Troubleshooting
Guides to troubleshooting.
Perform Speed Test
About
From time to time there will be connection issues when working from home to work resources. Here are a few simple steps to perform to help isolate the problem prior to calling the Help Desk to know whether to contact your ISP or not.
Speed Test
When internet slowness or network drops are occurring, the first thing to check is a speed test to identify what types of download and upload speeds exist on your network. If the speeds are below the optimal range, you may experience subpar performance.
Disconnect from VPN
If you are connected to Global Protect, you will first want to disconnect to ensure when the tests are performed they are using only your internet. Please "Disconnect" from the VPN if it is connected.
SpeedOfMe Test
The results of the test will show as they are being performed. Our recommendation on the internet speed (aka: download) should be around 20Mbps or greater. The upload speed should be around 5Mbps or greater.
If either of these speeds are lower that those benchmarks or indicate "Kbps" (which is lower than 1Mbps), then the first issue to resolve is the slow internet speeds. Often times, the ISP has some network congestion or network outage that is causing the slowness to occur and will be beyond the scope of the Help Desk to fix.
Our recommendation is to contact your ISP for troubleshooting or verification of any outage in your area and work with your Manager or Supervisor on what alternative work locations you have access to if the problem can not be resolved by your ISP.
If both of these speeds are in-line with the proper results, a call to the Help Desk for additional troubleshooting would be appropriate.
Sponsored Links Are Blocked
When searching for information on search engines like Google, you may run into a notification that a page has been blocked because of Ad Blocking:
The page that you’re trying to reach is most likely allowed. What’s blocked, in this case, is the Google sponsored link that takes you to that page as an advertisement. We made the choice to disallow online advertising links because, increasingly, they are used to lure people to fake websites that either deliver malicious software or harvest user credentials or other personal information.
In the example search below for a common consumer electronic, the links highlighted in red, which are indicated as being "Sponsored" will result in a message like the above. Scrolling down to the links in green, however, will work just fine and allow you to visit the page.
You'll notice that both the Sponsored and the non-Sponsored results appear to lead to https://www.apple.com, but the links in the red section are all advertisements that will count an ad impression on Google's servers first, and that is what is being blocked.
In any search, scrolling down beyond the Sponsored links should allow you to get to the page you want to see without needing to file a request to unblock anything.