after an hour of technical investigation, i can only conclude that at LEAST one of the following is true
1) the internet is bad
2) my ISP is bad
3) my internet connection is bad
4) my router is bad
5) my network adapter is bad
6) my computer is bad
7) I'm bad
i think i've narrowed it down to "i live in the middle of a city and every single 2.4 GHz channel is completely congested but 5 GHz is fine, however for some reason my computer and router don't want to connect over 5 GHz sometimes" which i have somehow fixed by setting the router's 2.4 GHz channel to the channel with the MOST interference, so that it forces 5 GHz? i have no idea if this is happening but now i'm getting 100 Mbps again. so.. maybe time to set up the 5 GHz AP with its own SSID
@jk 5ghz gets absorbed and reflected a lot easier so it's harder to actually use in other rooms
@Nine well, the range 802.11ac devices are allowed to use is on the x axis, it's split into channels to make it easier for devices to avoid each other. But if there's not many devices around, they can use a wider part of the spectrum to transmit more data, the parts of the spectrum the devices can use are the hills
also on some channels 5GHz migh get interference with weather radar, afaik routers are required by law to back off when they see that, so that's fun
@noiob why did you delete that reply i actually understood that XD
@Nine it wasn't correct, it's not "louder" but "at more frequencies"
@noiob oh, well, still, it defintely made sense. my brain just sorta turned to mush by the second or third use of "devices" for some reason.
@noiob ...that would make an amazing sticker
@Nine you can geet it on a shirt https://topatoco.com/collections/jeph-jacques/products/qc-devices
@Nine @kyra @jk at certain points in the spectrum, if there's not much else going on, you can use more bandwidth (basically use multiple channels)