A rather confusing Internet problem

I've been having a rather odd problem for a long time now.

Basically it can be described as insane packet losses after X hours of using the Internet. This is usually noticable in that I am unable to download zip or rars after these X hours because they will always be corrupted. A more visual sign of the problem is that images start to fail loading, as in  they switch color and position of the image data while rendering them in the browser. Sometimes a reload fixes it, sometimes it takes 50 reloads to get the image correct. While browsing you can also run into parts of html code being lost so layout of pages become garbled.

This all usually end with my firewall in the end get the html part completely dead, as in it reports "html stuff is turned off, please reboot" and I am unable to open any page in a browser.


My only clue so far is that it seems to be sped up by downloading, either normally through browser or by jdownloader or by torrents. It can happen without downloading, but usually have less chance of happening then.

A pure guess from my end have been that my network card overheats, but that a mere reboot would cool it down so much that it lasts another set of hours seems a bit odd.

So I thought I'd just throw my problem out here and see if anyone has a clue. I haven't found any information on the Internet, but then I'm not sure what to really search for.

If any form of information is needed I can give it. Currently I can only think of the following things to mention that I have.

- utorrent (latest)
- firefox 3.X, noscript plugin
- Windows XP professional
- Symantec Firewall
- D-link Airplus G+ DWL-G520+ Wireless PCI network card

Some routers and modems with virgin media needed upgrading because the amount of connections a torrent opens was making it shit itself. If it's the router you have to keep resetting then that's probably part of the problem. Also, install ubuntu

Also rebooting the computer would bear out this scenario as all connections would obviously be dropped

I'm not resetting the router, I think that one is fine. I'm actually sharing it with others in my family and they have never spoken of this problem.

The other person using torrents is sitting right next to the router though and uses a cable connection instead of wlan, which I guess makes it possible that it is my network card that just get choked by connections.

I actually just got the problem to return and was running the usual things. 1 firefox with a bit high amount of open tabs (like 40+), Final Fantasy XI, and jdownloader (which was mostly just downloading 1 file and waiting the usual 15 min on rapidshare for a second download).

I guess the easiest test is just to change network card or plug in some cable, but they never like cables running across the house.

let us know how it goes