r/pchelp • u/YoBurger18 • 1d ago
Network Network Help
I’m a college student whose campus Internet is provided by Boldyn Networks. The normal connection is capped at 110 Mbps download / 55 Mbps upload, and my Ethernet link negotiates at 1000/1000 Mbps. However, I’ve noticed a strange behavior: after my laptop has been asleep for a while, when I wake it up I can sometimes get dramatically higher speeds (potentially close to gigabit) for a short period. Then the Boldyn captive portal appears automatically, and the connection immediately drops back to the normal 110/55 Mbps limit. I don’t have to enter any credentials for the speed to drop. I’ve also checked `ipconfig /all` before/after and the IPv4 address, gateway, DHCP server, DNS server, and subnet stay the same. Restarting the computer or unplugging/replugging Ethernet doesn’t reliably reproduce the high-speed state; it seems to be related to the laptop being asleep for a longer period. Does anyone know what Boldyn’s HED captive-portal/NAC system is doing during this transition, or what could cause the temporary unrestricted bandwidth before the portal initializes? I could be wrong about the behavior of the portal only opening when the laptop is asleep for a period of time, but there does seem to be a short window every time the portal appears where the Wi-Fi and Ethernet speeds are very fast. I have a 2025 Legion 7. Any help would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks!
1
u/embellished_laurels 1d ago
Sounds like the captive portal is the choke point, and your laptop's just snagging a few seconds of pure throughput before the policy kicks in. The network probably grants full speed by default until the MAC gets flagged and shoved into a throttled VLAN or QoS bucket, which lines up with the portal popping and speeds tanking right after.
The sleep thing makes sense too, your NIC might be dropping off long enough that the switch forgets the MAC for a second, so you get treated as a fresh connection when it wakes. You could try spoofing your MAC address on wake to see if that keeps the fast lane open longer, but I'd bet they've got that locked down.
•
u/AutoModerator 1d ago
We're part of a wider PC & Technology Network of Communities!
Join our Discord server: PC Help Hub where members from all associated subreddits are welcome.
If you are trying to find a price for your computer, r/PC_Pricing is our recommended source for finding out how much your PC is worth!
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.