Non Browser Speedtest

[sulasno]

anyone using non browser to test your connection speed ? any recommendations ?

[CMSteve]

Guess you can try a ping test or trace... also a simple download/upload of a file and test the different speeds depending on time and place.

[beano2274]

is the router/modem yours?

If so log onto the modem and check the speed from there.

[Darrel]

is the router/modem yours?

If so log onto the modem and check the speed from there.

That would only tell you the synchronisation speed, which is pretty meaningless.

A ping will only indicate the latency, and eventual lost packets.

An FTP transfer to/from a robust server will tell you the real transfer speed. And of course this is what most (all?) browser-based speed tests actually do.

[beano2274]

I thought it told you the port statistics including port speed, packets, etc.

System status - show statistics

Edited July 24, 2011 by beano2274

[Pib]

is the router/modem yours?

If so log onto the modem and check the speed from there.

That would only tell you the synchronisation speed, which is pretty meaningless.

A ping will only indicate the latency, and eventual lost packets.

An FTP transfer to/from a robust server will tell you the real transfer speed. And of course this is what most (all?) browser-based speed tests actually do.

Checking your modem's sync speed should be the first test you do to ensure you are getting your basic speed to the ISP. Also check for proper/full sync speed whenever the connection seems to be slow....just because you line/connection is good today does not mean it might now be bad tomorrow due to a connection problem between your residence and the ISP central station/DSLAM. For a DSL connection the sync speed, Signal to Noise, DownStream Speed, and Upstream Speed along with Download and Upload attenuation values, all of which are important to checking the basic quality of your line/connection, will be in one of your modem menu selections. If using Cable Internet then your modem probably won't give you extensive line diagnostic info like DSL modems do...with Cable modem you usually just get Upstream and DownStream Power Levels, and maybe a SNR and speed valve...usually to confirm the basic cable sync speed you need to do a test to the ISP's speedtester site or use another speedtester program as long as you are testing to a nearby site, like to a Bangkok speedtester server.

After you ensure your have a good/full connection between your residence and DSLAM "and receiving an IP address" from the ISP server which makes a complete connection, then start doing your speed testing by whatever method you desire keeping in mind the numerous posts about false reading you can get from some speedtester programs. The DSLReports.com speedtester will usually give you real world results to the U.S., but programs like Speedtester.net can easily be fooled by hidden in-Thailand cache servers some ISP's use and give false/bogus results which makes sites on the other side of the world sem like they are just across the soi according to the speedtester results....but according to your browsing/file downloading/video streaming/etc., you know the results ain't right.

Edited July 24, 2011 by Pib

[bangkockney]

You can use pings to estimate available bandwidth by sending packet trains. Essentially you can characterise the relationship between probing speed and available bandwidth by measuring the one way delay of probing packets. By trying different probing speeds an estimate of available bandwidth can be found.

This is however a highly technical approach. But pings most definitely can be used to assess available bandwidth.

is the router/modem yours?

If so log onto the modem and check the speed from there.

That would only tell you the synchronisation speed, which is pretty meaningless.

A ping will only indicate the latency, and eventual lost packets.

An FTP transfer to/from a robust server will tell you the real transfer speed. And of course this is what most (all?) browser-based speed tests actually do.

[Darrel]

You can use pings to estimate available bandwidth by sending packet trains. Essentially you can characterise the relationship between probing speed and available bandwidth by measuring the one way delay of probing packets. By trying different probing speeds an estimate of available bandwidth can be found.

This is however a highly technical approach. But pings most definitely can be used to assess available bandwidth.

That's true.

I suppose one could, if one had the knowledge and the time. I suppose one could also use a teaspoon to empty a swimming pool, but I doubt that anyone would bother when there are large buckets and pumps available for the same purpose.

But an FTP transfer from a robust server is a far more useful and straightforward measure, well within the grasp of the most non-technical user. It also has the merit of requiring no assessment, and is not an estimation. It just gives the desired answer.

Horses for courses.

[sulasno]

thanks for all the responses

actually I am more interested in testing the upload speed rather than the download

[bangkockney]

With you on more straightforward, but agreement stops there.

If you're say in a large corporate network and you complain to IT that your dload speeds are slow. You can bet anything that the IT Dept will run much more robust test than FTP transfer before raising a ticket with their ISP.

You can not say that an FTP transfer test provides available bandwidth with 0 error. That's just silly!

Unfortunately, the results of such an exercise will result in the goodput which is typically less than the maximum theoretical data throughput, leading to people into believing that their communications link is not operating correctly. In fact, there are many overheads accounted for in goodput in addition to transmission overheads, including latency, TCP Receive Window size and system limitations, which means the calculated goodput does not reflect the maximum achievable throughput.

You can use pings to estimate available bandwidth by sending packet trains. Essentially you can characterise the relationship between probing speed and available bandwidth by measuring the one way delay of probing packets. By trying different probing speeds an estimate of available bandwidth can be found.

This is however a highly technical approach. But pings most definitely can be used to assess available bandwidth.

That's true.

I suppose one could, if one had the knowledge and the time. I suppose one could also use a teaspoon to empty a swimming pool, but I doubt that anyone would bother when there are large buckets and pumps available for the same purpose.

But an FTP transfer from a robust server is a far more useful and straightforward measure, well within the grasp of the most non-technical user. It also has the merit of requiring no assessment, and is not an estimation. It just gives the desired answer.

Horses for courses.

[Pib]

thanks for all the responses

actually I am more interested in testing the upload speed rather than the download

Actually, after you confirm your basic upload sync connection is correct by looking in your modem settings, even a regular browser speedtester like Speedtest.net, your ISP Ookla speedtester, etc., should work accurately to test your upload speed. I think your computer creates/generates the upstream file/packets to test the Upload speed, a newly generated file by your computer would not be cached anywhere in the system path between your computer and the test server. But even if the speedtester program sends the file to your computer only to have it sent back to test Upload speed, in all my speedtest program tinkering over the years, the Upload speed test result is rarely higher than the modem basic sync connection...and I expect those rare cases are caused by data packing bursting/compression which gave a slightly high result. For me, I can say that I feel 99.9% plus of the time my Upload speed never exceeds my plan's speed (i.e., with a 20Mb/2Mb plan, the upload speed will test out to be running at 2Mb or less); however, many speedtest programs will give you bogus/high download speeds and bogus/low ping times.

Now, please note that if using a speedtest program like Speedtest.net to test you upload speed, that does not mean you will get that speed if uploading/sharing files to a server somewhere in the world as that server may have limits/throttles set on how fast any upload will/can be transmitted/accepted. Just like limits/throttles/capacity limits may exist when dealing with any site. Heck there are still plenty of mom and pop sites running off 386 CPU computers from the 1990's.

Edited July 25, 2011 by Pib