There is a lot of debate about whether or not the patcher is broken. For me, about 90% of the time, it works perfect. Last patch and this patch, not so much. I have a 6mb down, and I'm lucky to get 200k down. Some people use 3rd party torrent programs instead; and even though I have never seen SE -say- you aren't allowed to 1.) technically its a violation of the terms of service, 2.) they always delete threads about how to do it.

Personally, today, 3rd party programs actually running slower for me, so I am using the patcher. You CAN set up port forwarding on your modem/router, and see if that helps. It does help a LOT of people (sometimes it helps me, other times it doesn't seem to matter). You can search the forums here or google search "FF14 Port Forwarding" to find a how-to.