high. Sorry .. but only the very latest routers can handle gigabit internet.

You need a much faster processor than a Gen4 (Gen5 much worse) TC can muster.

http://www.smallnetbuilder.com/lanwan/router-charts/bar/74-wan-to-lan

Gen5 Extreme (same speed as Gen4 TC) managed 430mbps WAN to LAN.

Gen6 Extreme (same guts exactly as latest AC Gen5 TC) managed 325mbps WAN to LAN.

In other words the latest one is slower than the earlier one.. and guess what.. your result exactly matches the testing from smallnetbuilder who do the best testing I have found anywhere.

Note the really fast throughput on latest routers.. are using hardware NAT.

This can be problematic. It means the router is not using software rules but rather built in NAT rules of the processor.. and this is done with everything other than base NAT turned off, so no firewall, no QoS, no parental controls, or vlan or vpn or anything else but just plain old NAT.

If you want a router for a gigabit connection that provides full functionality.. you are in Cisco high end stuff.. that might make your house mortgage look wimpy.

Or you need to run a powerful i5 or something with PFSense or one of the PC based router softwares.

That kind of connection just aint gonna happen on standard router processor which is after all only 1200mhz low power CPU in the Gen4 TC.

MLadd,

Did you ever make any progress with this? I am having the same issue. I have direct connection from fiber into TC Extreme. When I directly plug into my MacBook I am getting 19-20 Mb/s, but through the TC Extreme it maxes out at 9.4.

Thanks,

Billy

I have fiber to my home. Using speedtest.net the internet speed at the fibre modem is approx 900mbps. But the speed from my 4th gen TC ethernet port is approx. 350mbps.

I've read your many helpful posts on the WAN to LAN speed drop issue, and also the article on SmallNetBuilder, but months earlier my ethernet output speed would top out at close to 500mbps.

The SmallNetBuilder WAN to LAN throughput table shows the Airport Extreme top out at 325.5mbps. Assuming the TC is similar, my unit is slightly better at 350mbps (I'm sure speedtest.net isn't very accurate anyway). But can you explain why I had 500mbps, which is way over the WAN to LAN limit of the router? Anything I can do to get back some speed? Or indeed preserve the full WAN to LAN speed of my fibre connection.