Thread: High Speed Broadband?

It's raised regulary, and a search would find a number of threads that provide both tests and user results but to save a search http://users.bigpond.net.au/speedtest/

Speeds achievable depend on a number of things, including (frome home end)
Cable length and condition home to exchange.
Exchange equipment
ISP server capability and congestion
Link congestion between your ISP and the host server
Host server speed and congestion.

If any one of these is a bottleneck it will slow the whole thing incredibly. If you think you are being taken go to www.speedtest.net and run a test to a local server, then one to a server interstate, and finally to an overseas server and compare the results If all are slow, the issue most likely is from ISP to you, whereas a big difference between local and OS sites indicates that the intercontnental link is limiting throughput.

Thanks malb and kev.

Did the speed test and got: download 1.19 Mbps, Upload 218 kbps

Also followed advice and did speed test over continents and this came out fairly consistent except for Auckland at Upload 1329 kb/s Download 218 kbs.

Carry Pine

Originally Posted by Carry Pine

Thanks malb and kev.

Did the speed test and got: download 1.19 Mbps, Upload 218 kbps

Also followed advice and did speed test over continents and this came out fairly consistent except for Auckland at Upload 1329 kb/s Download 218 kbs.

Carry Pine

Looks like you are running at 1.5Meg, have you checked you modem/firmware to confirm it is capable of handling the higher speed?

From the BigpPond FAQ's "If your existing service is currently connected to an ADSL 1 port your upgrade will take up to 8 working days which includes a service transfer to an ADSL2+ port."

What distance are you from you local telephone exchange?

Depends on what speed you are paying for, if your download is 1.5MB and 256kbs upload then your test figures are reasonable. Very rarely will you get full download speed. Usually the speed difference is not necessarily seen when you visit websites, but should be obvious when you download a program or file from the internet. That should be quite marked from your earlier connection download speed. Your upload will be slower than your download speed , this is normal. If you are not happy with the speed, contact Telstra and let them know.

Just for comparison I got this result.

Im with iiNet as you can see.

Originally Posted by KevM

Looks like you are running at 1.5Meg, have you checked you modem/firmware to confirm it is capable of handling the higher speed?

From the BigpPond FAQ's "If your existing service is currently connected to an ADSL 1 port your upgrade will take up to 8 working days which includes a service transfer to an ADSL2+ port."

Been on new system for 20 days

What distance are you from you local telephone exchange?

1.8km

Any advice readily accepted.

Graham

Originally Posted by Carry Pine

1.8km
Any advice readily accepted.

Graham

Hi Graham,
The easiest way to tell what plan you are on is to log onto the big-pond site via this link - https://www.bigpond.com/internet/mybigpond/
enter your details, after you login you will see a section that says "My Plan" - copy and paste the details here.

Here is my result from speedtest, I'm on 1.5MB ADSL



Cheers,
Aaron

Thanks for the replies so far. I do know what plan I'm on: 400mb, 1500/256.

The only thing is that it just doesn't seem to be any faster! I posted the speed tests I did.

Did the speed test and got: download 1.19 Mbps, Upload 218 kbps

Also followed advice and did speed test over continents and this came out fairly consistent except for Auckland at Upload 1329 kb/s Download 218 kbs.

So is this what speed others have? Should I be happy with this? It's just that I can feel myself growing a beard waiting for some pages to download!

Graham

Find yourself a new plan here.

Ummm - you are on a very small plan (400 meg of downloads). Are you sure you haven't hit that and are now being capped? (I manage to chew through 2 gig a week, even without going out of my way to download torrents).

I get similar speeds to yours and most of the delays I get are either from slow servers or from my router loosing the plot with too many torrent connections and deciding that it's not going to talk http right now.

Alternatively, you might be seeing delays caused by ad servers - sometimes pages can take a while to display as they are waiting for friggin' flashy animated ads to download so the page can render - I know I see a difference between the speed of some sites at home versus at work; they are faster at home where I have Adblock keeping the ads out of my way.

Brickie: sorry to report suggested swap of provider- does not come near telstra's deal.

Master Splinter: Small plan maybe but I hardly ever go over. It's just slow.


Carry Pine

400MB then 15c/mb? gotta love the bigpong con. Even better how your uploads count towards the data allowance! Guess thats why ya lock into a long contract...

Carry Pine what would drive you to such a plan? you must use the phone and internet next to nothing? Or got some great deal?

Myself I have a 25GB/month plan (Thats real Downloads, not bigponds uploads+downloads) and what I am saving on the phone ($20 line rental, 8c untimed calls to landlines in oz and a number of other countries and 10.5c/min to mobiles) is paying for the net plan.

To speed ur browsing and use more of your link I'd look to increase the maximum connections your browser can make. This can help a great deal. Just don't go silly with it.

Master Splinter: Small plan maybe but I hardly ever go over. It's just slow.

Be careful because with *cough* some providers with just the modem "on" you are using download allocation.
I think this maybe the ISP pings to see if you are there alone.

While you may have signed up for a certain speed DSL will be only as good as your line to the exchange.

If you are basing the speed on the render of this site how or more so where your request packets go will effect the rendering speed. I haven't had a look but at a guess this site is hosted in America. (haven't done a ping and whois) As stated some sites will have bottlenecks and where your packets head maybe bottlenecking at some point.

You might have a 1.5 megabit plan but the speed is still constrained by the copper the packet requests pass through.