Internet Speed.

[Yohassakura]

The Steam server or my internet provider server?

Your ISP is allowing your speed to be: 38Megabits/8bits (= 4.75 MegaBytes/sec ~).
The steam server is allowing your speed to be: 2.5 MegaBytes/sec.

4.75MegaBytes is greater than 2.5MegaBytes.
You should be able to download at 4.75MegaBytes or so, because of your ISP.
However, STEAM is "forcing" you to download at 2.5MegaBytes.

[Yohassakura]

I've got a 20Mb connection, but i only get 12Mb max due to the distance from the exchange. However, i get 1.2MB actual download speeds from almost every site or resource (steam would be classed as a resource), and sometimes it peaks at 1.8MB on the rare ocassion which is above what i should be able to get from a 12Mb connection. When i get below 1.2MB download speeds, i know that it's either a server or node issue, and not down to my connection.

Whereas I do agree with your first paragraph, at 12megabits you should expect to get 1.5megabytes/s. (Following math, 12 / 8 = 1.5 ).

Whenever you're lower than that speed, it is more than likely your ISP capping you, (perhaps due to the traffic policy that they have), somewhat like a Fair Usage Policy, or because it's high-traffic time later in the afternoon, which tends to be 6pm until 11pm or so.

I can't really speak for your ISP though, not knowing which one it is and what policies they have - Perhaps it's a mix of both.

[Cyanotical]

You raise a good point, you can pay $75 here in the states for a guaranteed 60mbps down from Time Warner, or you can pay $35 for 30mbps; I think the 60mbps is just bragging rights, to be honest, because 99% of people do not engage in activities online where they'll ever be able to use that much download speed.

You pay for bandwidth, not speed, a 60Mb connection allows 10 computers to have a 6Mb connection

Unless you are server hosting, or have multiple heavy use computers in your house, anything more then 10Mb is not needed

[Deleted]

Whereas I do agree with your first paragraph, at 12megabits you should expect to get 1.5megabytes/s. (Following math, 12 / 8 = 1.5 ).

Whenever you're lower than that speed, it is more than likely your ISP capping you, (perhaps due to the traffic policy that they have), somewhat like a Fair Usage Policy, or because it's high-traffic time later in the afternoon, which tends to be 6pm until 11pm or so.

I can't really speak for your ISP though, not knowing which one it is and what policies they have - Perhaps it's a mix of both.

In terms of connection speed, the 1024 system is more common than the plain 1000, therefor, the 1.5 is a probably a tad lower.

[GoldFish]

Yeah, fastest we can get in our area !

[Deleted]

Yeah, fastest we can get in out area !

Zen Internet? I'd be tripping balls if I had a connection like that.

[GoldFish]

Seems wasted right? haha

[ispano]

Using about 200kB/s up and down while running that. It's a Comcast business 22/5 account, so no known caps.

[Cyanotical]

Whereas I do agree with your first paragraph, at 12megabits you should expect to get 1.5megabytes/s. (Following math, 12 / 8 = 1.5 ).

Whenever you're lower than that speed, it is more than likely your ISP capping you, (perhaps due to the traffic policy that they have), somewhat like a Fair Usage Policy, or because it's high-traffic time later in the afternoon, which tends to be 6pm until 11pm or so.

I can't really speak for your ISP though, not knowing which one it is and what policies they have - Perhaps it's a mix of both.

in the US it now illegal under the net neutrality act for your ISP to throttle back your connection, they do not however have to guarantee you full bandwidth
ex:
you pay for a 20Mb connection and only 5Mb are guaranteed, that means you can go up to 20Mb, but not below 5Mb

most home connections are not guaranteed though

---------- Post added 2011-06-04 at 11:53 AM ----------

Using about 200kB/s up and down while running that. It's a Comcast business 22/5 account, so no known caps.

how is that? im thinking of going with the 20/5 to help in hosting my minecraft server

[ispano]

It's not illegal. They can throttle if there is a good reason for it, and they aren't discriminating. Like if a certain node is heavily congested at certain times of the day, they can throttle people back to clear it up, so long as they don't throttle this program and not that one. And "technically" they don't even have to follow that, since it's not a law, just something the FCC put out. Courts have said they have no power to do so, or haven't said they DO have the power to do so. Will find the links for that info after my trip to the post office.

[milkGONEbad]

I love Slovakia!! Look up the village Trnovec nad Váhom... that's where I live and this is my connection. :-D

Your down speed is slightly better than mine, and my up speed is slightly better than yours. I play WoW on a really spiky 300-400ms and that's a very good day.

[ispano]

in the US it now illegal under the net neutrality act for your ISP to throttle back your connection, they do not however have to guarantee you full bandwidth
ex:
you pay for a 20Mb connection and only 5Mb are guaranteed, that means you can go up to 20Mb, but not below 5Mb

most home connections are not guaranteed though

---------- Post added 2011-06-04 at 11:53 AM ----------



how is that? im thinking of going with the 20/5 to help in hosting my minecraft server

Eh, hard to say. I'm currently fighting them to get this piece of garbage SMC off the line. They pretty much require you to use one of their SMC gateways. If you decide to use static IPS, which cost a bit more, then you have to, but they also don't cause an issue that way. But if you stick with dynamic, they have to do NAT, and are pretty horrible at it, at least if you push alot of connections. When I signed up, I got them to provision my SB6120, which worked perfectly on the same tier of residential. But I kept getting heavy packet loss for even minor uses of the connection. Finally let them switch back to the SMC and the packet loss is gone, but the issues with it being a gateway, and a horrible one at that, are now the issue. You can have techs out within 4 hours or the next day though. And no caps to speak of.

[Cyanotical]

It's not illegal. They can throttle if there is a good reason for it, and they aren't discriminating. Like if a certain node is heavily congested at certain times of the day, they can throttle people back to clear it up, so long as they don't throttle this program and not that one. And "technically" they don't even have to follow that, since it's not a law, just something the FCC put out. Courts have said they have no power to do so, or haven't said they DO have the power to do so. Will find the links for that info after my trip to the post office.

as i understand it even if they have a heavy node they still cant throttle back connection, speaking of post office this article about comcast throttling p2p traffic has a good example:

http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2...disclosure.ars

Would anyone here actually be OK if the Post Office was opening your mail and deciding that they didn't want to bother delivering it and hiding that fact by sending it back to you stamped 'address unknown, return to sender'?" Martin asked the audience. "Or would anyone here be OK if someone sent them a First Class letter, and the Post Office decided that they would open it, and deciding that because the mail truck was full sometimes, they would make the determination that your letter could wait, and then they would hide that fact from you, the fact that they had read your letter and opened it, and that they decided to delay it?

as i have heard it, and this is second hand, they are not allowed to throttle your connection to a heavy traffic server, they can however queue it in a buffer, different solution, but it produces the same affect on your end, slow speed

edit, the opening letter part i think is more to scare people, considering most routers open data packets


---------- Post added 2011-06-04 at 12:12 PM ----------

Eh, hard to say. I'm currently fighting them to get this piece of garbage SMC off the line. They pretty much require you to use one of their SMC gateways. If you decide to use static IPS, which cost a bit more, then you have to, but they also don't cause an issue that way. But if you stick with dynamic, they have to do NAT, and are pretty horrible at it, at least if you push alot of connections. When I signed up, I got them to provision my SB6120, which worked perfectly on the same tier of residential. But I kept getting heavy packet loss for even minor uses of the connection. Finally let them switch back to the SMC and the packet loss is gone, but the issues with it being a gateway, and a horrible one at that, are now the issue. You can have techs out within 4 hours or the next day though. And no caps to speak of.

hmm, somewhat odd, im also using a 6120, and i have no issues with it, i wonder what specifically they change on their end to cause so many issues

[ispano]

Yeah, the FCC "spanked" them. But the FCC doesn't have the power to make rules like that is the problem. Should they? Maybe. But they don't. Comcast did stop using sandvine.

And when I say throttle on a congested node, I don't mean the destination. I mean they can throttle you if your heavy usage is causing a problem for other paying customers. And they throttle the whole connection, not one service or application.

[Cyanotical]

Yeah, the FCC "spanked" them. But the FCC doesn't have the power to make rules like that is the problem. Should they? Maybe. But they don't. Comcast did stop using sandvine.

And when I say throttle on a congested node, I don't mean the destination. I mean they can throttle you if your heavy usage is causing a problem for other paying customers. And they throttle the whole connection, not one service or application.

that makes sense, but, if they can do that to me, why cant i charge my neighbors for generating too much EMI on my lines by not capping every non used cable port .../ragefist

[Yohassakura]

In terms of connection speed, the 1024 system is more common than the plain 1000, therefor, the 1.5 is a probably a tad lower.

As far as i know, all ISPs use 8 bits = 1 byte , 1024 bytes = 1kb and so on. It's mainly Hard drive manufacturers which use the metric 1000, rather than the "normal" 1024.

in the US it now illegal under the net neutrality act for your ISP to throttle back your connection, they do not however have to guarantee you full bandwidth
ex:
you pay for a 20Mb connection and only 5Mb are guaranteed, that means you can go up to 20Mb, but not below 5Mb

http://shop.virginmedia.com/the-lega...explained.html
(Heading: What is the difference between the Acceptable Use Policy and the Traffic Management Policy?)


About the "traffic management":

During our peak times, if we see that a particular customer is downloading excessive amounts within a one hour period which could be having a detrimental affect on other users then we will restrict that customer's actual throughput speed to 512Kbps until midnight of that day. At midnight the throttle will be automatically taken off the line and returned to its normal speed.

Although, I am basing this from one ISP (the one that I happen to be with), I'd assume that other ISPs would have similar protocols to "protect" themselves. It'd be nice if the US and UK policies were all one high standard really speaking.

[Cyanotical]

Although, I am basing this from one ISP (the one that I happen to be with), I'd assume that other ISPs would have similar protocols to "protect" themselves. It'd be nice if the US and UK policies were all one high standard really speaking.

that is part of the problem with the internet, its falls under nearly every countries jurisdiction, yet its for the most part public and difficult to regulate, even in china where it is filtered, the average chinese 12 year old probably knows more about tunneling, proxies, and vpns then most certified net techs

you can make a policy about the internet, it doesn't mean anyone will follow it

[ispano]

that makes sense, but, if they can do that to me, why cant i charge my neighbors for generating too much EMI on my lines by not capping every non used cable port .../ragefist

IF you know this is happening, tell your ISP. That's something they're supposed to look at. I had a tech out here, and there was noise on the line from a dude two buildings over, they went and took care of it.

[Masterec]

And I pay for 100 / 20, weird speeds...

[Cyanide72]

I'm very jelly of you guys pings .
you should value them .