Playstation online suddenly has packet loss. Resetting to factory settings makes no difference

[#1]

For about three weeks now whilst playing the Playstation online I have been experiencing extreme lag. The Playstation network warns of packet loss whenever it lags, which is around every 20-seconds seconds of play.

Using a Plusnet Hub2. The same setup has been working perfectly fine for almost two years, and nothing seemingly changed 3 weeks ago to cause this trouble in the network/packet loss.

I have full fibre and tested the wifi speed on my macbook beside the playstation which averages 450mb down and 80mb up. No other device in my home seems to be experiencing network problems.

I have restarted the router a dozen times. Left it off overnight. Reset it to factory settings. Nothing seems to work... any ideas?

[#2]

Packet loss can happen in multiple places:

- in your home network

- your end of the link, if too many bandwidth hungry users are competing at home for the link

- the FAR end of the link, ditto (but probably less likely, as they will have probably optimised a lot of settings to prevent loss)

- in 'the core'... that great catch-all that means anything between the other end of your link and the other end's link.

- in the bit between "the core"  and your broadband 

So, what do I mean by that last bit? Well, the kit in the street boxes, where multiple users are "joined together" to head off towards the core. This was a big issue a few years ago, when we had lower-speed ADSL, and the "onward links" were a bit limited in their capacity... depending on how much you paid, and who you were with, and home vs business, then the <total of user bandwidth> vs <upstream bandwidth> might be anywhere between 50:1 and 5:1

Packet loss happens when there's not enough bandwidth for everyone. Unlike cars on the road, which will just join an ever increasing queue, the internet just "drops packets": in most cases, the end-user's kit takes this as a hint to "go slower"

Things SHOULD be better with "super high speed fibre", but do you REALLY believe that there's a 1:1 ratio between the users and the upstream links? Of course not. However, "on average" there's (probably) enough capacity.

Of course, if a few new customers have joined in in your area, then there might be a slight slowdown.

More fundamentally, is your Mac and Playstation on a WIRED connection, or on Wifi? If on Wifi, then what speed is the WiFi negotiating? It could be as simple as that. That is why we say time & time again: if it's important, plug it in with ethernet. 

[#3]

Thanks Paul - I've purchased an ethernet cable to try later on.

I don't personally think it's a wifi issue. When I speedtest my Macbook right beside the playstation it's averaging 450mb down/80 up.

If connecting to Ethernet doesn't solve the issue what would be my next move? Contact Plusnet?

If connecting to Ethernet does solve it then what would be my next move? I need to connect to Wifi... Contact Plusnet?

[#4]

@QuinnChop If your MacBook works correctly, the issue is with the Playstation.

[#5]

Is there any way for me to test packet loss on my Macbook? 

The Playstation connects to wifi fine, updates/downloads fine + fast. It's just intermittent lag whilst playing games due to packet loss

[#6]

Is there any way for me to test packet loss on my Macbook? 

I honestly don't know, I've never had one, but I do know Macbooks/Chromebooks have  some 'limitations' compared to a normal laptop.

However, if your Macbook doesn't appear to suffer the same issues, as the signal is still coming via the same connection, it could be down to whatever servers the Playstation connects to, which will not be the same.

[#7]

@QuinnChop 

packet loss could be a symptom of a busy network, other than gaming what are other users of your WiFi (internet connection) doing?

Are there any cloud saves occurring, someone streaming using something like iPlayer, ITVX, Netflix, Amazon?

You may not notice packet loss on the MAC as the applications are not so critical, unlike a game they may be reporting packet loss.

Are both the PlayStation and MAC using the same WiFi band 2.4 or 5 GHz? Wireless congestion where many transmitted Wireless signals are using the same channel is also unhelpful, 5 GHz may be less busy due to range limitations for that frequency

This link https://packetlosstest.com/ tests for packet loss, in the test screen you can select Preset and Server location

HTH

[#8]

If anyone in the future comes to this thread with the same issue... I've solved it.

My PS5 was picking the wifi frequency automatically and had changed fro 5Ghz to 2.4Ghz severl weeks ago, for unknown reasons. I've forced it to use 5Ghz and now it runs smoothly again 

[#9]

Thanks for the update! It's amazing that such a simple thing can have such an effect.

(Of course, put your PlayStation onto Ethernet, and you won't have that problem again 🙂 )