A speed test will help you see the speed, quality and performance of your Internet connection. In order to do a proper internet speed test, there are two simple things you need:

  1. A laptop or desktop computer that is capable of being hard-wired to the router
  2. One internet/ethernet cable to be used to hardwire said laptop or desktop computer

Now, you may be wondering, “can’t I do the speed test over Wi-Fi?” and the answer is a bit tricky. You CAN do the test over Wi-Fi. HOWEVER, the Tech Support Team here at InfoWest does not recommend testing this way. The reason for this is that a speed test done over Wi-Fi cannot test the full capability of your connection. This is because when you are testing your connection over the wireless, and you move into a different room, your speeds will be affected by interference from having to go through the walls of your home or business. This interference causes a loss of speeds and is unreliable to accurately measure your connection. For this reason, we recommend testing over a hard-wired connection.

Once you have both of those items, we can begin testing. First things first, we need to hook up the computer. Make sure the internet/ethernet cable is firmly in the ethernet port on your computer. If you are using a laptop, and it does not have an ethernet port, ask a friend or family member if you can borrow their computer if theirs has an ethernet port. Once you have the cable firmly plugged into the computer, the next step is to plug it into the router. On the router, you will see 4 ethernet ports clumped side by side. These may be black in color, or be labelled with the numbers 1 through 4. Plug the other end of the cable into any of these 4 ports.

Second thing to do is to head over to speedtest.infowest.com, and run the test. You will want to run it a total of 3 times for consistency. Record your results on a piece of paper, on your phones notepad or, etc. Compare these speeds to your plan speeds. If you are seeing speeds less than what you should be getting, please give us a call. Once connected to your local InfoWest Technical Support team member, remember to mention that you have run speed tests following this guide. This will help our team members in narrowing down the source of the problem. Let’s keep your InfoWest Internet performing at optimum speed. Run an InfoWest speed test today!