Broadband

[johnriley1uk]

I mentioned broadband problems at Wednesday AD&D and I've now installed a replacement router.

It just worked, apart from a new password for logging on a computer it did everything itself. The problem had been the connection dying at regular intervals. The new router logged on much quicker than the old one and has been happily connected for two days now. The speed did die at one point, but I left it and within an hour I saw it suddenly shoot back up again. Obviously not me here, but either BT or Virgin at their end.

Speed is more stable, not up much but vatying between 5 and 5.8 Mbps. Not too bad for a phone line. When it slowed it went down to 0.74 Mbps download, slower than the upload speed of 0.80 Mbps that was unaffected. However, it seems to be stabilising as we go, so fingers crossed. Ping has actually improved dramatically and is now routinely 15ms. Previous best had been 25ms but if was often much slower.

[johnriley1uk]

I forgot to mention that not only did Virgin send a new router but they also insisted on halving my monthly bill. Bizarre really as price was not the issue, quality of service was the issue. Companies seem to find that one very difficult to understand these days.

I don't mind paying more if I get the very best service in exchange.

[johnriley1uk]

Out of curiosity I tried Speedtest.net on both IE8 and Firefox.

Download speed:
IE8 5.13
Firefox 5.17

Upload speed:
IE8 0.74
Firefox 0.74

PING
IE8 25ms
Firefox 25ms

[Mike]

I am surprised that you didn't try Chrome or Safari! I would like the know the full picture (btw that includes Opera!).

[johnriley1uk]

Safari I'm not very fond of really, but I might well have a go at Chrome.

[johnriley1uk]

Virginmedia seem to have settled doiwn now to around 5.36 Mbps dowmload and 0.74 Mbps upload.

Interestingly, my new high power Orange dongle can manage 1.36 Mbps download and up to 1.1 Mbps uplooad, the latter being faster than the BT landline. In theory, this dongle can handle up to 8 Mbps download, but it depends very much on the mobile network locally.

I was using the Mobile Broadband last night as Virgin had server problems that made all the EPZ sites unavailable and it worked very well on 3G and 3G+

[Mike]

BBC article which shows the average Broadband speeds in the UK. It is interesting that Virgin Media has the best average in the list but is also the only company I know who relies on full optical cable delivery for their main distribution (although I think that they have some delivery over copper networks).

[johnriley1uk]

Interesting stuff. As speeds increase though, websites will become ever more complex and the higher speed will become necessary. If you want slow, then try a mobile dongle on a remote mobile network. I had a good signal in Scotland, but the ping was 1200msec instead of 15-25ms and the download speed 0.02 Mbps. It was excruciating....

[Mike]

I would not have bothered. I think I would have found the nearest coffee shop and gone there to use their free wifi once a day! Amazingly in Cornwall on a camp site my mobile internet was as fast as Manchester City Centre!

[johnriley1uk]

That's a thought indeed, thanks Mike.

[nila]

Out of curiosity I tried Speedtest.net on both IE8 and Firefox.

Download speed:
IE8 5.13
Firefox 5.17

Upload speed:
IE8 0.74
Firefox 0.74

PING
IE8 25ms
Firefox 25ms

My speed test results are,

Downloadspeed:1.787Mbps
Uploadspeed:0.837Mbps
I checked my internet speed test here ScanmySpeed.com .
Is this good or not?