Bandwidth hogs

[Nick_Jinn]

Just a thought....

If an ISP doesnt actually want you to use 3mbps, maybe they shouldnt advertise themselves as offering that much. If they dont want you downloading TBs of data per month, maybe they shouldnt sell you a package that has an upper limit of several TBs or hundreds of MBs. Maybe they should say what they mean and mean what they say, rather than talk big and deliver little.

The REAL plan would have a much lower number....and all ISPs should be required by law to advertise the MINIMUM speeds, not the 'up to' speeds which the modems or servers wont actually allow, except in short bursts of a second or two for loading images.....you can actually download a little under 1 mbps if you purchase a 6 or 12 mbps plan, with short bursts for loadng pages, and you can expect it to slow down even more during peak hours if you live in a populated area.....and if you use more than 50 gb per week, thats your limit.


But they want to advertise these HUGE bandwidths, and 'stupid fast' speeds that they have no intention of delivering.....then they get furious when you actually use it.


As much as the cell phone plans now SUCK and have become unviable as broadband solutions, at least they are honest about what they are willing to provide....5gb a month. Thats your limit. Take it or leave it....If only Comcast, charter and the DSL companies could be that honest...but they wont. The first person to introduce that is the first person to see their customers jump ship as people want the better deal, even if they dont actually use it.....they dont know the difference between 50 tb or 50 mb, they just know that one company is offering double the bandwidth, so it must be the better deal. lol. Not if you dont need it, and not if you are not allowed to use it.


Traffic control, limiting certain classes of uses, like people who use TORRENTS for perfectly valid reasons, like downloading an ISO for a perfectly legal OS, should not be targeted just because an ISP has no intention of delivering what they sell you.

[Dustin2128]

my ISP advertised download speeds of 2 mb/s for my DSL internet package (not dsl lite). In reality my upper limit is 750kb/s. Upload speed's pretty well above average though, and I can do almost anything I want, torrents being the only thing I care about, and I'm glad its not as tyrannical as comcast.

[rabbotz]

go back to dial up? at least that way you would get close to the promised speed, maybe?

[Nick_Jinn]

If only I could say what was really on my mind.

[rabbotz]

If only I could say what was really on my mind.

whos stopping you?

[Dustin2128]

whos stopping you?

code of conduct maybe?

[rabbotz]

code of conduct maybe?

so say it politely?

[jmore9]

Here where i live i use comcast and they give me about 200 gigs a month. Now i am a huge downloader and i have yet to even come close to that limit.

As for the speed promised , my experience has shown it to be on the site you are visiting's end. For instance youtube only lets me go about 140 to 180. But i can go to archive.org and get up to 400.

My speed has depended on the sites i visit. Most today do not have the capacity for everyone to go wide open , imho.

it all makes one think what are you getting when you buy 8 or 10 meg speed packages, if a lot of your sites will not allow you to go that fast.
Bragging rights ?

[Legendary_Bibo]

I use Qwest and my parents pay for 12mbs and according to speed test I get 11.22mbs download, but my upload is atrocious. We only have 800kbs upload. I think the two xboxes currently running have an effect on that though. I think the speed for torrents is based on the seeders limiting their connection and the amount you're connected to.

[NightwishFan]

I have seen my debian server go to 1400-1600 kb/s downloading updates.

[poisonkiller]

My real speed differs from the advertised speed by 0.2 Mbit/s, so it's pretty good advertising. :)

[bigseb]

If only I could say what was really on my mind.
My interest has been pique'd...

[Frogs Hair]

Music players and web radio are my biggest hogs.

[Ojustaboo]

I pay for 50mbps and I get nearly that 24/7.

Costs me £28 a month (or £38 if I didn't also have their phone rental)

With Virginmedia in the UK, they badly traffic manage all their broadband tiers except for their top one where there's none at all.

Rumour has it they are testing 100mbps, which will mean they will introduce traffic management on their 50mbps, forcing me to pay more money for their faster service if I want a truly unmanaged service.

Will do a speedtest right now, back in a sec

http://www.speedtest.net/result/868751601.png (http://www.speedtest.net)

[Prefix100]

ISPs measure in bits rather than bytes though.

So advertised 8mb/s = 8000bits/s not 8000bytes/s.

At least that is what I have always thought.

[BuffaloX]

Your supplier must deliver as promised, otherwise it's false advertising.
I just changed my supplier, and in my order confirmation I got very precise information on what speed I could expect, based on the quality of my line, and with overhead subtracted.

Almost all ISPs in Denmark offer flat rate, which I think is nice. Administering caps and throttling is a completely unnecessary, and only serve to confuse the market and increase prices IMO.

AFAIK countries with a dominance of flat rate ISPs are generally cheaper than those using caps and throttle.

[rottentree]

Your supplier must deliver as promised, otherwise it's false advertising.


They usually secure themselves by including something along the lines of "You cannot complain unless get less than the minimum specified rate(which is much lower than the advertised one)." in the contract but I'm not complaining their service is almost 100% in tune to their promise.

[chriswyatt]

When I watch iPlayer it mysteriously slows down to a halt after 10 minutes, even if no one else is using the internet. I do wonder if there is some sort of capping going on there.

[McRat]

Capping is the duel-du-jour. Many in the internet based media scream "Caps are EVIL!", while ISP's try to figure out a way to give you good value for your dollar and still make a buck.

Most of your ISP's buy bandwidth from the Biggies, then resell it to you. If they buy too much bandwidth, your prices are too high. If they don't buy enough, you suffer when demand peaks during the day.

I have a feeling it will continue to migrate towards metered bandwidth. Why should an individual who uses a little subsidize somebody who uses a lot? Personally, I'd like to pay for what I use, not for somebody who hosts a pirate video site out of his house. And why should my neighbor who seldom uses the internet pay for my daily usage?

Here's a thought that will PO a lot of folk: I want the per-GB internet prices in my area to go UP. Why? I want more supplier options, and I want them to develop faster speeds. The US has tragically poor internet infrastructure compared to most of the developed world. Nothing sparks innovation as much as greed does.

[BuffaloX]

Capping is the duel-du-jour. Many in the internet based media scream "Caps are EVIL!", while ISP's try to figure out a way to give you good value for your dollar and still make a buck.

Here's a thought that will PO a lot of folk: I want the per-GB internet prices in my area to go UP. Why? I want more supplier options, and I want them to develop faster speeds. The US has tragically poor internet infrastructure compared to most of the developed world. Nothing sparks innovation as much as greed does.

You are not P-ing me off, you want better internet options, and are willing to pay, fair enough.
But consider this: Any industry will take whatever profits they can. If a business can take a 90% profit, without improving their product, they will. Higher prices/profits does not guarantee better products, competition and transparency does.

Caps may not always be evil, but they are generally undesirable for a number of reasons.

1: They muddle the market, making it harder to estimate which provider actually deliver the best product. This has been shown time and again, to decrease quality and increase prices, because competition is diverted away from quality to clever marketing.

2: It adds a layer of administration that does nothing to improve the final product.

3: Throttling may pave the way to destroy net neutrality.

4: It limits the ways some people use the Internet, and so causes a less rich Internet.

Never use an ISP that use cap and throttle if you have a reasonable alternative.

[Nick_Jinn]

BuffaloX is right on the money. Higher prices does not equal better service OR better working conditions or wages. Sometimes wages decrease as profits increase. The more they have the more they want, like a beast whose apatite is only stimulated the more it eats.

I am not convinced that Comcast or ATT are in the hole as far as their profits. I think they are still making a buck for all their complaints.


But if they have no intention of delivering what they promise, how about not promising it? How cayn you call someone a bandwidth hog when they use far less than 10% of the upper monthly limit? Something is wrong with this picture.

They justify the high prices then set some bandwidth cap of 14tb a month or something, but people who only download a few hundred gb a month are considered "hogs".....WTF? I cant stand the dishonestly and double speak.

Even assuming that they are charging a fair price for what they ACTUALLY offer (ignore the testing kits provided from their own sites, because they dont factor what the servers or modems allow in practice), they are liars and cheats for luring you in with a package that claims to be more than it is. Thats false advertising, even if other options are not better. Maybe I would have gone with DSL if I knew Comcast was going to cap me.

Yeah, I have comcast. I hear some of you talking about getting what you actually pay for, and to be honest I am a little jealous, even of those of you who only have DSL. It sounds like some of you are getting better torrent speeds with slower DSL than with my "faster" Comcast cable.



edit: I guess they made the limit much lower, but I dont ever use the limit. I guess people who do use even half of that limit are considered hogs.

[McRat]

Obviously the perfect scenario is to get bandwidth as fast and as cheap as possible. In the long run selling a "connection" works against the consumer.

Under the current structure, there is no incentive to improve speed other than competition for speed, which does not work in areas with no competition. If the commodity being sold was actual GB's of transfer, profits go UP when speed goes up. No speed increase? No more money. Bad reliability? Less profits. Slowdowns? Less profits. Today, slowdowns, downtime, poor connections, only affect the customer, not the provider.

Regardless of what the US gov't believes, less than 1/2 the USA has access to better than 3mbps speeds at under $400/month. Technologies in the pipe that require broadband saturation are going to be delayed in the US until somebody comes up with a system that makes it profitable to expand the coverage of true broadband (4mbps+).

PS - My speed is 30-50 mbps here. That's great. But what about 1/2 the USA that has under 4mbps? How are we going to fix that? Or is it "Every Man For Himself" or "Save me a Dollar, and I'll spit on my neighbor?" perhaps "Who cares about 10 years from now? As long as I'm happy today?"

http://www.speedtest.net/result/869056912.png (http://www.speedtest.net)

[Nick_Jinn]

1. Those "Speed Tests" do not reflect real speed. Those are theoretically speeds that the lines are capable of, not the speeds that their servers will deliver to you.

2. You are missing the point about false advertising. In fact, you have not properly addressed that issue at all. Why promise more if you are not willing to deliver?

Its like selling a small country for 700k USD, and you get there and you only get 4 acres of prime real estate....yeah, thats market rate, but you were promised the world. Whether the property is worth more or less than that 700k does not address the truth in advertisement issue. Whether its a fair price for what you get does not address the truth in advertisement debate. Whether having caps or not having caps is a good thing or bad thing does not address the truth in advertising issue. Get it?

3. You have not demonstrated that these companies are unable to meet the demand created by power users and still turn a profit, even from those power users.


4. When comcast came out, their theoretical upload speeds were still less than 500kbps, and I was paying for 12mb down and 2mb up. Thats the theoretical. The reality was poorer.

[Nick_Jinn]

Also, how is criticism the mega-corporations somehow anti-human being or pro-individualism to the point of spitting on your neighbor?

I have reason to believe that these companies are turning huge profits even before the bandwidth caps and could afford a few more lines and a few more servers and still come out ahead without screwing our neighbors....its greed. Not the greed of people who download music, its the greed of the corporations.


Comcasts profits are up up up. Dont tell me that I am the one screwing my neighbors. Thats a bunch of BS.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/tech/news/6848570.html

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/comcasts-quarterly-profit-rises-more-than-5


Look at the dates. Profits keep going up, but they are looking for an excuse NOT to add more lines or servers even as they get new customers....people who use their advertised and agreed upon speeds and bandwidths are the "problem", rather than comcast for not adding hardware accordingly.

Everyone should buy HUGE bandwidths and not use them, like half of America does, which is where we get this 'median' estimate for what people should be using.....Also, we should all go out and buy hummers and never go out in nature or carpool and not even have kids....like a big status symbol..FYI, I have nothing against hummers if you live in a rural cabin and grow your own food or work out in the desert, but I find it disgusting when people drive huge SUVs when they dont even have familys and detest the outdoors. My point is, this isnt a good way to judge what a reasonable amount of bandwidth is.

[LeifAndersen]

The University of Utah's connection is amazing. Over the summer, I can get ~5 MBps (not Mbps), and I think I could get more, but I have no need to try. During the school year, it's still really fast. (~1-2 MBps on average, although I'm downloading less during school. ;) ).

[Nick_Jinn]

Thats awesome. Maybe somebody broadband will be a free public utility.

[McRat]

Also, how is criticism the mega-corporations somehow anti-human being or pro-individualism to the point of spitting on your neighbor?

I have reason to believe that these companies are turning huge profits even before the bandwidth caps and could afford a few more lines and a few more servers and still come out ahead without screwing our neighbors....its greed. Not the greed of people who download music, its the greed of the corporations.


Comcasts profits are up up up. Dont tell me that I am the one screwing my neighbors. Thats a bunch of BS.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/tech/news/6848570.html

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/comcasts-quarterly-profit-rises-more-than-5


Look at the dates. Profits keep going up, but they are looking for an excuse NOT to add more lines or servers even as they get new customers....people who use their advertised and agreed upon speeds and bandwidths are the "problem", rather than comcast for not adding hardware accordingly.

Everyone should buy HUGE bandwidths and not use them, like half of America does, which is where we get this 'median' estimate for what people should be using.....Also, we should all go out and buy hummers and never go out in nature or carpool and not even have kids....like a big status symbol..FYI, I have nothing against hummers if you live in a rural cabin and grow your own food or work out in the desert, but I find it disgusting when people drive huge SUVs when they dont even have familys and detest the outdoors. My point is, this isnt a good way to judge what a reasonable amount of bandwidth is.

In 10 years, your TV, Phone, Videophone, Software, Games, Etc, will all require high-speed internet. And more jobs will be Home-Based. If it takes you 4 hours to download the Vista Service Pack 2, exactly how is that benefitting anyone except the electric company?

Trivia - A 56k phone modem will take over 23 hours to download Vista Service Pack 2. This will only climb as time goes on.

I just downloaded the XP SP III for a test, 316mb. It took 90 seconds though a wireless connection. Not sure what that works out with the overhead, but it's at least the 25mbps that I'm being sold.

As far as Hummers go, I like Hummers, but not 4x4 ones. ;)

[lostinxlation]

The REAL plan would have a much lower number....and all ISPs should be required by law to advertise the MINIMUM speeds, not the 'up to' speeds which the modems or servers wont actually allow, except in short bursts of a second or two for loading images.

The question is how to calculate the minimum speed. If you are on DSL, your theoretical minimum speed is 0 or close ot 0 bps, if the line is extremely noisy. I don't think it's useful to know that min speed is 0bps in a very extreme case, which is very unlikely to happen. If it's on cable, you share the same cable with others in your neighborhood and depedning on how many are on the internet at a time, your speed varies This means whenever your neighbors sign up the cable internet, your min speed changes and it ends up in the speed different from that the company said when you signed up and it makes knowing the min speed upon the sign-up meaningless.
I know what you mean by false ad, but I don't think it's practical to use the minimum speed to represent the connection.

[witeshark17]

Broadband should be a right as has been made so in Finland... Yup...:KS

[LeifAndersen]

I agree. I don't think it needs to be free...but everyone who wants it, should have the ability to get it, and for a fair cost, and if they can't pay for it at the moment, I think something should be worked out.

[neoargon]

The upload and download speed differences can be technological limitations . For eg in adsl technology, download speed is very much higher than upload speed.

[neoargon]

My isp offers 256kbps to 2mbps speed. I get 190-216 kbps . I came to the conclusion that what we get is
<what they offer>/10

[Sean Moran]

My isp offers 256kbps to 2mbps speed. I get 190-216 kbps . I came to the conclusion that what we get is
<what they offer>/10

It makes me wonder, when I'm meant to be running at 256/64 here in this hotel, but for some reason, the login page of the ISP - 192.168.1.50 or whatever - tells me I'm on 512/256. Still, the best I got for the first couple of days back last month was averaging around 150 kbs, and since their service karked it a couple of weeks ago, the average is around 50kbs on a good night, and in the 20s usually, not that there aren't frequent times throughout the 'peak-hour' day when single digit kbs is to be expected.

Then there's the amount of goop that so many web pages dish up with every click on a link to put up with. In 1998, I bought my first 33.6k modem and a dialup account. Download speeds back then were a consistent 4-6 kbs, and going from memory, it took around ten seconds from 'username' & 'password' to login to Yahoo! mail, at around 5kbs. Now the bandwidth is roughly ten times that of 1998, and I just tested the Yahoo! mail login time from 'username' & 'password' to 'Done.' for the inbox page: 70 secs at around 50kbs.

Technology it is, but I can't understand how anyone could call this online waste of time 'Information Technology' when it only caters to such a minority of the bandwidth hogs amongst the larger minority of online users as a subset of all people.

Tssk, tssk, Internet.

[elvinatom]

McRat, no offense intended, but I think you miss the point. I don't want mega fast for mega cheap. I want the be able to get what I need, not pay for what is "claimed" to cover it and then not receiving it. I have no problems here and I cannot complain. I actually do get what I pay for. But I hear it all the time: bandwidth is promised and then you get capped. Now that is NOT ok!

If those ISP are really having problems with too many people pulling TBs, give the consumer options: For a generic user contract you get 10GB/month. Silver gets 500GB, Gold gets 5TB and Platinum has no cap at 10MB/sec (for USD 250/month). That would be fair play as far as I am concerned. But marketing strategies don't seem to allow that. Marketing strategies seem to suggest it's better to sell unlimited and then making sure you don't take unlimited by applying discriminating measures.

[Xianath]

Bandwidth hogs are a fact of life, it's Pareto's Principle. You deal with them by allowing sufficient bandwidth to accommodate the 5-10% of the users to hog up 80-90% of it and still leave enough for the average Joe out there. It's always worked that way. I used to own and run a small ISP several years ago and had this logic built in my tc/thb based traffic shaper. Worked like a charm, customers were happy, and we did much better than the competition or the previous owners. We only put caps (and then only soft throttles on those) in the first two months until we could get our stats right, then it all went smooth.

Oh, and for trials and whiners, there's a separate, top-of-the-foodchain traffic class :) Everyone does it, there's simply no way I came up with the idea first.

That said, you should get what you pay for. Aren't there consumer organizations that can take care of your rights?

[McRat]

McRat, no offense intended, but I think you miss the point. I don't want mega fast for mega cheap. I want the be able to get what I need, not pay for what is "claimed" to cover it and then not receiving it. I have no problems here and I cannot complain. I actually do get what I pay for. But I hear it all the time: bandwidth is promised and then you get capped. Now that is NOT ok!

If those ISP are really having problems with too many people pulling TBs, give the consumer options: For a generic user contract you get 10GB/month. Silver gets 500GB, Gold gets 5TB and Platinum has no cap at 10MB/sec (for USD 250/month). That would be fair play as far as I am concerned. But marketing strategies don't seem to allow that. Marketing strategies seem to suggest it's better to sell unlimited and then making sure you don't take unlimited by applying discriminating measures.


None taken.

It does seem the industry standard today is to overstate true speed. Recently AT&T had a class-action suit against them that they lost. You can file for AT&T DSL rebates. They knew the peak speed was wrong, and they sold based on that number regardless. They used the # of the fastest successful connection in your area, even if your speed was capped lower inside the DSL modem. When they turned up your speed, it would go unstable and become useless, so they turned down the speed without notification.

Now that IMO is criminal theft. If I sell you 5 gallons of gasoline, or 100kwh's of electricity but only deliver 1/2 of it and try to hide the fact from you, that's no different than running a con-game.

The courts do not see deliberate theft by a corporation as a criminal activity, so it continues.

What I'm saying is that if what was sold was GB's (would be nice if it GB * speed factor, but straight GB would do), the accountants who run these corps would see service as a profit center instead of just overhead. The accountants would demand the infrastructure and speeds get improved to increase their bottom line.

I hear alot of stuff about how the companies should just "do better" in very vague terms. That is not working really well. So IMO they need to change a broken system instead of just wishing it was different.

[Jaecyn42]

I hear alot of stuff about how the companies should just "do better" in very vague terms.

Allow me to put this sentiment into more concrete terms, for you.

Instead shilling a truckload of money on re-branding as XFINITY, Comcast should make some actual investments into its infrastructure to improve the product/service.

Every since they (Comcast) bought out the local Mom and Pop cable company (Insight Media), upload and download speeds have gone done, network downtime is more frequent, channels have gone missing (not digitalized, just moved into higher prices tiers or discontinued completely), Tech Support no long understands the meaning of the phrase "I already reset the router, and the modem, twice." and, to top it all off, prices have consistently increased without any noticeable improvement to the quality of the product/service.

Thank heaven for the new corporate logo to make me THINK I'm actually doing business with a decent company.


/end rant

[elvinatom]

What I'm saying is that if what was sold was GB's (would be nice if it GB * speed factor, but straight GB would do), the accountants who run these corps would see service as a profit center instead of just overhead. The accountants would demand the infrastructure and speeds get improved to increase their bottom line.

agreed

[Nick_Jinn]

Everyone should see this. You may have a lawsuit coming your way, and not the measly 16 bucks. Opt out of that lawsuit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEQmIEoMUJY



Also some good commentary, but the top one is important.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVew2mwTbtw&feature=related

[Nick_Jinn]

This is also a good independent site that will test your speed.


Dont trust Comcasts site which will temporarily jack up the speed then slow it down again.


http://www.abeltronica.com/velocimetro/pt/?idioma=uk&newlang=uk

[McRat]

Best way for me is to monitor a large download. This tells me what to expect. One of the Service Packs from MS is a good speed test.

www.dslreports.com is pretty good, but the Java one sometimes goes nuts. Look under Tools. A lot of magazines use it.

SpeedTest might be high for systems that have "boost" for a few seconds of initial seeks, but is right more often than wrong.

[djinnkeeper]

Everything else aside, I think people just don't understand the difference between Mbits and Mbytes. ..maybe it is false advertisement in that the providers know that people will assume that 3mbit DSL somehow = 3mbyte download speeds. :o Also, not speaking for cable, but if you have DSL (especially if you're in a moderately populated area) and your speed fluctuates a lot, there are many more factors to consider besides your ISP totally screwing you. Old, noisy phone lines, which the ISP does not own.. neighbors downloading/uploading, full-blast, 24/7.. (I suppose that'd kinda be the ISP's fault for jamming too many customers through one hub)

Back in my early DSL/cable days, I'd sometimes get uppetty about speed consistency, or some short down time.. but then I'd visit my Grandparents for a long weekend or holiday and be forced to using dialup. Lemme tell ya.. I wish that 54kbps meant kilobytes and not kilobits. ;)

[Sean Moran]

Everything else aside, I think people just don't understand the difference between Mbits and Mbytes. ..maybe it is false advertisement in that the providers know that people will assume that 3mbit DSL somehow = 3mbyte download speeds. :o Also, not speaking for cable, but if you have DSL (especially if you're in a moderately populated area) and your speed fluctuates a lot, there are many more factors to consider besides your ISP totally screwing you. Old, noisy phone lines, which the ISP does not own.. neighbors downloading/uploading, full-blast, 24/7.. (I suppose that'd kinda be the ISP's fault for jamming too many customers through one hub)

Back in my early DSL/cable days, I'd sometimes get uppetty about speed consistency, or some short down time.. but then I'd visit my Grandparents for a long weekend or holiday and be forced to using dialup. Lemme tell ya.. I wish that 54kbps meant kilobytes and not kilobits. ;)
Yeah, we should take heed of the burden it puts on our neighbours and the rest of the users of the same ISP backbone when we fee the need to download a new 700mb .iso file.

[pricetech]

I used to sell dialup back when it was actually usable. Prospective customers would ask if it was unlimited, a term they had heard used by most, if not all of the competition. In order to be completely honest I had to say no, not because our limit was anything less than even a power user could want, but only because we, like the competition, did not offer nailed connections for a dialup price.

I also had people who wanted to know how "fast" it was. Again I would be honest with them and tell them it was based upon too many variables to be guaranteed in any way, though customers switching from other ISPs usually found our service to be faster.

Speeds are advertised using the phrase "up to". Hence it is not false advertising. Whether that seems ethical to you or not, it's just reality. Speeds can't be guaranteed for everyone since there are too many factors involved, many of which are beyond the provider's control.

If you want a QOS, pay for it.

[Nick_Jinn]

I used to sell dialup back when it was actually usable. Prospective customers would ask if it was unlimited, a term they had heard used by most, if not all of the competition. In order to be completely honest I had to say no, not because our limit was anything less than even a power user could want, but only because we, like the competition, did not offer nailed connections for a dialup price.

I also had people who wanted to know how "fast" it was. Again I would be honest with them and tell them it was based upon too many variables to be guaranteed in any way, though customers switching from other ISPs usually found our service to be faster.

Speeds are advertised using the phrase "up to". Hence it is not false advertising. Whether that seems ethical to you or not, it's just reality. Speeds can't be guaranteed for everyone since there are too many factors involved, many of which are beyond the provider's control.

If you want a QOS, pay for it.


You should be manager of Comcast.

Comcast has lost me as a customer, and I am going to file a complaint about the low speeds I have been getting....1.7mbits per second download.....my upload speed has been raised mysteriously since threatening to sue them, but my downloads arenot the 18mbps they are claiming.

[NightwishFan]

Comcast (especially the "powerboost" nonsense) I like less than Microsoft (who actually make sense sometimes, and do not always cheat you).

[Nick_Jinn]

The Powerboost nonsense is a way for them to 'explain' how they cap and slow down your connection, and spin it as a good thing rather than as a way to rob you.


I did an independent test, and Comcasts test had results about 11 times greater than what the independent test showed me.



This has to be illegal.

[NightwishFan]

I would not be sorry to see them taken down. I even do not like their trained monkeys that try to sell you a lemon.

[Lucradia]

Good thing that PC Games are not bandwidth hogs, they just need a smaller ping, and at least 512 KB/sec.

[Nick_Jinn]

Does anyone think that ATT DSL is any better?

A few things I dont like about ATT is that they caved immediately when Bush was doing illegal spying on Americans, and went above and beyond what was legally asked for and actively engaged in spying of their own for Bush co....illegal spying I might add, and they were pardoned from what I understand.....Google, despite being a corporate giant that collects a lot of data from users actually did stand up to the illegal spying, so despite being a huge corporation they did earn some points with resisting and demanding a proper court order.


Still, I am really pissed off at Comcast for conning me like this. ATT may at least give me the service they sell me.



How is their quality? They are the only phone company in town (I thought monopoly was illegal), so its the cheapest option if I want to use the same phone jack and not pay for a tech to come out.....24.99 for 3mbps for the first year....not bad at all. It wouldnt surprise me if my torrents actually go faster than on Comcasts "12mbps" service.

Anyone use them?

[McRat]

Some have good luck with AT&T DSL, others don't.

I'm in a Don't Bother area. Nobody in this area can get a stable AT&T DSL connection faster than 384k no matter what the advertised rate is (1.5+).

[lostinxlation]

How is their quality? They are the only phone company in town (I thought monopoly was illegal), so its the cheapest option if I want to use the same phone jack and not pay for a tech to come out.....24.99 for 3mbps for the first year....not bad at all. It wouldnt surprise me if my torrents actually go faster than on Comcasts "12mbps" service.

Anyone use them?

You made a couple of posts saying you're dissatisfied with the service you get from big ISPs and now how do you know ATT can give you 3mbps ?
Frankly, asking people about connection speed is pointless unless you are asking someone who is using the same ISP, same servive within a few blocks away.
Suggestion ? Like another thread you started sometime ago, talk to your neighbors.

[Nick_Jinn]

While there is some truth to what you are saying, Comcasts problems are systemic and NOT limited to a city block. Its just bad policies to the core of their being. I was wondering if people had better experience with ATT in general.

I understand that service can vary, but that isnt what I am asking. I know that I can get 3mbps DSL, but not 6mbps. I dont need to ask anyone what speeds my apartment can get.


What I want to know is how badly this company dicks you around.


And yeah, there are some smaller companies, but they all buy their bandwidth from ATT anyway.




And what Comcast is doing has to be criminal. Their "speed test" is showing me 18mbps, but an independent site is showing me only 1.7 mbps.

So what do they do? Jack up the speed for 10 seconds then slow it down with "power boost"?


I am going to try again and see if the OTHER independent site also shows a boost in signal strength when I log into Comcasts testing site. If so, I think I should sue them.

[lostinxlation]

Are you sure those speed site can measure the bitrate on the local loop ? The bitrate advertised is for local link which is between your modem and CO modem and I don't even know how it's possible to measure the speed without involving the system software running in the modem.
By accessing some website, you are most probably measuring the overall bitrate across all the network between the server and your machine.

To measure the speed on the local loop, the measurement must be originated at CO modem. To do so, speed measuring websites have to measure the start time and end time of data transmission inside the CO modem. This requires the modem software to be involved, but I don't think external website can 'hack' the operation of modem software for obvious reasons.

Unless those websites can access the contents in the modem chips or system software(which is very unlikely for a few reason), it seems impossible to know the actual bit rate.

[McRat]

Humor me. Get a stopwatch and download this:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=5B33B5A8-5E76-401F-BE08-1E1555D4F3D4&displaylang=en

It's 316mb. Tell us how long the download takes.

[Nick_Jinn]

Humor me. Get a stopwatch and download this:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=5B33B5A8-5E76-401F-BE08-1E1555D4F3D4&displaylang=en

It's 316mb. Tell us how long the download takes.



177 kbs, 28 minutes.

[lostinxlation]

If you are interested, mine took 34 min.

ATT DSL (HSI Express) $28.00 /month.
San Jose/Campbell area

I don't remember the plan speed and which current plan it's equivalent to, but 1.5M plan where the price is $30 might be a good match, considering I signed up 2 years ago. But I don't know how far the central office is and also FTP needs to exchange ACK signal between the server and client from time to time, which could be a big overhead if the server is far.

[Ojustaboo]

Your supplier must deliver as promised, otherwise it's false advertising..

In the UK, they blatantly lie to us though, anyone using an ISP that uses BT for their ADSL, ADSL2+ will never get the advertised speeds as it's impossible due to the way BT do things.

On a standard 8mbps ADSL line, the fastest possible speed is 7.15 mbps
On an 24 mbps ADSL2+ line, the fastest possible speed in 21 mbps.

ADSL connection rate
BT IP profile

160 - 287
135

288 - 415
250

416 - 575
350

576 - 863
500

864 - 1151
750

1152 - 1439
1000

1440 - 1727
1250

1728 - 2015
1500

2016 - 2271
1750

2272 - 2847
2000

2848 - 3423
2500

3424 - 3999
3000

4000 - 4543
3500

4544 - 5119
4000

5120 - 5695
4500

5696 - 6239
5000

6240 - 6815
5500

6816 - 7391
6000

7392 - 7967
6500

7968 - 8127
7000

8128 - 9087
7150

9088 - 10207
8000

10208 - 11359
9000

11360 - 12479
10000

12480 - 13631
11000

13632 - 14751
12000

14752 - 15903
13000

15904 - 17023
14000

17024 - 18175
15000

18176 - 19295
16000

19296 - 20415
17000

20416 - 21567
18000

21568 - 22687
19000

22688 - 23839
20000

23840 +
21000

These profiles are set by BT at their exchanges hence ISP's have zero control over it. If for example your router was connected at 6426, the maximum download speed you can achieve will be 5500

(info taken from adsa24's website faq at http://adsl24.co.uk/faq/)

[Ojustaboo]

Humor me. Get a stopwatch and download this:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=5B33B5A8-5E76-401F-BE08-1E1555D4F3D4&displaylang=en

It's 316mb. Tell us how long the download takes.


85 seconds (wired), stuck at 3.5mbps (according to firefox) for the whole download, which looks like some sort of site cap.

I also just tried downloading ubuntu amd64 iso and picked a mirror site at random, downloading at a steady 5.9 mbps according to firefox.

[Nick_Jinn]

If you are interested, mine took 34 min.

ATT DSL (HSI Express) $28.00 /month.
San Jose/Campbell area

I don't remember the plan speed and which current plan it's equivalent to, but 1.5M plan where the price is $30 might be a good match, considering I signed up 2 years ago. But I don't know how far the central office is and also FTP needs to exchange ACK signal between the server and client from time to time, which could be a big overhead if the server is far.



See...My Comcast connection should have downloaded 4x faster at least, not barely 6 minutes faster than your 34.

That means that if everything is comparable, I should be able to download that file in 17 minutes on a 3mbps connection, which beats Comcasts 28 on a 6mbps with 12mbps "power-boost".

I realize that all things will not be even, but its a good idea about how I am getting cheated when a cheaper and allegedly slower connection is actually in practice faster.

[juancarlospaco]

Dont worry, IPv6 is worse,
so <snip> lo0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0ng Packet to transport the same data.

:)

[Nick_Jinn]

Shouldnt there be a law against showing a false speed, or temporarily jacking up the speed for a test then pulling you back down again?

Shouldnt they be required by law to give you your true speeds, or the general ballpark in practice or average, and not some theoretical capacity that they have no intention of providing to you?

[lostinxlation]

EDIT: never mind..

[McRat]

177 kbs, 28 minutes.


Yup you're being hosed. That should take <5 minutes with a solid connection at 18mbps.

Sorry, I just don't take synthetic speed tests as the final word.

Unplug cable modem, reconnect, and if that has no effect, call-call-call-again. This is the area that AT&T and many others truly suck. Service.

It almost sounds like your download is throttled to the upload speed. This can be changed at the office. Even if you have bandwidth hogs, it would never get that bad before you started to get most requests as PAGE NOT FOUND.

You might also try to manually set your DNS address to something like 8.8.8.8. In rare cases your ISP is using their DNS service to assist in traffic shaping.

[pricetech]

Tell us how long the download takes.

4 minutes and 10 seconds over a 10 meg comcrap connection that is pretty heavily used since there are over a hundred boxen that access the Internet via that connection.

If you want to avoid doing business with an unethical company, the don't even consider att. Lies and fraudulent billing is why they no longer provide any services to me and my house.

[Nick_Jinn]

Cool. I am going to get set up with Cruzio, a local company.....they unfortunately have to use ATTs lines, but they dont shape your traffic the same way.

[Nick_Jinn]

I found a new and even better solution. My internet is lightning fast now.