Speedtest 'Man'

Dammo

I regularly test my broadband speed on Speedtest.net in the vain hope that I'll actually get something approaching the speed I'm supposed to get :rolleyes:.

The 'man' in the graphic is always in Ireland and the arc goes from whatever server it selects to him and back.

I tested this evening and he's standing on the east coast of the USA! The speeds varied over a couple of tests from 0.21mbps to 3.94mbps.

Anyone ever come across this before? Just seems a bit unusual.

jbkenn

Dammo wrote: »

I regularly test my broadband speed on Speedtest.net in the vain hope that I'll actually get something approaching the speed I'm supposed to get :rolleyes:.

The 'man' in the graphic is always in Ireland and the arc goes from whatever server it selects to him and back.

I tested this evening and he's standing on the east coast of the USA! The speeds varied over a couple of tests from 0.21mbps to 3.94mbps.

Anyone ever come across this before? Just seems a bit unusual.

I take it you reside in Ireland, I don't know where you reside, I don't know who your ISP is, I don't know what package you are on with that ISP, it does'nt matter, so, heads up for you, the next time you decide to run a speed test on speedtest.net have a look a the map of Ireland/UK, and pick a test site nearest you in Ireland, underneath the map on the bottom left corner it will display your I.P. address and the name of the ISP to whom that I.P. block is registered, if the map of Ireland/UK does'nt appear then your ISP is not located in Ireland.
Be aware that the test facilities for speedtest.net in Ireland are provided FOC by the ISP's listed as a free service, so don't expect them to allocate huge resources to it, the results will give you at best an indication of your throughput, as there are many factors that will impact on your results, don't get hung up about them, life is too short.

FanadMan

jbkenn wrote: »

I take it you reside in Ireland, I don't know where you reside, I don't know who your ISP is, I don't know what package you are on with that ISP, it does'nt matter, so, heads up for you, the next time you decide to run a speed test on speedtest.net have a look a the map of Ireland/UK, and pick a test site nearest you in Ireland, underneath the map on the bottom left corner it will display your I.P. address and the name of the ISP to whom that I.P. block is registered, if the map of Ireland/UK does'nt appear then your ISP is not located in Ireland.
Be aware that the test facilities for speedtest.net in Ireland are provided FOC by the ISP's listed as a free service, so don't expect them to allocate huge resources to it, the results will give you at best an indication of your throughput, as there are many factors that will impact on your results, don't get hung up about them, life is too short.

Is there any way to get an accurate reading then? I'm on 3s NBS and as far as they are concerned, speedtest.net is their official guideline.

jbkenn

FanadMan wrote: »

Is there any way to get an accurate reading then? I'm on 3s NBS and as far as they are concerned, speedtest.net is their official guideline.

NBS, enough said, what did they lumber you with?, sounds like you got a ball of $hit satellite?.
The least one would expect from 3, after they got €78.2 million of taxpayers money, is that they would ante up and host one of the the test sites

Dammo

jbkenn wrote: »

I take it you reside in Ireland, I don't know where you reside, I don't know who your ISP is, I don't know what package you are on with that ISP, it does'nt matter, so, heads up for you, the next time you decide to run a speed test on speedtest.net have a look a the map of Ireland/UK, and pick a test site nearest you in Ireland, underneath the map on the bottom left corner it will display your I.P. address and the name of the ISP to whom that I.P. block is registered, if the map of Ireland/UK does'nt appear then your ISP is not located in Ireland.
Be aware that the test facilities for speedtest.net in Ireland are provided FOC by the ISP's listed as a free service, so don't expect them to allocate huge resources to it, the results will give you at best an indication of your throughput, as there are many factors that will impact on your results, don't get hung up about them, life is too short.

Yeah, I reside here. I was recently moved to a 4MB package by Regional Broadband and have, as I say, been checking it to see if there's any discernable difference.

My query just stemmed from my surprise at seeing the figure in USA when he's normally here in Ireland. Sorry I wasn't a bit clearer.

vibe666

ftp downloads from heanet using a good download manager will give you an accurate reading.

Dammo

Thanks Vibe, I'll try that later.

Why though, during the speedtest.net test, is the 'man' standing in USA and not Ireland does anyone know?

It's likely to be insignificant but I'm just curious.

vibe666

it will be down to your IP address.

groups of IP address ranges are assigned to each provider, it's possible that you just happened to get one in a range that was incorrectly registered to a company in the US, so the speedtest site thinks you are in the US as a result.

to avoid this problem, just manually pick the speedtest site closest to you to get an accurate reading.

FanadMan

jbkenn wrote: »

NBS, enough said, what did they lumber you with?, sounds like you got a ball of $hit satellite?.
The least one would expect from 3, after they got €78.2 million of taxpayers money, is that they would ante up and host one of the the test sites

Nah - got the B260a. The connection is a bit flaky at times - could be anything from 0.5mbps up to 4.5 (according to speedtest anyway lol). But the upload is terrible. Don't think I've seen it going over 1.1mbps