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[Ammit]

Does this measure the actual throughput??

[roseway]

The actual throughput in their test, yes. That doesn't mean that it's necessarily representative of what you get in real life, any more than any other speed test is.

[Astral]

The BT checker always seems to read significantly slower than other testers IME. Whether it is a more accurate figure, who knows?

[mr_chris]

Get NetMeter (a free network traffic meter) and have a look at what this does during various downloads. You may have to change the units back to Kibibits / second (Kibibits = binary Kilobits i.e. 1024 rather than 1000) to compare the same units as you get from speedtest sites.

You'll soon get to learn the maximum speed your connection is capable of. Note that NetMeter includes all TCP/IP overheads too, so 'actual' download speed (of useful data) will be less than the maximum reported by NetMeter. This is normal.

[rwm32]

A small note of caution.

Get NetMeter (a free network traffic meter) and have a look at what this does during various downloads.

Read this with interest: as I've posted in a new topic, I've experienced wildly differing speedtester results.  So downloaded & installed NetMeter yesterday. Great.

Didn't have any cause to re-boot yesterday, and shut down as usual overnight.

Unfortunately, when booting this morning, XPHomeSP2 threw a fit: unable to start svchost for network services. This was a consistent & repeatable error, whether re-starting warm or completely powering down.

Checked event log and spotted two relevant entries:

Warning: TraceLevel parameter not located in registry; Default trace level used is 32.

Error: Faulting application svchost.exe, version 5.1.2600.2180, faulting module ntdll.dll, version 5.1.2600.2180, fault address 0x00018fea.

Didn't have time to go through major diagnostic steps (Safe Mode start &etc), so simply uninstalled NetMeter & re-booted.

XP started up perfectly, with no anomalous entries in the event logs.

Just thought I'd mention it...

[Ammit]

I've got netmeter on my PC and run XP and have had no issues.  But strange that that happened with yours!    Glad it's ok now though. 

So truth is...no speedtester gives entirely accurate results am I right...but seeing as you don't have anything else to go by you can treat them as such.  I hope this is correct. 

[roseway]

'Accurate' doesn't really mean much in this context. Actual speeds vary all the time, depending on several different factors, so all that a speedtester can do is give you an indication of speed at the time you run the test on that particular server. The better speedtesters (those with plenty of capacity and good routing) will, to a certain extent, give you a means of comparing results if you're tweaking your MTU/RWIN values for example, but you still need to take the readings with a dose of salt.

[dave.m]

I, personally, feel that there is a rather unhealthy obsession with internet speed.

OK! If you have signed up to an ISP who promised you "Not less than . . . " and you are only crawling along then something serious needs looking into. But if you connection is of such a speed that, in normal use for whatever you use the internet, you are usually satisfied then running speed tests with different checkers  is of no relevance because each speed checker will give you different readings.

If you are thinking of tweaking or doing more serious adjustments then a series of test reports from any ONE speed checker prior to your experiments will give you a datum upon which to gauge whether your tweaks etc have improved your speed or not. Using different checkers before and after tweaking will not give you a comparable data base to see what results your alterations have made.

I have occasionally  used Speeedtest.net just to keep a datum of my speeds to refer to if my connection slows right down, as it did about a month ago, but it recovered the next day, so I did not need the references to fight my ISP.

Over the last three weeks my speeds have been (in three tests) between 3,884 and 4,376 kb/s but I would not have noticed any real difference between the lower and higher results.


dave

[kitz]

One of the common reasons why some speedtesters may vary is because of overheads.
Remote speedtesters all have to make an allowance for the amount of overheads on the line... and different parts of the network/internet will encounter different amounts and types of overheads.   So say if you were designing a speedtester for adsl you will estimate the amount of ATM overheads over and above the TCP/IP overheads.
Therefore it depends on the designer who wrote the speedtester and how much of an allowance he made.

When you use something like DUMeter or Netmeter (both of which Ive used for years without problems) it will show you the speed including TCP/IP overheads.

- Understanding adsl speeds

[Ammit]

Please could it be noted that I work for an ISP.   I need information not for my own internet connection (I don't have one at home!!) but so that I can learn and be better at my job. I'm very new to this - it's sometimes frustrating when people think that I need this info for my own home connection, I am trying to learn is all.   

[b4dger]

Please could it be noted that I work for an ISP.   I need information not for my own internet connection (I don't have one at home!!) but so that I can learn and be better at my job. I'm very new to this - it's sometimes frustrating when people think that I need this info for my own home connection, I am trying to learn is all.   

Hi Ammit,
I had noticed from one of your previous posts 
Good on you for trying to up-skill yourself, but it's rather disappointing that your employer isn't providing you with some decent training!!!  Guess that explains why people have so many problems when they report a problem...

Keep reading - that's my tip 

[UncleUB]

No wonder people have problems with ISP support when they themselves have to come where us who need help come.No fault on your part Ammit,but like b4dger says your company should be supplying you with proper training.You should not be thrown to the wolves so to speak until you are properly trained.

[Ammit]

Amen to that!!

Well all my training has been "on the job" - i've got a lot lot better recently but it's like a family business, it's very small (not a massive ISP) - we resell and no we don't go on big coporate training days like i've done in previous companies i've worked for (but i wasn't in IT there).

I have taken a very long time to solve some problems but through doing this i've also gained a lot of knowledge (compared to what I had before at least).  It's not great coming on a forum to learn but there are lots of people here who know what they are talking about so it's great for me.
I do think it's a lot to expect of someone to walk into a job and be able to answer the phone within 2 weeks and deal with problems - i've had nobody sitting down with me and going through things - perhaps 1 hour in the 4 months of been here but other than that......

It's a challenge and I am still determined to be at the same level as tech support staff at say... Zen, who really DO know what they are doing.

Thanks for all the support and help that you've given me though.     I don't want to give myself a reputation of someone who knows nothing on this board - because I do.... i'm just not an expert (yet).  *runs off to read more ADSL info*

[kitz]

You'll get there - but no-one ever knows it all

[UncleUB]

There is a saying that, 'There is no substitute for experience' Like any job you will be learning something every day giving you that experience and knowledge.Keep it going.