True Brutally Throttling International Bandwidth During Primetime?

[wintermute]

Quick poll. Recently for the past few days international download speeds on bit torrent and programs that require streaming have fallen down to levels below dial up modem speeds. I've been getting 2-3kb averages on bit torrent (which is like the old 14.4k modem)

Calls to True have been met with indifference or they blame the international sites for being slow.

I have a feeling that True is throttling bit torrent now or putting in hard caps for international bandwidth. So this is an informal poll to see if this is the case across the board or if there is actually something wrong with my line.

[Pib]

Have you run any speed tests yet to international sites, like Speedtest.net (which may give high/false readings for some True custumers), Speakeasy.net, Dslreports.com, etc. This would help to see if your overall speed is way down, or whether it's just torrents.

[MKAsok]

No problems here. Maxing out at around 460K as normal with BT - True 2MB in Thonburi (they bumped it up to around 5MB over the last few months). Same at work (Asoke) with True - normal speeds. I have noticed HTTP speeds have been awful the last couple of days, so there's some kind of problem somewhere. They're not throttling BT though as far as I can tell.

[flexxx]

It's not only True. I have TOT 3mb (no other choice in my area....Sisaket) and their service has also been terriible for the last few days.

I'm losing connection completely between 7-9am and 7-10 pm, both briefly and for long periods. Last night was the worst, lost service completely 8pm to midnight. Midnight on the dot back it came with a bang! TOT say maybe a local server problem and they'd send someone to check.

This evening same problem again, from 8pm connection's dropping in and out. Modem reset doesn't work.

It's taken me three attempts to send this post!

Seems to be a bit more than throttling, any other service providers giving the same problems?

[Pib]

I'm on the TOT 4Mb plan here in western Bangkok and it's been working fine (3.5Mb in-Thailand speed; average 1Mb international international); in fact for the last week or so it's got a little faster and I'm pulling closer to a 1.5Mb average international average on speed tests to the west coast of the U.S. The various speed tests are faster and just my overall browsing is faster/pages appear faster/etc. No disconnects at all (knock on wood)...the 4Mb plan has been about 99.99 percent stable/reliable (knock on wood) since I switched to the plan about 4 months ago.

Edited July 20, 2010 by Pib

[Glimcoil]

On a True 16/1MB Plan now (in Silom, Bangkok) and for approx the last week it's horrible. Last night at 11:30pm I measured 350kb down and 400kb up (bit, not byte). This is measured to my own "mini" speedtest on my server in San Jose, CA (on a commercial colo - I definitly have no bandwidth issues there. But offical speedtest sites showed the same results)

Was fine up to approx 1 week ago. (at least around 1.5M down around 10..11pm)

- Martin

(BTW: I'm using the mini-speedtest which can be downloaded from speedtest.net - it seems this one installed on my own server gives real results unlike the fake results from the offical sites)

[Digitalbanana]

I noticed both my TOT and True dropped to a 1/10th normal speeds over weekend. Back to normal since Monday.

[Pib]

Still looking for the mini-speedtest you mentioned, but just noticed something while looking around speedtest.net....it could explain why some True customers get false/high speed readings, especially to international sites. A cut and paste from the Speedtest.net web site follows:

Why are my test results outrageously fast?

This is usually the result of something installed on your computer that is intercepting traffic between your web browser and the server. Examples of this would be security software from ZoneAlarm, McAfee or Symantec. Try momentarily disabling the software to see if it is the source of the problem. Make sure you don't leave it disabled! Any software firewall should work with Speedtest.net if configured properly.

[scubajo]

I use True Online 4MB standard internet, I noticed a few days ago that suddenly Bittorrent downloads were getting much slower (downloads up to 5kB/s), also downloading the *.torrent files seemed to be blocked..

Received a SMS yesterday from True that maintenance was scheduled for last night and that we might be without internet for one hour. Torrent speeds did not increase today until after midnight, now I receive downloads up to 60kB/s.

[Glimcoil]

Still looking for the mini-speedtest you mentioned, but just noticed something while looking around speedtest.net....it could explain why some True customers get false/high speed readings, especially to international sites.

Mini Speedtest is here for download: http://www.speedtest.net/mini.php

However you need a server (with good bandwidth) to install it.

- Martin

(Wow: At 5am I'm actually getting 15.5M down and 650k up to/from the US! Now If I could get just 10% of this around 10..11pm)

[fvw53]

It is a poor consolation to read that I am not alone to be astonished by the more than usual loss of connection and the slow down to dial-up speeds of my ADSL ( I am a customer of Ji-Net)

[scubajo]

Torrent downloading seems to be stuck at 10% of capacity and uploading at 50%. Once I hit a local peer and downloading went up to normal capacity! Web browsing seems to be at normal/slightly faster speed as even youtube is working proper now..

Could this blockade of P2P have anything to do with the CRES blocking parts of the internet and therefore be "temporary"?

[RedNIvar]

Had the same problem with True during the weekend. Download speeds with Bit Torrent returned back to normal as of yesterday. Like you I am still in the dark as to what happened.

[Digitalbanana]

It wasn't just True for me, TOT/CSLox had same problem in Thonglor area of Bangkok for me. Ok again since Monday morning. No explanation given from either company.

[BKKjohan]

I use True 4MB and bittorrents are still slow, in fact new (well seeded) downloads don't start at all.

On http://wiki.vuze.com/w/Bad_ISPs True doesn't have an entry but the other ISP's are not appealing.

Hope this is something temporary and be back to normal soon!

[wintermute]

Right now bitorrent seems to wildly fluctuate..it will be stuck at 5kb downloading with .02-.03kb d/l speeds for each torrent and then drop off connections.

I tried downloading a normal file (non torrent) on a u.s. server and it worked fine with speeds at 100-150kb/s. It looks like True _is_ doing something with incoming torrent related connections. With what people have been saying here it seems to confirm what i've been thinking.

There are times when BT downloading does seem to go to normal but those are off peak hours like others have said.

I've asked True about this several times now and today a tech dropped by and said he couldn't find any problems. Right now evidence seems to lean towards True doing funny stuff with torrent downloads or finally actively throttling.

It's possible that this is a temporary issue for whatever reason but the activity is very questionable at the moment.

Edited July 21, 2010 by wintermute

[BKKjohan]

It might actually be a problem with public trackers, as I just downloaded at full speed from a private tracker..

[Laawman]

I'm also getting all of the above problems with a True basic package - any decent speeds come from a local peer. I also have a Usenet account, but that too is throttled back to BT speeds. Hopefully, True isn't back to it's old tricks again otherwise I shall be cancelling my account forthwith!

[MRToMRT]

I have same problems and private trackers are still OK, I suspect major throttling of known trackers. What I cannot understand is though, who would want a high down speed unless they are torrenting? Its not as though the BBC site is going to download any faster if you have a 8 MB connection or a 16 MB connection.

[wintermute]

True is definitely cracking down on torrent downloads and it looks like they are running Sandvine which is a notorious isp throttling program. I'm not sure whether they are doing it by region or as a whole. Since some people living in the boonies seem to be unaffected it could be by region with the heaviest downloading patterns around the large metro areas.

I ran various network monitoring tests and everything reported back traffic disruption consistent with sandvine throttling. I further confirmed this by accessing bitorrent through VPN tunneling and immediately the transfer rates went back to normal.

So it looks like it may be time to switch isps. Can anyone report their experiences elsewhere?

[BKKjohan]

From what I quickly googled Sandvine throttling basically upsets the uploading, unless it is to a local peer. Maybe we should look for a localized tracker..

[wintermute]

From what I quickly googled Sandvine throttling basically upsets the uploading, unless it is to a local peer. Maybe we should look for a localized tracker..

Not just uploading but different kind of throttling settings disrupts traffic both ways which causes "ACK" disconnects from seeds. This means you will get extremely poor speeds downloading from any torrent due to constant disconnects with the seeding ips.

I ran network monitor tests which detected this going on. This means True has finally rolled out Sandvine but i'm not exactly sure which localities are effected yet.

A lot of isps don't just throttle bittorrent but they also combine that with hard caps on encrypted traffic etc.. to reduce customer downloading abilities to a trickle. Since there's literally no consumer oversight over these sorts of limitations True can pretty much do whatever it wants.

[BKKjohan]

I read on the True Online website that I have a Data Traffic Limitation of 540MB per hour with my 4MB Standard Package, I wouldn't mind a smaller limit to help True fight P2P clogging up the international bandwidth.. I do still experience higher speeds using a private tracker or when I am (accidentally) connected to a local peer! I don't see much future changing to another ISP as I expect them all to be equally bad.

Very disappointed in True Online as I decided on this ISP after reading articles on the internet about True using cache for torrents to keep open the international bandwidth.. Guess that using a VPN will be the best solution!

[Digitalbanana]

I read on the True Online website that I have a Data Traffic Limitation of 540MB per hour with my 4MB Standard Package,

Do you have the reference for that please? I cannot see any limits referenced to the True 4mbps 599THB/m plan?

[Supernova]

It is a poor consolation to read that I am not alone to be astonished by the more than usual loss of connection and the slow down to dial-up speeds of my ADSL ( I am a customer of Ji-Net)

I'm also on Ji-Net (2Mbps plan). Very stable connection, no problems browsing websites or downloading (via http, P2P). If you're experiencing frequent disconnects or loss of signal, have your phone provider check the line.

Those of you having problems, test your internet connection @ M-Lab.

[BKKjohan]

Do you have the reference for that please? I cannot see any limits referenced to the True 4mbps 599THB/m plan?

Check the Terms & Conditions at the bottom of the page. It is well hidden and in Thai, but the reference to the Data Transfer Limit is English.. http://www.trueonlin...m/en/terms.aspx

[Digitalbanana]

Do you have the reference for that please? I cannot see any limits referenced to the True 4mbps 599THB/m plan?

Check the Terms & Conditions at the bottom of the page. It is well hidden and in Thai, but the reference to the Data Transfer Limit is English.. http://www.trueonlin...m/en/terms.aspx

Thanks for the link.

I would be well inside the limit of MB/hr for the standard package. Torrents still slow tho (10% previous), so guess not related.

[johnboi]

True is definitely cracking down on torrent downloads and it looks like they are running Sandvine which is a notorious isp throttling program. I'm not sure whether they are doing it by region or as a whole. Since some people living in the boonies seem to be unaffected it could be by region with the heaviest downloading patterns around the large metro areas. I ran various network monitoring tests and everything reported back traffic disruption consistent with sandvine throttling. I further confirmed this by accessing bitorrent through VPN tunneling and immediately the transfer rates went back to normal. So it looks like it may be time to switch isps. Can anyone report their experiences elsewhere?

I've been racking my brain for a week trying to figure out why my newsreaders speed dropped to 8-10 Kbps when its usually 900Kbps. Thanks for the idea to switch to VPN Tunnelling. I changed servers to SSL and speeds are way up again. True suck.

[jfchandler]

Pib, I don't know exactly why Speedtest.net's web site gives totally bogus results for True DSL international connections between Thailand and the U.S. But, I do know that they DO....

Re the snippet you posted below, I've haven't ever had ZoneAlarm, McAfee or Symantec on my PC in Thailand, though I do have MS Security Essentials...though I don't have any reason to believe that will affect speed test results. So I'm not sure that explanation applies in our case here.

As you know from our exchanges in other posts, in my experience, the flash speed test at DSLReports seems to give reasonably accurate, real-world test results. And users can choose between connection points in Los Angeles or the East Coast.

With my True 8mbit premium connection here in central BKK, I find I can consistently get speeds of 400 to 600 kbits in the evenings around 10 pm, and 1-2 mbits during the mornings on international connections to the U.S. But never much faster than that to the U.S. And for some reason, Sunday nights here seems to be the worst time of the week.

Still looking for the mini-speedtest you mentioned, but just noticed something while looking around speedtest.net....it could explain why some True customers get false/high speed readings, especially to international sites. A cut and paste from the Speedtest.net web site follows:

Why are my test results outrageously fast?

This is usually the result of something installed on your computer that is intercepting traffic between your web browser and the server. Examples of this would be security software from ZoneAlarm, McAfee or Symantec. Try momentarily disabling the software to see if it is the source of the problem. Make sure you don't leave it disabled! Any software firewall should work with Speedtest.net if configured properly.

[jfchandler]

I'd be betting that 15.5M result from SpeedTest for a connection to the U.S. is a FAKE result...

Try testing the same connection on DSL Reports to L.A., and report back here the real results.

Mini Speedtest is here for download: http://www.speedtest.net/mini.php

However you need a server (with good bandwidth) to install it.

- Martin

(Wow: At 5am I'm actually getting 15.5M down and 650k up to/from the US! Now If I could get just 10% of this around 10..11pm)