Suddenly Fast Download Speeds From The Bbc

[msg362]

OK I use iMac/ Safari,/get iplayer automator, sometimes use 'hide VPN' to download from BBC iPlayer. Using the TOT ( only provider here) it is very slow.

Have been using Google DNS but I'm told it logs all my activity and I'm not happy. Then used Open DNS, but today found a Google test programme called 'Namebench'

Ran it ( it took about 20 minutes) and came up with a DNS called 'Internal ( 202.44.52.1 /203.121.130.40) I loaded that and then ,at 1.30 pm out in the sticks, I'm downloading a 450 MB file in about 10 minutes!!! The fastest I've ever managed. ( normally, with big downloads, I run overnight).

Anyone else with similar experience?

I think 'namebench' is wonderful!!!

Thought I'd add the print out

Edited February 27, 2012 by msg362

[msg362]

Unwind!!!!! it's suddenly gone slow!! A 1100 MB file is predicted to take 8 hours.!! Can anyone explain?

Edited February 27, 2012 by msg362

[Pib]

I think for the one called Internal, that's just the DNS function from within your router being reflected...it's really just mirroring whatever DNS service you are really using (probably your ISP's DNS servers) by having a certain amount of DNS info cached in the router. Also notice the starting IP address of the DNS server named Internal is 192 which is probably the starting IP address of your modem/router and will also be the starting address of the other devices on your home/local network. If I remember right you can mark/remove internal DNS to be excluded from the Namebench test.

It can be misleading...almost like some speedtest-type programs give a person faster-than-light download speeds and ping times....just like the server you are connecting to on the other side of the Earth is just across the soi from you. All of this caused by cached servers really feeding you a mirrored image of the file because that file just happenned to be cached since someone else had previously downloaded it from that server on the other side of the world.

Edited February 27, 2012 by Pib

[NHJ]

DNS have nothing to do with speed they are Domain Name Servers, when you knock on the door and say the Server name it does reply with IP adress.

some DNS reply faster than others but it doesn't change the speed of the cab you used to go and knock on the door.

[Sateev]

DNS have nothing to do with speed they are Domain Name Servers, when you knock on the door and say the Server name it does reply with IP adress.

some DNS reply faster than others but it doesn't change the speed of the cab you used to go and knock on the door.

Oh so incorrect.

Bad DNS can slow response times a LOT. In fact, it's one of the most common problems with slow networks. You seem to think that your browser only looks up the address once (which may be true for a web page, but NOT for a file transfer of many megabytes). Also, as PIB mentions, local caching servers play a part in speeding things up, but when the cached part of the file is exhausted, the other parts may have to be retrieved from other, more distant, servers. See 'Squid proxy' for more info.

Google has spent a lot of effort to improve DNS times by locating DNS servers all over the world. There's a reason for it.

[Pib]

My personal experience and testing (ie., using DNSBench and NameBench plus just how fast something appears to occur to me) in trying different DNS servers is it can help in opening some browser pages pages faster since some browser pages can be pretty complex with all the underlying links/different IP addresses related to the links, ads, etc., which comprise the overall page. Just like looking at the ThaiVisa home page...there are a bunch of links, ads, etc., pointing to other IP addresses which must be opened to complete the whole puzzle/picture.

My testing from my Bangkok residence showed my ISP's DNS servers....and I've been on TOT, JINET, and True---provided the fastest response since their DNS servers were in-Thailand and as a 3d party DNS server GoogleDNS was the fastest. And just to be clear, my ISP's DNS servers were faster than GoogleDNS, but GoogleDNS was the fastest 3d party DNS server since they have DNS servers in quite a few locations around the world where other 3d party DNS servers seem to only be based in one or a couple of countries. The less distance your internet electrons have to travel to get info from DNS server XYZ makes a big difference in how fast your computer gets the IP address info it needs to actually go make the connection to the site you want to surf to. So, your locaton can also make a difference in how fast DNS server ABC, XYZ, etc., work for you.

Personally, my file downloads were not any faster or slower once the download started when using a 3d party DNS server although there were X-milliseconds difference in initially connecting to a particular web site. And when using these different DNS benchmarking programs keep things in perspective that if one DNS server connects to a web site in 50 milliseconds and the other DNS server connects in 75 milliseconds your brain/eyes are probably not going to be able to perceive that very small difference. However, but, if a complex webpage has 10 of these different sub-links that take an additional 25 milliseconds each to open then that adds up to 250 ms (a quarter of a second) and your brain/eyes will probably starting noticing a speed difference...how fast that web page completed its pull-up.

But to use an analogy and based on my personal use/testing of different DNS servers, a DNS server is like a phone book to look up website IP addresses/numbers...while one address book may look-up the IP number faster it probably won't speed things up after making the connection.

As mentioned, these have been my results; your results may vary.