Measuring Broadband America Report Released

AzTechGuy writes "Early this year I received one of the 'Whitebox' routers to test the speed of my ISP and compare it to the advertised speed. Today I received an email that they have released the first report with another report due at the end of the year. My results do not correspond with the results reflected in the report." It appears that most ISPs are within 80% of their advertised speeds during peak hours with Verizon leading the pack mostly exceeding their advertised rates. Cablevision users, on the other hand, shouldn't expect more than half of the promised bandwidth (youch!).

Comments

Errr what?

[OverlordQ]

My results do not correspond with the results reflected in the report.

You mean a single data point doesn't follow the trend? Throw the study out! It must be crap!

False advertising

[Bob the Super Hamste]

I would say that any company that was listed that never reached an average of their advertised speed should be taken to task for false advertising. Maybe dragged in front of the FTC, and possible legal action since it looks like most providers are never able to deliver their advertised speed.

Promised bandwidth?

[prisoner-of-enigma]

Cablevision users, on the other hand, shouldn't expect more than half of the promised bandwidth (youch!).

"Promised bandwidth"? I'm sure if you read the fine print on *any* residential broadband SLA, you'll find the ISP "promises" exactly *zero* bandwidth. Every contract I've ever seen says they promise speeds "up to" a certain amount but there is no lower limit to what they actually deliver. This is akin to the good old days of zero CIR frame relay where the provider had the right to discard up to 100% of your packets if network congestion became an issue. In return, you got rock-bottom pricing. I never saw any ISP ever drop 100% of packets due to a zero CIR, so you were essentially gambling (and winning) that the ISP would always have some spare bandwidth.

I'm sure people who opt for the 22Mbit/sec package expect they should get 22Mbit/sec or something close to it on a regular basis, and if the ISP is only regularly providing, say, 2Mbit/sec then the customer has a reason to be upset. However, to say the ISP is "promising" bandwidth is a complete fabrication. The OP should read up and understand the different between "up to" and "no less than."

good faith?

[Nyall]

I wonder how long this will last until a class action suit.

I think the ISPs are hiding behind the variables like distance to the tap and peak hours to not make a good faith effort to provide what they are advertising.

In many cases people pay for 3mbs but get 2mbs, then upgrade to the 6mbs plan and get 4mbs, which demonstrates the ISPs capability to have delivered the full 3mbs in the first place.