What connection speeds are you on?

NickH · August 2007

Heya - just got curious about something. What connection speed are you on? I know that most ISPs offer "Up To 8Mb/s" (megaBIT), but reality rarely matches that.

So, what's your current connection speed - both narrowband and broadband users?

Pick the one that's closest to your connection speed.

Lee Fogarty · August 2007

Your speeds are a bit out with 10mb being common now and Virgin offering 20mb. That's just UK. Across Europe is much quicker.

There are more that are now fibre optic too so connection speeds are loads better.

I was on 10mb for ages. Had it cut to 2mb when I started working away from home more. I've not noticed much difference apart from upload speeds being slower. I don't download much though.

NickH · August 2007

Heh. I'm happy to bundle all >8Mb speeds together - the different speeds above that won't really matter for what's on my mind right now as 8Mb is more than fast enough.

DEATH · August 2007

It's supposed to be "Up to 8Mb", but is usually around 4 - 6 Mb. It's the BT top of the range package thingy with the internet phone (that I never use) and the wireless broadband router (which doesn't actually transmit any signals), always on (except for when it's off, at least 6 times a day it disconnects, waits 5 minutes and then re-connects) 24/7 unlimited thruput service.

I'm seriously considering going back to Blueyonder/Virgin media, this BT service sucks big time!

chop983 · August 2007

I've got 16MB from sky, it churns out around the 10-13MB mark

Quazar · August 2007

I've got 24MB ADSL2+ from Be, but it's only synced at 13MB at the moment.

Winston · August 2007

They all still have a pathetic 256K up, though.

Here, we can't get anything faster than 2Mbit/sec. I whine at Manx Telecom about it and they make excuses about the market - but Greenland is far more remote with a far lower population density, yet you can get 24 meg ADSL2 there. Jersey gets a better deal, too, another island with a similar population to ours.

The reality is that Manx Telecom have a monopoly and they can charge high fees and give slow service and no one can do a thing about it. They have the government in their pocket, too. It's amazing how Manx Telecom suddenly found out that yes, they could charge a LOT less for mobile phone charges when competition showed up!

And MT isn't even Manx, it's owned by O2 which in turn is owned by Telefonica. But guess what, they rape you on roaming charges if you're across and use the O2 network, even though it's all part of the same company...

Quazar · August 2007

Winston wrote: »

They all still have a pathetic 256K up, though.

The ADSL2+ i'm on is 1.3MB up, or if I wanted to pay a bit more and sacrifice a few MB of download speed then I could get 2.5MB up.

Aren't a few of the cable providers up to 1MB or so for upload?

icabod · August 2007

Pleasant surprise a couple weeks ago... my connection dropped, and when it reconnected it was at just over 4Meg. I think they did an upgrade at the exchange, as it's been at that ever since. Bearing in mind I'm a good few miles from the exchange, and they made our phone lines out of papier mache, I think that's a decent speed.
Upstream is around the 400K mark.

Lee Fogarty · August 2007

NickH wrote: »

the different speeds above that won't really matter for what's on my mind right now as 8Mb is more than fast enough.

It's not that video of you pole dancing is it?

Daren · August 2007

I'm on an up to 8Mb connection, but it runs at 4Mb. It's about 450k up.

NickH · August 2007

fogartylee wrote: »

It's not that video of you pole dancing is it?

Even though it would require both widescreen AND high-def in order to fit me on the screen, er, no...

beanz · August 2007

I get the meter reading about 750k when downloading...so whats that in mb?

Winston · August 2007

Quazar wrote: »

The ADSL2+ i'm on is 1.3MB up, or if I wanted to pay a bit more and sacrifice a few MB of download speed then I could get 2.5MB up.

Ah, ADSL2+. We'll probably get that in 2015.

icabod · August 2007

Generally I work out that the download speed in Kbytes is about 1/10 of the rated speed, give-or-take.
For example, with my 4Mb connection, I get about 400Kbytes/s download.
I figure it's a fairly good figure, as there's 8-bits in a byte, but there is overhead when doing comms, and you need to take into account errors... give around 10-bits in a byte. Rough figures, obviously.

So I would say you're connecting at about 7.5Mb/s.

mulder · August 2007

When we first got our 'up to 8 meg' on BT, I got downloads of about 200k max. Then it went really slow for a while, often under 100k, then they said they'd upgraded the exchange (I think) and we are back to 200k again. So, still only 2meg :( I can't complain much though, I was on dial-up for years, and so this last 8 months has been great and the novelty of 200k downloads still hasn't worn off!

icabod · August 2007

Not sure if it makes much of a difference, but I had quite a few dropped connections at various times, as the router reconnected at a different speed. Then recently I replaced the main surge protectors in the house, which the phone lines go through, and the connection has been incredibly stable ever since... even through the various storms it's only disconnected when I've manually reset it.

Best 70 quid I spent that day.

psj3809 · August 2007

BT havent been bad at all, i hardly lose connection apart from when obviously the box is automatically updating it seems. I get about 4 meg, i know they say up to 8 but i heard the blurb about 'its because of the nearest point to you' or whatever bull they say.

I need a stable line so i've kept with BT, nearly went to Carphone Warehouse but it seems a nightmare, couldnt even call them, only had an email address on their website when i looked to join so sod that.

Sure there will be quicker ones in the future so i'll switch then but it must be a sign of me getting old. I was so used to 28k, then 56k then 512k so having 4 meg or so broadband still makes me think wow !

mile · August 2007

how do i find out what my connection speed is?

NickH · August 2007

mile wrote: »

how do i find out what my connection speed is?

Your ADSL modem/router/whatever should tell you, especially if it has a web interface.

mile · August 2007

NickH wrote: »

Your ADSL modem/router/whatever should tell you, especially if it has a web interface.

my desktop plugs into a cable under my desk, the internet comes out of it.

psj3809 · August 2007

mile wrote: »

how do i find out what my connection speed is?

When you connect I presume theres an icon in the bottom right of Windows XP which says you are connected, hovering over that often gives you the speed.

Or dial up your ISP and ask them how fast your connection is, take 2 thirds of the inflated b-s number they tell you and thats what you've probably got

Arjun · August 2007

I'm on a 256kbps line. Ultra-pathetically S-L-O-W! I get an average transfer rate of 15kb/sec that max outs at 25 kb/sec on really good days.

I wish the government would wake up and free the market from the monopoly of the public sector company that's holding up progress in broadband.

guesser · August 2007

our router connects to the exchange at 1 meg, that's the absolute maximum we can get here, and that's dodgy it sometimes drops to half a meg automatically. we live right out in the middle of nowhere miles from the nearest exchange, you don't have to go far up the road and it's dial up only.

the actual speed occasionally gets up to 1 meg, but only in the middle of the night :x during peak time when everyone in all the other villages are online too, it unsurprisingly slows down to a about quarter of a meg or sometimes less. very frustrating. The infrastructure is just shit. there just isn't enough bandwidth for for everyone to have broadband internet round here

dm_boozefreek · August 2007

I've got a 4MB connection, but up until less than 2 months ago it was dial-up. So I couldn't watch anything from Youtube that was posted up here, now I can.

I've mainly been downloading MAME and Neo-Geo stuff since I got the cable modem in (my wife would kill me because I promised her I wouldn't DL any more games), and I've been revisiting the 80's and 90's via Youtube.

Anyone know where I can watch the old Tuborg ad with all the green hands snaking in and out of each other (from 1990 I think?, could be 89' though), tried Youtube but no joy.

chaosmongers · August 2007

I've just tried a download speed test.

I'm on a 2 Meg Toucan connection and the download speed is 1826 KBPS.

Is that any good, or am I being conned?

Malc74 · August 2007

Well, according to the lying bast("exaggerating scoundrels". Ed.) at Thunder Bay Telecom I have a 100Mbps connection.

Which is, of course, complete fuc("bally nonsense". Ed.)

VincentAC · August 2007

We're on 4meg here from virgin. And it's usually about right although they've started traffic shaping recently. If I download more than 1gb between 4 and midnight then I'll be limited to 2-3mb for 5 hours.

And today is the first full use of the net I've had since monday night when something went pear shaped with virgin's lines. Some sites worked on monday, most didn't. Some that didn't work on moday worked on tuesday but some that did work on monday didn't work tuesday... blah blah until about 1pm today (well, yesterday I suppose, it is after midnight).

Other than that we've had no problems whatsoever with the net.

Well... other than our router possibly dying which means Sioux can't get online with her laptop but that's a different story.

Nick Elliott · August 2007

Got Virgin (ex NTL) upto 4MB which usually this means between 3MB-4MB which is plenty fast enough for me.

mile · August 2007

psj3809 wrote: »

When you connect I presume theres an icon in the bottom right of Windows XP which says you are connected, hovering over that often gives you the speed.

Or dial up your ISP and ask them how fast your connection is, take 2 thirds of the inflated b-s number they tell you and thats what you've probably got

ive got windows 2000.

i dont know who my internet service provider is, it might be netscape if they are one.

stvd · August 2007

2MB Tiscali. I'm not sure if I actually get 2MB from the thing but it's more than enough for my XBOX Live

What connection speeds are you on?

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