Fluorescent Lights Interfering with my Internet

[TekkyTG]

My parents own a pretty big thrift store in a pretty small town. I live in the back of the store. My ping is usually (average) about 50 in Fortnite, but there's one major problem. When the fluorescent lights are on, my ping goes from 30-40-50 to 600+ and often above a thousand even.  even late at night, if even a single light gets turned on in my house (which only has fluorescent lights) my ping hits unplayable and there's no chance of me winning a game (There is only one internet service in town, Windstream, and there is a new contract for four times speed the company could buy but they don't want to spend the money on it btw). I've lost so many matches from my parents simply turning a light on so they can get a cup of water out of the break room it's not even funny. I'm hooked up via Ethernet on a 3 foot cat 5e cable through a wall straight to the router. I'm also supposed to get an upgrade on my speed from 20mb per second to 100mb per second on the 3rd, but that obviously won't fix my problem, but it will definitely help. I've done my research and discovered that the fluorescent lights cause RFI interference with the internet, even though I'm hooked via Ethernet. My security system and credit card register are both on Ethernet as well. Apparently if I upgraded to cat7 with shielding this could be solved, but some people say I'd have to buy cables for everything in my house for it to completely work... and some people even say if I buy the cables but don't put protection on the internet port itself I'll wind up worse than ever because the RFI will back up on the port and then flood my internet... Anyone an expert on this that could help me out?

[Snipergod87]

Only thing i can think of are shielded cables, you can try shielding the cable(s) from your comptuer to your router and modem only first.

Another thing to be concerned about is if it is coax internet shielding on that, some coax lines are quad shielded, some are not, but it could also be far enough away from the lights that it doesn't matter.

 

Alternatively change the fluorescent lights to LED, I believe they have ones that work with ballasts if you are using the tubes.  You can suggest that to your parents as saving energy as well.  You could also try and get them to start off small and just doing the areas where the networking is close by.

[Piru_Ma]

Could you wrap your ethernet cable with heavy duty foil as a test?

[TekkyTG]

Not a bad idea, but what do you mean by foil? Kitchen aluminum foil?

[TekkyTG]

21 minutes ago, Snipergod87 said:

Only thing i can think of are shielded cables, you can try shielding the cable(s) from your comptuer to your router and modem only first.

Another thing to be concerned about is if it is coax internet shielding on that, some coax lines are quad shielded, some are not, but it could also be far enough away from the lights that it doesn't matter.

 

Alternatively change the fluorescent lights to LED, I believe they have ones that work with ballasts if you are using the tubes.  You can suggest that to your parents as saving energy as well.  You could also try and get them to start off small and just doing the areas where the networking is close by.

That actually really helps. I was actually thinking about googling anti-RFI fluorescent lights or something already, so that'd be cool!

[mariushm]

You don't have to buy Cat7 cable.

You can buy cat5e , cat6, cat6a  but the keywords are FTP or STP or SFTP cable , basically ethernet cables with insulating foil or mesh around the twisted pairs.

 

Here's a list with filters pre-applied for you: https://www.digikey.com/short/pc04jj

 

Even the cheapest in that list is insulated throughout, and when plugged in it makes contact with the metal of your pc which normally is grounded, if you plugged your pc in a grounded mains socket.

 

[porina]

I'd try to isolate which side is susceptible to the interference, your home network side, or the ISP side. Have you tried a different cable on your side? If the router supports wifi, is that affected?

 

Does the high ping only happen as a light is switched on, or is it bad continuously as long as the light is on? For the first instance, a different starter might help, but this is a wild guess. Can try replacing magnetic ballast with electronic ones for example.

[TekkyTG]

It's constant, and it even lasts a few minutes after the lights are turned off again, porina. mariushm, that's a great list. I'll most likely be buying a new cable soon.

[Snipergod87]

Also something to figure out is if the latency happens inside or outside the network, when the lights are on try pinging your gateway (usually 192.168.1.1) and something like googles DNS servers 8.8.8.8.

 

If the high latency is only when leaving you network than its the connection to the modem from the router (if separate) and the connection to the outside world.

If its high for everything than its at least internal as well.

[TekkyTG]

The modem and router are one device.

[TekkyTG]

My gateway's ping was 1ms, and with all my lights on in my store my ping for Google was 800+

[TekkyTG]

Oh, and do you know what TTL stands for? For my gateway it was 64, and for Google's DNS it was 120.

[Snipergod87]

Time to live, not important for this test.

So the issue is not your ethernet, but the line leaving your modem.  However that is being routed through your house probably has it close to the lighting, and may not be easy to change

 

I am assuming it is Coax (cable), it may not affect TV's due to different frequencies being used.

 

I only really see a few good options

Replace fluorescent with LEDs (since its a business there may be a discount from the state or what not)

Change the route the coax cables goes (might not be possible)

If the coax cable isn't already shielded then get one that is shielded, but I have seen even quad shielded coax cables get plenty of interference.

Move the modem to a different coax connection to see if any better (but unlikely)

[TekkyTG]

Well, my ceiling is a false ceiling with the real one about 3 feet above it. I'm pretty sure the internet is running on top of the false ceiling (classic commercial ceiling tiles with metal grids) and my brother (who used to install internet) thinks the problem is in the metal grids that the internet cable is setting on, which would explain why I still have the problem with Wi-Fi and turning off the lights near my computer and router brings my ping down to 200 from 800 if all the other lights are still on.

[TekkyTG]

I talked to my mom and she's thinking about moving to LED bulbs, but she plans to look into it more.