time for the annual Internet Speed Quest

[Derek Atkins]

John Abreau <jabr at blu.org> writes:

> When I talk to actual non-technical people who tell me their Internet
> connection is too "slow", I almost always find that they're complaining about
> slow browser response, or video that keeps buffering during play, or other
> latency issues. The number of complains I hear about large files taking too
> long to download is only a tiny fraction of the latency-based complaints. 
>
> This is based on my direct first-hand experience, not on untested
> assumptions. 

Video buffering is not necessarily a latency-based complaint.  It can be
latency, but it can also be pure throughput constraint.  Usually it's an
issue at the sending site or intermediaries and not necessarily the last
mile.  Or it could be an issue at the local network (e.g. going to a
wifi connection with marginal S/N that reduces your pipe significantly
from what's available on wireline).

For example, on my 22/6 Comcast service I can regularly see 30/8 when
using ethernet and rsync and/or bittorrent..  But when I use my wifi I
rarely see more than 8-10mbps pulling down the pipe (e.g. watching
something on HBOGO).  I'm 99% sure the issue is my wifi, although
sometimes it's the upstream server being unable to service the requests
reasonably.  Rarely is it my Comcast "last mile" (except perhaps in the
case of buffer bloat when my network is saturated).

-derek

-- 
       Derek Atkins, SB '93 MIT EE, SM '95 MIT Media Laboratory
       Member, MIT Student Information Processing Board  (SIPB)
       URL: http://web.mit.edu/warlord/    PP-ASEL-IA     N1NWH
       warlord at MIT.EDU                        PGP key available