How do I troubleshoot my son's choppy Zoom video call connection over Comcast cable?
My kids depend on our Zoom calls working. We have been struggling lately with all of us in the house and sharing our Comcast internet connection in West Chester, PA. Video tends to go from perfect quality to low quality at random. Nobody is on the wifi at the time, or there are at least no large streams.
If two of our kids are doing Zoom calls at the same time, I do notice it happen more regularly. Is this really a bandwidth problem? How do I check it? Is there something wrong with the WIFI?
We have Comcast 1G service along with the in-home security protection package. The wifi box is located in the office upstairs and the kids mostly do their Zoom calls from the dining room or living room on the main level.
I feel embarrassed for my kids as they seem to always be the trouble children when it comes to disruptions from Zoom issues. Please help!!
Answers ( 1 )
Hi Samantha,
It sounds like you're doing all the right things. If you have Comcast 1G service, it is likely that you're at least paying for the network speeds you need to keep a Zoom call going at high quality. Video quality on Zoom calls is rarely an issue with Zoom itself. It's often a misnomer and many people think the issue is within the app.
The issues usually boil down to some combination of the following:
Troubleshooting the Issue -
Network Connection Speed
Number 1 is usually the easiest to fix, and also to test. First, you should know what is the download/upload speed provisioned by your ISP. Comcast's 1Gig service is typically provisioned at 930Mbps/35Mbps Down/Up. This is their top-of-the-line connection and is normally more than enough for 90% of typical households before the pandemic hit. Post-pandemic? That is another story entirely. See the traffic mix discussion below.
To verify you're getting what you pay for, go to http://speedtest.net and run a speed test. You should ideally do this from a computer hard wired into your main home router to take your WiFi connection out of the picture. If the results are well below what you're supposed to be getting, call Comcast or your ISP to let them know and ask them to send out a service technician.
WiFi problems -
This is where it gets very tricky. The hardest thing to troubleshoot is typically the wifi connection. Try the following: Take your laptop from room to room, especially troublespot areas, and run the speed test above. If it's better and closer to your purchased speeds than other rooms, then you've likely got a wifi signal strength issue.
If there are parts of the house that are just dead zones, you're likely going to need to purchase a WiFi mesh solution from Google, Orbi, or Plume. All are great and should suit your needs. I won't dive into the details of these, but any solution should handle most internet connections today.
For more in-depth troubleshooting of your home WiFi connection, feel free to take a look at this question and discussion. Several of our Sages go through possible culprits and throw out ideas to improve your in-home experience.
Google/Nest Wifi on Amazon -
https://www.amazon.com/Google-Nest-Wifi-Router-Generation/dp/B07YMJ57MB/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=nest+wifi&qid=1613790133&sr=8-3
Orbi by Netgear -
https://www.amazon.com/NETGEAR-Orbi-Ultra-Performance-Whole-System/dp/B01K4CZOBS/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=orbi+wifi&qid=1613790184&sr=8-3
Plume Pods -
https://www.plume.com/homepass/blog/meet-the-superpod-plume-membership
Traffic Mix Problems
The last one in your list has to do with the fact that many service providers provision their connections with high download speeds but slower upload speeds. Cable companies like Comcast, Charter, and Cox are especially susceptible to this problem as their installed infrastructure has aging technology that limits their ability to deliver high upload speeds today. This has traditionally not been a problem since most internet traffic was a download to your house.
With the advent of Zoom schooling, however, and with so many people now teleworking and joining conference calls from home, the upload bandwidth requirements have exploded. This could definitely be your problem.
If the network connection speed is high and your wifi signal is strong throughout the house, then you're likely just hitting the upload max speeds for Comcast. A single Zoom high definition (HD) call can take up to 3.0Mbps per call. If your connection speed is around 10 Mbps or even 35 Mbps, you can see slowness and choppy video when an HD call is going. It will only get worse as more HD calls are operating within your house. Count the number of simultaneous calls going in your house when you have the most degraded experience and it will likely correlate very highly.
If you can't add more upload bandwidth, you could seek out another ISP that provides fiber to the home connectivity like Verizon FIOS where they have symmetric upload and download speeds. This helps solve most of the problems we see today.