can 2mb broadband realy get 876kbps download speed

[dan1066]

i have 2mb and its pretty bad i have never gotten more than about 100 kbps when downloading anything from anywhere and then i did this test and i got 876kbps and 107kbps as an upload im not sure of my upload speed because i have never seen it but it can take over a min to upload a jpeg picture which is never big. could the fact that i have a router be effecting the test? i know for sure that i cant get more than 130kbps because i had this program where u download games and the servers will download to u at ur connections max speed and there was people on the site getting 600kbps (and were complaining about it being slow!) if i could really download at 876kbps i would have gotten it there or something over 200kbps. so am i really able to get that speed?

[howfast]

Originally Posted by dan1066

i have 2mb and its pretty bad i have never gotten more than about 100 kbps when downloading anything from anywhere and then i did this test and i got 876kbps and 107kbps as an upload im not sure of my upload speed because i have never seen it but it can take over a min to upload a jpeg picture which is never big. could the fact that i have a router be effecting the test? i know for sure that i cant get more than 130kbps because i had this program where u download games and the servers will download to u at ur connections max speed and there was people on the site getting 600kbps (and were complaining about it being slow!) if i could really download at 876kbps i would have gotten it there or something over 200kbps. so am i really able to get that speed?

Hi dan1066

I think you may be confusing bits with bytes. DL speeds are measured in either kbps [kilobits per second] or in kBps [kilobytes per second]. The browser dialog you see when downloading usually shows the speed in kBps [kilobytes per second]. As there are 8 bits in a byte your DL speed of 100 in the browser download window really equals 800kbps which is close to the 876kbps from the speedtest.

However, if you are on a 2Mbps package then everything being equal you should expect to get upto 1.7Mbps i.e around 1750kbps or 210kBps. Having a router should not affect the speeds obtained, but if it is a wireless router make sure you’ve restricted access and that no one else is using your bandwidth.

Howfast

[dan1066]

i thought that something was up with it and i have had it 2 months and pain the upgrade fee and all that well im gonna ring them and make them upgrade it to the proper speed and they cant make any dumb excuses that it was me who was wrong. well thanks you for that at leased i now no that they were cheating me, i just look forward to ireland getting broadband as fast as the brits

[eoinok]

Why does no one ever ever mention contention?

You are buying a 2Mbps package contentended at 16/20/24/48:1 or what ever it may be.

If you want guarenteed 2Mbps DSL all the time, pay for an uncontended line???
Yea, thought as much, not too many people would want to pay "uncontended rates" but will hiss and moan when they dont get the full speed.

[howfast]

Originally Posted by eoinok

Why does no one ever ever mention contention?

You are buying a 2Mbps package contentended at 16/20/24/48:1 or what ever it may be.

If you want guarenteed 2Mbps DSL all the time, pay for an uncontended line???
Yea, thought as much, not too many people would want to pay "uncontended rates" but will hiss and moan when they dont get the full speed.

Hi eoinok

Contention should not be a major issue unless you happen to be on the same connection as others who use P2P, Bittorrent, VOIP, stream video or download large files constantly.

On the basis that it is reasonable to expect that not everyone will be online or even downloading simultaneously then a smaller amount of bandwidth can service a larger number of connections without any serious deterioration in the bandwidth available to any one connection.

I don’t believe everyone here is moaning about not getting full speed rather you will probably see that most of the complaints about not receiving full bandwidth concerns people who pay for a 2Mbps connection and get 1Mbps speeds or pay for 3Mbps and only get 2Mbps or even 1Mbps speeds on an ongoing basis.

It is not unreasonable to expect that if an isp offers a 1Mbps and a 2Mbps service that the 2Mbps connection will give speeds in excess of 1Mbps. Notwithstanding the contention issue where an isp offers a number of different speed packages the DL speed obtained from the higher packages should not fall into what would be expected from the lower ones.

Just to keep the purists happy, this is especially true for anyone using DSL where the contention ratio for most 3Mbps packages is 24:1 while the 1 and 2Mbps packages are contended at 48:1.

Howfast