[Rant] IBB [end_rant]

uteotw

hmmm.... apprently BitTorrent is the biggest P2P traffic generator ! Surprising !
http://www.cdfreaks.com/news/9133

I wonder if this is in their contract ? Shutting down ports and blocking IPs ?

cmdrpaddy

i dont really mind, while bit torrent was working i was downloading close to 2 gigs a day, now im getting around a gig a day from direct connect, but i dont mind

Mutant_Fruit

we're on the "Business" equipment. So i think what happens is that in the middle of the day, we get throttled way back. I ran a graphing program, and from 2:30 til 5:00 (nearly exactly) i was limited to about 10kb/sec. All other times its full 60 down.

THe program is called "online eye (www.pmasoft.net). If anyone else wants to run it and check what times they're limited at i'd be interested to find out. I'll see if its the same story tomorrow.

Jonnie_Onion

Isn't that just because you're contending with other business users?

uteotw

My downloads run pretty much 24/7 and I check from time to time during the day using RemoteDesktop to see what's going on and to do some refresh. NewsBin has its own meter and for the past month and a half it was always running above 950kbps except when the news server has issues.

I also use http://www.dumeter.com to monitor downloads/uploads. Since IBB fixed my connection this is the first time I notice a slow down not due to the news server. And it's been constant at around 128kbits since monday morning.

The limitation seems to be on that news server only... I've no speed download limitation on other news servers. I'll give IBB a ring to find out.

uteotw

hmmm.... I switch off the POE box.... and my router for 10 minutes... now the nntp download is fluctuating between 300kbps and 800kbps... strange... I will monitor this tomorrow.

Mutant_Fruit

Yeah, i use DUmeter also, and i've foundit very reliable, but it only grapghs back the last 30 minutes of download history, the one i mentioned previously graphs up to 24 hours of material on the graph, so you get a really accurate reading on what its like.

Basically for the last 12 hours its been rock solid at the top, i.e. 61kb/sec rock solid. (see attachment). I'm gonna add a few more downloads to Getright and leave it running all day to monitor that too, if only i can find stuff i need

Mutant_Fruit

Ok, from todays graph it seems i was limited from 11:00am til 2:00 pm this afternoon. I find this strange, as my contract says (and the service is still advertised as) being completely unlimited.

Ah well, i don't really mind. At all other times it's blazingly fast.

uteotw

I checked this morning around 11am and regularly all afternoon and I'm stuck at 128kbps ! Still stuck right now and even on the second news server I use !
I tried on 2 different machines, with 2 different news softwares.
Again just to confirm this seems limited only on these 2 servers and only for the nntp protocol !

I tried to unplug the POE box like last night but to no effect.
I didn't ring IBB today but I'm going to email them now and follow with a call tomorrow I don't pay good money for these server to get limited by my ISP !!!

pete

Contention.

Mutant_Fruit

Definately not contention. At exactly the same time, both my uploads and downloads dropped to 12kb/sec. They continued at this slow speed for about 3 hours (the graph isn;t that accurate). Then, at about 2:00 BOTH my upload and download increased from 12kb/sec straight back up to the full 60kb/sec.

So, unless there was syncronised downloading happening with 6 of the other 7 users i'm contending with, then it is most definately limiting.

uteotw

not contention at all... I'm exchanging email with IBB and I will explain more tomorrow...

Hal1

anyone else notice cráp transfer rates and pings past few days? just pinging to my gateway at siac now and im getting:

Ping statistics for 62.231.34.49:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 3, Lost = 1 (25% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 327ms, Maximum = 567ms, Average = 448ms

and so i dialed up on meh modem and wahhey its a hell a lot more reliable wtf!?!
i recently upgraded to there 1mbit breeze service which is not proving to be any better than there 512 offering and the only reason im still with them is cause of the no cap. it seems the only time the service is any good is from 7pm onwards, sigh

DrEvil

From what i hear you can get the VL equipment on the 1Mbit connection if you pester them enough this will definitely sort out the ping problems and hopefully the download speed

Silent Assasin

Yea Ive been in contact with Them aswell during the week...for the last 2 weeks my connection has been rank....

They told me to download a file from their ftp site and post him the speed i was getting...

I tried to download it and it was coming down at a 10.kbs

Im giving it another go now and It is 20kbs Can someone else on Irishbroadband try and download it and let me know what speed their getting ?

the server is ftp://mon.irishbroadband.ie theres a couple of iso files to download there.

Im on the Guiness Transmitter !

Cheers !

mag

40KBps here , im on the Ballycoolin Transmitter , Breeze Home package.

Mutant_Fruit

getting the 10mb file at 61.5kb/sec. (thats about 500kbps). Thats using the VL equipment.

Hal1

Originally posted by Mutant_Fruit
getting the 10mb file at 61.5kb/sec. (thats about 500kbps). Thats using the VL equipment.

Hi, how are you finding the VL equipment, how stable is it? is there any downtime / timeouts etc, and are you on the home breeze service? im on the 1mbit home breeze and i was promised an upgrade to VL when i upgraded my connection which hasn't happened yet.

thanks for any replys.

pete

10meg.iso

9.76MB in 2min 45 sec

60.6KB/sec

Mutant_Fruit

The VL equipment is th bees knees (sorry, but i had to say that). Except for the two times i noticed my connection was limited during peak hours, its been full 60kb/sec all the time, up and down.

Pings always >10ms to boards, in game pings for uk servers and irish servers are under 50ms. In other words, this stuff rocks. I have no complaints about it yet.

Silent Assasin

Thanks for the feedback lads, Still no improvement on the speed today..Saturday.
Must give them a ring on monday and see what they suggest

I wonder would their slow Network would result in the a slow direct debit. ??

Rhetorical Question If i ever heard one

uteotw

About IBB throttling my connection still no real update yet... they quickly replied to me a couple times but then nothing else... I'll phone them on Monday.

The status is that IBB throttle people down to their minimum contention ratio when they download to much ! They say they do this during business hours (6am - 6pm) to give more bandwidth to business users.

Anyway this seems to be load of BS as it happens to me well after 6pm and apparently even at the weekend now ! I'll have to ask them about Business days.

Apparently in the contract it says something about that we cannot use the "service in such away as to impair or degrade the operation or performance of the Services and/or the Irish Broadband network, including but not limited to abusive or excessive use". That's very unclear, what does excessive mean ? 100% of your download speed, 95%, 90%...etc... and doesn't necessarily mean that I cannot download 24/7.

On their website the RipWave page http://www.irishbroadband.ie/htmdocs/our_products/ripwave.htm mentions a "a fair usage policy" and "Irish Broadband reserves the right to contact those users with excessive usage to request adherence to reasonable limits". I haven't been contacted by IBB ! I contacted them ! And anyway what's a reasonable limit ? I don't think this is clearly defined in their contract. If I get a speed ticket on the road I know that I broke a precise speed limit.... not an "excessive" one ! But that page doesn't apply to me I don't subscribe to RipWave.

The "fair usage policy" is not mentioned on the Breeze and Breeze Plus pages http://www.irishbroadband.ie/htmdocs/our_products/breese.htm . There is no "disclaimer" or "Term of use" link on their site that would imply that the information isn't accurate. Also nothing seems to be exactly defined in my Breeze contract about the exact definition of "Excessive usage".

Stay tuned...

Mutant_Fruit

here are a range of Breeze products to suit the ever-changing Internet requirements of the home user. Breeze Home is suitable for Internet users who wish to shop, bank, send photographs to friends and family and have access to a continuous virtual library. In addition, Breeze Home has an added advantage of unrestricted uploading and downloading, ideal for research and study. Breeze Home Plus is for the more sophisticated home user. Breeze Home Plus is a superior home product suitable for families with high usage, parents who telework or indeed those with home networks.

I just bolded the important part. THats taken directly from IBB's site. And i'm a breeze user, so i should not get capped/limited at any time, for any reason.

HelterSkelter

Originally posted by Silent Assasin
Yea Ive been in contact with Them aswell during the week...for the last 2 weeks my connection has been rank....

They told me to download a file from their ftp site and post him the speed i was getting...

I tried to download it and it was coming down at a 10.kbs

Im giving it another go now and It is 20kbs Can someone else on Irishbroadband try and download it and let me know what speed their getting ?

the server is ftp://mon.irishbroadband.ie theres a couple of iso files to download there.

Im on the Guiness Transmitter !

Cheers !

I'm on the Guinness transmitter and have been having problems with very high pings (1000ms) and slow download speeds for more than 2 weeks now. I was onto IBB and they asked me to perform the same download tests from ftp://mon.irishbroadband.ie. I have tried it several times and it always ranges between 7Kb/s and 20Kbps.

I am getting really pissed off at this stage. Everytime I phone they tell me they will work on sorting it out but nothing happens. And they never call me back when they are supposed to.

Silent Assasin, let me know if you make any progress.

Ripwave

Originally posted by Mutant_Fruit
In addition, Breeze Home has an added advantage of unrestricted uploading and downloading, ideal for research and study.

I just bolded the important part. THats taken directly from IBB's site. And i'm a breeze user, so i should not get capped/limited at any time, for any reason.

Read it again - they're not cutting you off or charging you more when you go beyond a certain point.

They're slowing you down when other people (who have paid the same amount of money that you did) are trying to use the network, but you've downloaded a lot more than them, and are impacting their usage.

IBB make it very clear what their Contention Ratios are. It's not eactly rocket science to figure out what "excessive usage" and "reasonable limits" mean when you know what the contention ratio is.

HelterSkelter

Originally posted by Ripwave
Read it again - they're not cutting you off or charging you more when you go beyond a certain point.

They're slowing you down when other people (who have paid the same amount of money that you did) are trying to use the network, but you've downloaded a lot more than them, and are impacting their usage.

IBB make it very clear what their Contention Ratios are. It's not eactly rocket science to figure out what "excessive usage" and "reasonable limits" mean when you know what the contention ratio is.

What's the craic with their min guaranteed download? I'm on Breeze Home Plus 512K 8:1 contention. Does that mean my min should be about 8Kbps? They were trying to fob me off with that argument but I told them that it is impossible that everytime I logged on there are 7 other users downloading constantly at full speed. He had no reply to this, just agreed with me.

Moriarty

Originally posted by Ripwave
Read it again - they're not cutting you off or charging you more when you go beyond a certain point.

They're slowing you down when other people (who have paid the same amount of money that you did) are trying to use the network, but you've downloaded a lot more than them, and are impacting their usage.

IBB make it very clear what their Contention Ratios are. It's not eactly rocket science to figure out what "excessive usage" and "reasonable limits" mean when you know what the contention ratio is.

Contention != Traffic shaping

Mutant_Fruit

contention is not the same as traffic shaping.

I'll try to make my point clearer.

The breeze home, and breeze home plus package offer completely unrestricted uploading and downloading. By limiting me to 12kb/sec during peak hours, they are breaking that condition, i am being restricted. They say that they are limiting me (manually) to 12kb/sec, to supply more bandwidth to their business customers, but that should not happen with my package.

By rights, my connection should be left alone, and let the 8-1 contention limit what speeds i can get. What i mean by that is, when the 7 other business customers start downloading, then fine, my bandwidth will decrease. But i totally disagree with them manually limiting me for several hours.

Ripwave

Originally posted by Moriarty
Contention != Traffic shaping

No ****, Moriarty! (Sorry, couldn't reist).

I didn't say contention was packet shaping. I said that

It's not exactly rocket science to figure out what "excessive usage" and "reasonable limits" mean when you know what the contention ratio is.

And if IBB use packet shaping to ensure that people who are "light" users aren't slowed down by the "heavy" users, that seems perfectly reasonable to me, as the light users are paying exactly the same amount for the service as the heavy users.

uteotw

HelterSkelter : 8 to 1 contention means that your guaranteed minimum download speed is 512kbps / 8 = 64 kbps (kilobits) = 8 KB/s (kilobytes).

I've had issues with high pings for months (search for a thread I created). High pings have an effect on your download speed , but once you have reasonable pings (under 30 ms) you should at least reach your minimum download speed. The high speed issue is totally separate from the contention ratio issue. Keep bugging IBB for them to fix your connection.... they might have to change the hardware they've provided you.

Now back to the throttling...

RipWave : I see what you’re saying and there are different type of users with different need. I need to download 24/7... IBB being unlimited is perfect.

Nothing in their contract or website define any precise restriction for their users, especially Breeze and Breeze Plus. After they installed the antenna I read the whole contract before signing and nothing was indicating any restriction of usage or limitation. They cannot use vague words like "fair usage" on their website and "excessive" in their contract and do as they please later. They also don't mention what business hours and business days are in the contract. I don't believe that the contract even say that they can change these conditions without informing their customers.

Do you see road signs indicating "no excessive speed" ? No you see road signs with precise speed limits, you also see precise paying parking hours on street meters. Would you buy any product on which the guarantee wouldn't apply if you'd made an "excessive usage" of it if the guarantee wouldn't define what the normal conditions are ?

What IBB is doing hasn't been clearly communicated to their customers and it's bordering false advertisement. I'm fine with the contention ratio I signed for as long as it's not arbitrarily forced on me by IBB because they don't have the network infrastructure to cope with users demands.

I'm not saying IBB has an easy job competing with Eircom, NTL and the other BB providers and they try to maximise their network. But the service they are currently providing is not what I signed for.