How can I split an internet connection into two?

[Silly Ducklings]

I'm not talking about a switch, I'm not talking about two wifi hotspots, I mean two separate connections with two separate bandwidth caps.  I have 6Mb down and 0.8Mb up on a really good day, and my sister downloads things/streams netflix/uploads images to social media (0.8 upload, you can imagine how brutal this would be) almost 100% of the time she is awake at my house, meaning I lose anywhere between 20 and 70 packets per minute when I play league of legends.  I manage to fit in some ranked games when I have time early in the mornings when I wake up (if she's still asleep), but obviously this isn't a very great solution.  Is there any device that can make two separate connections out of one, that won't interfere with each other if one of them gets completely floored?  I've got a nighthawk router with dynamic QoS, and that doesn't do anything at all as far as I can tell, so before anyone suggests I tweak my QoS settings, I've tried. (also tried manually setting my priority to "highest" and all of her devices to "low", also does nothing)

[Godlygamer23]

I hope you're not trying to somehow keep your speeds the same while she's uploading because I don't think it works that way at all.

[RGProductions]

2 minutes ago, Godlygamer23 said:

I hope you're not trying to somehow keep your speeds the same while she's uploading because I don't think it works that way at all.

I have slow internet too, and what he means is splitting it in two, like turning a 6/0.8 into two 3 0.4 connections. It annoys me too, 150 ping.

Also: 3000th post! Ill overhaul my profile soon!

[LHJKO]

just ban her device tell your games over and say you dont know whats wrong

[Godlygamer23]

Just now, RGProductions said:

I have slow internet too, and what he means is splitting it in two, like turning a 6/0.8 into two 3 0.4 connections. It annoys me too, 150 ping.

You can limit them on the machines themselves. 

[kerradeph]

Are you on wireless? And with that upload, you will probably be hosed unless your basically completely cripple what little upload she gets. Do you have options to ratelimit her devices?

[RGProductions]

Just now, Godlygamer23 said:

You can limit them on the machines themselves. 

Not on a TV running a proprietary OS. Its very annoying, the TV always takes priority over my computer in bandwidth.

[Silly Ducklings]

6 minutes ago, Godlygamer23 said:

I hope you're not trying to somehow keep your speeds the same while she's uploading because I don't think it works that way at all.

If you're saying that I'm trying to keep the speeds at 6 down and 0.8 up while she's streaming/uploading, no I know that isn't gonna work.  I wanted to make two connections, one with like 4 down 0.5 up, the other with like 2 down 0.3 up.

 

Edit - A lot (like 75%) of the problem is her apple tv which she uses for netflix, so throttling that with netlimiter or something similar isn't an option.  Same with her iphone and social media, AFAIK there isn't an app for that.  Even if there was, i've discussed buying her a netlimiter license on her laptop so she could do that but she just blows me off every time.

[SnowyMus]

Aside from getting a different router that has more effective QoS settings, getting a second Internet connection, or connecting when she's not using it, I don't think you can really do much about this. 6/0.8 isn't really much to work with.

[Oshino Shinobu]

No, you'd need to get another line run into the house by your ISP. No matter how late or early you split a single connection, it's still only one connection so will still be limited by the speed of the single connection as it is now. 

[meenmeen1103]

Kick sister out. Ok maybe not, don't actually know a good solution but feel your pain

[Oshino Shinobu]

2 minutes ago, Silly Ducklings said:

If you're saying that I'm trying to keep the speeds at 6 down and 0.8 up while she's streaming/uploading, no I know that isn't gonna work.  I wanted to make two connections, one with like 4 down 0.5 up, the other with like 2 down 0.3 up.

You can do that locally through a router,managed switch or end devices to limit a device or portion of the network to a certain bandwidth. Depending on how you do it (doing it through software on end devices gives you the most options in terms of flexibility), you can set it up so that the limit is only enabled during certain times. 

[Silly Ducklings]

Just now, Oshino Shinobu said:

No, you'd need to get another line run into the house by your ISP. No matter how late or early you split a single connection, it's still only one connection so will still be limited by the speed of the single connection as it is now. 

That's what i was worried about.  Right now we're so far grandfathered in to a shit ATT line that if we dropped it now theres a 99% chance we couldn't even get it back.  Definitely can't get another one, in fact we have two phone lines, but they said it wasn't gonna happen.

[Oshino Shinobu]

Just now, Silly Ducklings said:

That's what i was worried about.  Right now we're so far grandfathered in to a shit ATT line that if we dropped it now theres a 99% chance we couldn't even get it back.  Definitely can't get another one, in fact we have two phone lines, but they said it wasn't gonna happen.

Yeah, without getting two lines and therefore two different connections from your ISP (your devices won't even be on the same local network with two lines in), anything you do the limit or separate the network is going to be local. 

 

If your sister is okay with it, installing a network limiter program to prevent her computer/devices from using all of the bandwidth is probably the best way. If she's not, you should probably talk to her about working something out rather than just doing it. 

[Silly Ducklings]

5 minutes ago, Oshino Shinobu said:

Yeah, without getting two lines and therefore two different connections from your ISP (your devices won't even be on the same local network with two lines in), anything you do the limit or separate the network is going to be local. 

 

If your sister is okay with it, installing a network limiter program to prevent her computer/devices from using all of the bandwidth is probably the best way. If she's not, you should probably talk to her about working something out rather than just doing it. 

Even if she would be ok with that, which I doubt very seriously (i've had about 5 conversations with her about installing a throttling program on her laptop, none of which ended well), most of her time on the internet is spent either on her iphone or apple TV, and I doubt very seriously I could find something like NetLimiter for those.  I guess my only option is to find a really beefy router with some A+ firmware so i can throttle her then, any suggestions?

 

Edit - I realised after posting how terrible "so i can throttle her" sounded, but you have to understand that this has been a problem for years, and that everyone in my house agrees with me.  Also, everyone who does internet intensive activities will be throttled, not just her. (she's just 90% of those activities sadly)

[m0k]

depending on your router you can just create a separate SSID for a guest wifi

its easy on all asus and netgear routers 

[BubblyCharizard]

most decent routers have a QOS option, in which you can prioritize VOIP and gameplay over anything else

[Bruno_A]

Change the wi-fi password and pee on her to show dominance.

[BlueCrazii]

8 minutes ago, bruny06 said:

Change the wi-fi password and pee on her to show dominance.

We aint talking about dogs here lol

[Bruno_A]

2 minutes ago, BlueCrazii said:

We aint talking about dogs here lol

I was joking. Didn't mean to offend anyone.  

[Donut417]

If push comes to shove see if your router supports DDWRT. QoS options work on it. Plus you can prioritize services that you want. Other wise try to find a better internet provider. As your isnt cutting it. 

[hammer3339]

Pretty much it's just the old internet chestnut of "get good internet" getting a better plan/ prioritizing your games services or banning her device from the network are basically the only real solutions. 

[Silly Ducklings]

6 minutes ago, Donut417 said:

If push comes to shove see if your router supports DDWRT. QoS options work on it. Plus you can prioritize services that you want. Other wise try to find a better internet provider. As your isnt cutting it. 

I've thought of a 3rd party firmware, but as far as I can tell the two most popular ones (tomato and DD-WRT) don't support my R7500. (I think openwrt does, but that one seems a bit over my head TBH, so I'd rather go with the more popular options if possible) 

 

If I could have 2 gigabit, even if it cost 400 a month, i'd have it.  The money isn't the issue, the area is.  I'll probably just have to get another router and load some firmware that actually does something onto it, as the dynamic QoS from netgear doesn't seem to do much.

[KuJoe]

I would personally avoid QoS on the router, most consumer routers handle it poorly.

 

What I would do is split your connection into two with two managed switches (router to both switches) and set the speeds on the switch's uplink ports (switches handle QoS much better than routers because of the ASIC processors).

 

                                 /-------------Switch1--------Your sister's connection

Modem -------- Router  

                                 \-------------Switch2--------Your connection

 

Disregard my post, I thought you could specify the upload/download speeds on a switch like you could a router. If you are both on wireless though Ubiquiti's hotspots have some good bandwidth management options.

Edited August 15, 2017 by KuJoe
I was incorrect.

[Silly Ducklings]

3 minutes ago, KuJoe said:

I would personally avoid QoS on the router, most consumer routers handle it poorly.

 

What I would do is split your connection into two with two managed switches (router to both switches) and set the manage the speeds on the switch's uplink ports (switches handle QoS much better than routers because of the ASIC processors).

 

                                 /-------------Switch1--------Your sister's connection

Modem -------- Router  

                                 \-------------Switch2--------Your connection

Never considered that, do you have any suggestions on what switches I should be looking at?  I don't want to break the bank, but I'm afraid if I spend $30-40 bucks on a small switch I'll end up with the same problem I have now, so any tips would be greatly appreciated.