Question about powerline - why is upload faster than download?

[Hudlum]

Newbie here, first post as well.

Here is my setup:
Just got Fios in April with their latest Actiontec router and 75/35 service situated in the living room.
Have a D-Link av500 Powerline Adapter going to Actiontec LAN port
Have other D-Link av500 Powerline Adapter going to the office about 25 feet away and that goes to an Asus RT-N56U router.
My PC in the office with gigabit LAN connects to a LAN port on the RT-N56U
Using CAT5/CAT6 on all connections

I check my speed thru verizon speedtest and speakeasy and I get a little less than 30Mbps DL but get around 38Mbps UL. It doesn't make sense to me.

I try same test with a PC directly connected to the Actiontec and get the expected 78Mbps/38Mbps results.

I know that ethernet is faster than powerline, so I do think it's the Powerline that's slowing it down. I just don't understand why it's only affecting DL speed and not UL speed. I figured that the powerline will affect both DL and UL.

Am I missing something?

 

[thiggins]

I frequently find different up and downlink throughput with powerline and wireless devices. Not sure of the exact cause, but it is not unusual behavior.

 

[Hudlum]

Thanks, Tim. I just find it odd that my download speed was cut in over half
(78 vs 29 Mbps) but my upload speed was hardly affected when comparing the 2 PCs. In fact, I think I can upload faster from the Powerline PC if not throttled by Verizon.

At times my download speeds are actually worse - I've seen it in the teens - depending on time of day.

 

[thiggins]

I think I was answering a different question.

If you want to see whether your powerline adapters are limiting throughput, don't use Internet based tests. Just put a PC at either end of a powerline connection and drag and drop a large (multi-megabyte to Gigabyte) file and look at what Windows reports. Do this in both directions.

500 Mbps powerline varies over distance more than 200 Mbps. Look at these throughput vs. location plots for a few 500 Mbps powerline devices. Throughput starts out high, but drops off to less than half the full rate.