Varying speeds on ADSL

[Martin963]

I've related on other threads our rather mixed experiences with Club Internet ADSL and VOIP since we signed up six weeks ago.   I'm wondering if anyone with knowledge on the background workings of ADSL can advise.

I've been testing our speed frequently with this link

http://www.internetfrog.com/mypc/speedtest/

kindly posted elsewhere.   During the day we get over 400 kbps download and about 130 kbps upload,  on which I have no complaints. 

However,  during the evening (and that is if the wretched thing is working at all) the download speed comes down to values of 80 - 120 kbps (often being slower than the upload speed measured at the same time) and one evening it hovered around 10 kbps before stopping altogether.   Having said that this 10 kbps was actually dellivering web pages much faster than a dial up would have done.

The reason I'm querying this is that back in the UK we use Eclipse (excellent company) and I remember that when we signed up one had the choice of different packages,  the main criteria being to decide whether one wanted a guaranteed spped 24/7 or whether one wanted unlimited access with no guarantee of speed.   We opted for a 10 GB limit with guaranteed speed and at our 1 Meg that is - for our purposes - very good.

Now in contrast the Club Internet offer is unlimited in terms of download quantities,  so what I'm asking is whether we're simply suffering from a rationing of speed during the evenings (when presumably there's more traffic),  and if so whether others are in the same position but perhaps notice the effect less if they have a faster "usual" connnection  than our 0.5 Meg.

I ask because it will decide whether I engage in a fight-to-the-finish with Club Internet to get something done about a service that is not living up to expectations,  which has been off for long periods on several occasions, (*)  and for which I have already had to pay over €16 to ring their helpline,  as a result of which NOTHING has been done (I know,  because the promised call from an engineer has never materialised (as I can prove from 3131)), or whether I shrug and say "well it's working in the daytime which is mainly when I want it,  so what the ....".

Any advice from ADSL techies gratefully received.

(*) mainly at the same time as some neighbours' Alice ADSL and VOIP has gone down too

[suein56]

[quote user="Martinwatkins"]I've been testing our speed frequently with this link

http://www.internetfrog.com/mypc/speedtest/ 
 
[/quote]

I cannot answer your queries as I don't know enough about the situation, but I can say that in the past when using a site to test Adsl speed quite a few of us found that Interfrog, though usually reliable, occasionally went haywire and gave very strange results. Someone recommended  http://speedtest.net/ which has always given consistently reliable results.

Though on one of your points I can say that my 1 meg connection dips at very busy times ie when school gets out, between 5 and 7 in the evening and on Saturdays in general, just dips - not an all out slowdown.

Sue

[AnOther]

In a word I think your problem is Contention, or rationining if you will, although if it is off for long periods but your phone is still working then that is possibly something else.

You probably know this but you do not have your own dedicated fixed speed connection to the internet but share the available bandwith at your exchange with X number of other users, usually on a basis of around 50:1, and if the other 49 are online, and depending on what they are doing, then your speed can drop to a crawl. Are you on ADSL or READSL I wonder, at 512kb and max 400kb download speed it sounds like maybe the latter. What is your distance from the exchange ?

Regarding your Eclipse experience, I'm with BT in the UK at present and on their 2mb package you pretty well got 2mb 24/7 but on the (up to) 8mb package it can vary from under 1mb to over 7mb.

 

[Martin963]

Thanks for the replies.  The two speed tests do give very conflicting answers,  I like the look of the frog one simply because it "stabilises" before giving an answer whereas the other one seems always to give the highest figure as the final result,  even if there have been consderable fluctuations during the test. 

The problems last weekend were it seems universal to all ADSL users round here.  Wish I'd known as I would have saved €16 talking to Club Internet.

A suivre....

Thanks again