After fiber-optic internet finally arrived in my neighborhood, I did what any broadband nerd would do: brag about my new superfast speeds on social media. Screenshots showed downloads of nearly 1 gigabit per second, about 10 times faster than my previous connection. That is the equivalent of streaming over 200 Zoom calls at 1080p, high-definition resolution—all at the same time.

To my surprise, I started receiving disappointed DMs from friends and family. “I have the same provider. Did you pay extra?” “How did you get that speed? Mine’s so slow.” “Ugh, I’m having a lot of connectivity issues with my fiber.” I put my personal-tech-support hat on and got to work. The root of their issues? Old home-networking equipment.

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