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tylerl's avatar
tylerl
New Contributor
11 years ago

Cox Arizona and YouTube

Dear Cox,

Either you're purposefully throttling YouTube, or your local YouTube content cache / distribution point is horrifically under-powered. YouTube videos on all devices connected through Cox stream only at the lowest possible resolution, and even then it takes 5 to 10 minutes to get through a 30-second video. I wish that was an exaggeration. It's not. This problem is persistent over the past several weeks at least, though varies by time-of-day.

And I know with 100% certainty that the problem is, in fact, Cox, and specifically Cox's connection and local cache of YouTube, because when I connect directly to YouTube from Cox, the connection is terrible. But if instead I tunnel my traffic from Cox here in Arizona to a personal server in Texas or Atlanta or New York or London, and then back to YouTube, HD videos play at full speed with no issues at all (over the SAME cable connection). I can stream even Ultra-HD 4K content from YouTube as long as Cox doesn't know it's coming from YouTube.

So, to recap:
Cox Cable Arizona -> Youtube   -- Telegraph-era Slow
Cox Cable Arizona -> New York  -> YouTube  -- Blazing Fast

In case this is not terribly clear. DEAR COX: YOU ARE CAUSING THIS TROUBLE. STOP BREAKING THE INTERNET.

youtube speed cable

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  • tvmaster's avatar
    tvmaster
    New Contributor
    11 years ago

    you're not alone...this is also happening in Orange County, Ca.  Cox reps have stopped communicating with me over this, which would indicate I hit a nerve.  Strangely, between the hours of 11pm and 5pm, I can stream just about ANY HD content from Youtube.

    It would appear something is being one to the packets during prime time.  My Internet speed is fast, and ALL OTHER HD sites (Netflix, Vimeo, etc.) stream perfectly, 24 / 7.

    So, WHY is just Youtube being affected?

    lastly, if I access Youtube via either a VPN server, or a different provider, Youtube HD streams perfectly during prime-time.

    Cox upper-level (?) tech support promised to return my complaint, but have now disappeared.....nice service, Cox.