British Deceived On Broadband Speeds

[nikster]

Because everyone loves to complain about how Thai ISPs don't deliver on their promises... it's the same all around the world, here in a study conducted in Britain

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-10760069

I had a similar experience in the USA, where most stuff I did was limited to 200 KB/s even though it was supposed to be a 10Mbit line (which means 1000 KB/s if it actually delivered).

[garyh]

Wouldn't be like the brits to complain.

[Pib]

Rarely can a person approach the advertised speed...I think all the planets have to be lined up to get the advertised speed. But when that lower speed is continuous/smooth with low ping times then a person will never notice it unless running tests.

Now most True customers on the high speed plans, like the 16Mb plan, honestly believe that are they are getting 16Mb speed to the USA/EU with ping times that could only be achieved if the server was 50 KMs down the road. Why do they believer this? Because various speed test programs some how get fooled/give false reading for many True customers. But hey, they are happy and that's all that counts. Cheers.

[negreanu]

Still downloading at 1.7MB/s from giganews on west coast with a ping of 273ms on true 16mb premium. I am happy! cheers.

No need for speedtest programs when ACTUAL downloads are more realistic and cannot be manipulated by those who claim True are. BTW everytime I run the speedtest.net program I never get an unrealistic ping. Always 250-360ms range which is normal.

Confirmed with online gaming on blizzard west coast servers of around 230ms.

1. Giganews.

2. Apple Itunes Store (US!)

3. Microsoft West coast download centre (Try downloading Windows XP from there)

4. Youtube 720p West coast

5. Torrents.

All the above I can more or less max out the 16mb. What else doi need?

Some people on here just because their line quality sucks and they are not the getting the speeds. Automatically assume that everyone else who is getting the speeds is lying....

I have given up with the 1 or 2 anti-true impossible you are getting 16mb to the us guys on thaivisa. They simply refuse to believe it even after i posted screen shots. Waste of time even entering into a discussion with them.

Edited July 27, 2010 by negreanu

[Supernova]

Rarely can a person approach the advertised speed...

Indeed.

I touched the subject briefly with this post.

BTW everytime I run the speedtest.net program I never get an unrealistic ping. Always 250-360ms range which is normal.

I get similar ping rates to the USA and Europe.

[nikster]

Yah, my 10Mbit 3BB also delivers 10Mbit for most intents and purposes. For torrents, iTunes, Apple.com and basically most all sites I download large files from. Let's say - for all those sites where I know they have massive infrastructure behind them. For some others I get much lower speeds - 1Mbit - but that may very well be the server on the other end which throttles the speed.

Now I am not 100% happy, I sometimes need to jump-start the connection - seemingly. It's slow. Then I go to speedtest.net and do a quick test to BKK which tests at 10Mbit. Then it's fast after that for normal stuff - not my perception, I have a meter running on my screen at all times, I know what I am getting. And sometimes there are short interrupts that kill the VPN. I blame this on the microwave tower which delivers my line though, not 3BB per se. Still - this connection is pretty good and better than what I had before. Unimaginable 5 years ago when I first got to Thailand.

Oh and just yesterday I was watching some YouTube videos over my iPhones True 3G connection and got 500 kbit/second download rates for that. Crazy. Good luck getting that in the west on a mobile connection.

[Olli]

Depends to which site/server you'll connect!

Keep in mind: you're limited to the max speed of upload the other end has! If the other end has 512 kbps you get a max of 612 kbps download.

Many servers also having a kind traffic shaping and allowing a max connection speed to a single connection.

By using a Download Manager, I get the full speed while downloading. I pay for 8 Mbps and even get more, I'm just happy with that! Nothing to complain!

[wpcoe]

Seeing Olli's connection summary (presumably from a D-Link device since it looks just like mine) brings up a question.

When I was using Zyxel modems (two different ones), their connection summary would always say 1024/3096 to match the advertised speed of my 3BB Premier package. However, my current D-Link ADSL modem reports: 924/3068. Why the difference in reported connect speeds?