Sorry for the delayed response, but I've had a particular busy week so far.
Taking advice from whomever I get it, and trying a few things, but no luck so far.
So this week I connected to a different ISP. They're speed was 50mbs down and 15mbs up, and I still had the same problem. On Friday I gave up after 40min to try and load a CC game, I tried both ISP and both had the same problem.
I think we can rule out that the internet is the problem.
Next thing will be to install the launcher on another PC at home and see what it does in peak times.
I will try and answer a few of the questions above hereafter. Thanks everyone for trying to help.