Hi charlie
Astral's covered a lot of it already, but just to expand.
>> which synchs solidly at 8128
>> Noise Margin of 11 db.
If thats the case your should get max speeds, however... does your SNR Margin vary throughout the day (most drop during the evenings), but as long as your SNR Margin doesnt drop too low then you should be ok.
>> My best is usually ~1.8 Mb/s
When did you get maxed? Are you still within your 10 day training period?
It could be that your bRAS profile hasnt been set correctly yet.
Have you been effected by a storm recently which could have caused your line to loose sync.
If so it could be 3-4 days before your line stabelises again. :/
Have you ever been able to get above 2Mb speeds (stuck bRAS profile).
>>> have suggested that I power cycle the router at least once a day for the next few days
Normally if you have a good connection with good sync speeds IMHO you are best staying connected. However something is wrong somewhere so perhaps the DLM needs a kick start.
If I were you I would try during the ealier part of the day when line conditions are normally optimal. Dont do it too many times though or the DLM may think you are loosing sync. Once a day should be sufficient.
>> Is there a prog out there that estimates what download speed you should get with ADSL max?
Astrals covered that one... youd need to put your previous premax details (fixed 2Mb/1Mb etc) in
hereTheres no harm in seeing what BTw estimate your line is capable of . Put your phone no in the BTw checker
here.
The higher your speeds, the more variations start to occur on the line, and the SNR becomes more important. 8128 is pushing the limits for most phone lines on adsl. Most phone lines can easily cope with 488 kbpw.
Upstream uses lower frequencies than DownStream. The higher the frequency then its more likely to be affected by Noise. (Look up frequency bins if you want the real techy explanation).
>>> Is it realistic to expect speeds greater than 2Mb/s.
Finally theres the wonderful thing called contention. :/
IPStream adsl is sold as a shared resource to make it affordable for all. Therefore the maximum speeds you can acheive depends upon what other users at your exchange are doing with their connection. The more users using their connection at the same time as you.. and theres less available bandwidth for you.
On a good exchange and with good line conditions.. I would expect to see speeds between 3-4Mb at peak + 6Mb during the wee small hours of the morning.