Broadband connection speed?

Cerro

Most speed test sites are a waste of time. As Matty has said, download something from a big company. 1Mbps = 100kbps download. So 8Mbps should be around 800kbps (assuming whatever you download from has the capacity to provide that much bandwidth to you).

Remember, the speeds quoted to you are the maximum theoretical speeds. I'm signed up to an 8Mbps service but my phone line (due to distance from exchange) is only capable of 3Mbps - blame the government/BT for not switching to fibre optical lines years ago. If you are in a city area you are more likely to suffer high contention ratios - meaning at peak times you get less because everyone else is humping the line and certain ISPs traffic shape to limit certain TCP/UDP port traffic. So there are many reasons why you won't get the full 8Mbps.

euglycaemia

georgiac wrote: »

I am trying to find out how fast my broadband connection speed is.

I've been on asdl.com (I think) but I am a real numpty and haven't got qa clue what it all means.

When my dad logs on a box appears in the bottom left hand corner of his screen telling him the speed.

Please does anyone kow how I get the same box as that?

I am on a dell with XP connection via a outer box that plugs directly into my pc.

Thanks

Hai

Try and log on at www.thinkbroadband.com

globalds

ITF!!!! wrote: »

Hi I just read through this thread and decided to give it a go myself.What speed does this mean im getting could someone be kind enough to translate for me.
Thanks in advance

Just short of 5 megabytes......Divide the big number by 8 should geive you the bytes ...The upload is locked by NTL so you won't get much diference on that side .

Fonz_2

For a good idea of speed try downloading the following file - it's from a fast server and should reflect accurate speeds. Give it a minute or two to get into its stride and let us know what speed the download box is reporting:

http://ubuntu-releases.datahop.it/feisty/ubuntu-7.04-desktop-i386.iso

This is what it will look like - it's the figure which says 2.01mb/sec on my pic below which you need to keep an eye on

Toxteth_OGrady

Run this - http://speedtester.bt.com/

It's probably what your ISP Tech Support will get you to try anyway.

:cool:

TOG

matty2767

Fonz wrote: »

For a good idea of speed try downloading the following file - it's from a fast server and should reflect accurate speeds. Give it a minute or two to get into its stride and let us know what speed the download box is reporting:

http://ubuntu-releases.datahop.it/feisty/ubuntu-7.04-desktop-i386.iso

This is what it will look like - it's the figure which says 2.01mb/sec on my pic below which you need to keep an eye on

thats fast fonz. it would take me about 20mins to get this file

continentalgal

Fonz: I betcha on cable? The new VM max speed? How do you get such a download window in firefox?

georgiac

Fonz wrote: »

For a good idea of speed try downloading the following file - it's from a fast server and should reflect accurate speeds. Give it a minute or two to get into its stride and let us know what speed the download box is reporting:

http://ubuntu-releases.datahop.it/feisty/ubuntu-7.04-desktop-i386.iso

This is what it will look like - it's the figure which says 2.01mb/sec on my pic below which you need to keep an eye on

OMG talk about making me feel totally inadequate!!!!!!!!

My download would take 3 hours 14 minutes.

Time to call in the pro's me thinks.

Fonz_2

Yeah it's cable - VM's 20mb package

georgiac

Many thanks for all the replies.

After several frustrating weeks dealing with friendly if slightly incompetent tech people at homecall (pipex) it is fixed.

Having tried different modems, routers, cables, running to main BT box in house, etc etc they decided there was a fault.

I completed speed tests for them which they lost three times, eventually I had enough and spoke to a manager who recognised the problem in 1o seconds.

BT hadn't upped my connection from my old package to the 8mb/s one.

Fixed in an hour, alls well that ends well, now 4 times faster than it was, not great but much better, thanks again.