100mb Connection - Low speed test results, but pages load instantly.

[Deatheryn]

Before we get too far into the abyss, what ISP do you have? I've not heard of any residential 100Mbit/sec connections (at least not any affordable ones). Usually those are business class only. 100 MBit/sec = 12.5 MByte/sec (there's a difference between bits and bytes). Is the 5 "mb" test result you're seeing listed as 5 Mb or 5 MB (pay close attention to capitalization). If it's 5 MB, then that's closer to what real world throughput would be factoring in latency and overhead.

This^ 100% There are 8 bits in a Byte so there is a pretty substantial difference between Mb and MB! Also is it 100 up or down? These are all subtle tricks ISPs play in order to fool their customers into thinking they are getting better service than they actually are!

[Yohassakura]

Hm, I can rule out most of these factors as this morning before my 100mb got installed I did a speed test and it came out at 57/58 just fine.

I assume you're using Speedtest.net? - Sometimes the servers are just shit on there. E.g. I just tried a couple...

London:

Namesco - http://www.speedtest.net/result/1928547767.png
Structured Comms - http://www.speedtest.net/result/1928550850.png

Gloucester:

FirstNetServ Ltd - http://www.speedtest.net/result/1928543115.png
LAUSTA - http://www.speedtest.net/result/1928552771.png

(100mb from VM from SWales)

[Deleted]

Sometimes the servers are just shit on there.

Pretty much. If you're using a higher speed connection, its not unusual for the servers you test against to simply not be capable of sustaining the connection over a single link. In some cases, the closest servers can be one of the worst. I'm better of testing against Oslo or Copenhagen, than Malmö for example. Furthermore, none of the speed test servers get anywhere near the latency of my Norwegian clanmate's TS server. (2ms vs 10-30ms)

At 20+mbps, you tend to reach a point where diminishing returns become rather heavy - and the use of parallel servers/services becomes necessary. Torrents are generally the only thing which does this natively on a large scale. MMO-Champion for example only transmits websites between 500-1500kbps.

[justifysan]

Hello all, I've got 100mb internet connection, however when I do a speed test it comes out at 5mb.

Saying this, pages load instantly.

Any idea why the speed test would read low?

you need to let your ISP know!
check that it shows Mega bits(Mb) or megabytes(MB). Try with scanmyspeed.com to check your speed test results

[TwentyTwelve]

lol so many people saying "isp is fine" "isp is bad" etc, personally virgin sucks for me, but i know people who have great performance from them too, it all comes down to luck sadly, if you are effected by what i had with VM (high utilization) i'd get out of the contract if iw as you, i have 2 mates on Virgin Media and myself (or was) 6 months into the contract of 50down/5up i started to not be able to raid for 6 months, had 98% packet loss, 300jitter, 400 ping, both sometimes spiked to 4k + on the tests. wow latency was 4k-20k, speed test went on a roller coster ride lol, up,down,up,down so unstable...

The issue was high utilization, too many people assinged on one sever (so they move some off/build a new server?) but i found out more people was being put on the server, which wouldnt resolve it ofc, when i called virgin media up about this they basically said they can't stop it due to money (lol), they dont care about customers, only the money... i had to get legal help, get formal warnings written up etc and after 6 months, i went to BT (dad still uses VM line) i had a thread on their website too so i posted i was leaving, and also posted my new speeds, BT infinity upto 40mb/10up, got 38mb,8upload, ping test show'd 0-9jitter and 10 ping, brilliant, funny enough since we left and got warnings, my dad has had a massive change in speeds, 50mb constant etc from VM, my 2 mates, 1 has fine performance for 95% of his time with VM, the other is in the same boat i was, like 80% of the time hes had VM, hes recieved less than 2% of what he pays for.

Long story short, phone them up and quote them on the problem, if it is high utilization i'd start crying check their forums and see how long it takes for the problem to resolve (crap service), not saying VM are the only ones who do this though, as i said, it all comes down to luck, i know people who suffer with BT too, whereas mine is perfect.

[yurano]

Everyone so far has missed the fact that the OP hasn't posted what router he is using. A wireless N router can support 150/300/600 mbits. However, a wirless G router can only support 54 mbits (which is approximately 6.75 mbits, close to what the OP has been getting).

One method I used to use to test connection speeds without using a speed test website is to download a very large file from a robust server. Back in the day, the iTunes download was sufficient. Find a 1 Gb game download from a large server and see what speeds it reports. Steam is probably a good choice.

[Milkshake86]

Just going to /thread this here and do it quickly.

Just because YOU have 100Mbps connection does not mean that any server anywhere will ever let you achieve that kind of throughput, that is your connection and yours alone.

[xindralol]

http://www.speedtest.net/result/2015121596.png
usually speeddtest is over before you get the full potential though kinda dumb if they only use like a 5mb file for upload I'm pretty sure I got 100 up/down since the cat5 cable is 100mbit

http://i.dslr.net/imc/0/0/0/2/102753162.png
20MB down lol gg

[Reith]

Before we get too far into the abyss, what ISP do you have? I've not heard of any residential 100Mbit/sec connections (at least not any affordable ones). Usually those are business class only. 100 MBit/sec = 12.5 MByte/sec (there's a difference between bits and bytes). Is the 5 "mb" test result you're seeing listed as 5 Mb or 5 MB (pay close attention to capitalization). If it's 5 MB, then that's closer to what real world throughput would be factoring in latency and overhead.

Shaw has a 250MB/15MB unlimited bandwidth plan in many places in Canada for $190, which isn't too bad.

[Fojos]

Before we get too far into the abyss, what ISP do you have? I've not heard of any residential 100Mbit/sec connections (at least not any affordable ones). Usually those are business class only. 100 MBit/sec = 12.5 MByte/sec (there's a difference between bits and bytes). Is the 5 "mb" test result you're seeing listed as 5 Mb or 5 MB (pay close attention to capitalization). If it's 5 MB, then that's closer to what real world throughput would be factoring in latency and overhead.

1 Gbit costs around 100 euro in Sweden, residential. 250 Mbit + phone + TV is around 50 euro a month. :P