Warp speed - disappointing.

This subforum is now locked. Please post TelstraClear topics in the Vodafone forum. You can find more information here.

Forums › TelstraClear › Warp speed - disappointing.

Ford

48 posts

Geek

Topic # 107096 7-Aug-2012 11:05
I live in Chch and I tried out the warp speed. In a word – Disappointing. While I could attain around 93mg download maximum my 7 year old Intel p4 machine CPU would sit at 100% constantly. So the most I could attain was around 55mg downloa I have a 1.5yr old laptop with a dual core processor, no problem with cpu but speed still fluctuated from 30mg to 93mg Average speed over time being around 65megs. I ran telstras speed test and the little blue ball kept freezing from time to time along the download route. In 3 days I had used up 10G of my data allowance. My son tried out his PS3 on line he only noticed a small improvement. What of the Docsis3 modems. They allow you to download torrents without the use of a router. But even with popular torrents the most download speed I could ever get was about 1.5mb download per sec. Prior with my 15mb motorolla I could attain downloads of just over 1.1mg per sec. Also the modems are locked down so you can’t configure any settings and now I am back to my regular 15mb download plan I still have some weird audio feedback when I am watching online tv that I never had before with the motorolla. The only advantage for warpspeed for me was the 10mg upload which was mostly consistant and made a noticeable difference to online backups and remote support. Now that I have returned to my previous plan of 15mg download speed is back to its smooth consistent state. Telstra let you keep the Docsis3. They won’t let me just have the 10mg upload without the download. My uploads are back to 1.5-2mg. In summary – a huge waste of money given the fact that you can’t obtain anywhere close to the top speed consistently. And the wild speed fluctuations cause browsing issues. I wonder if I’d be better with the new VDSL plans from Telecom. While they only allow 50mg download they still have the 10mg upload. I wonder if the speed would be more stable. Sorry Telstra – thumbs down to you. Ford

1 | 2 | 3 | 4

198 posts

Master Geek

Trusted

Reply # 668803 7-Aug-2012 11:19
I was on the beta and I now have warp speed. Im also in Chch. I have zero overhead on any pc in the house. We game and download at the same time on various pcs. Any game hosting is speedy. I would suggest you had an issue that should have been looked at. I download at full 100 from ftp all the time. As I said in my review of the beta at the end of the day the speed is only as good as the connection at the other end. Yes for the average kiwi anything above 25 will show zero difference you can detect. If however you do a lot of file transfers on a high speed connection at the other end then you will definitely see the speed ping along. Anyway sorry to hear the product did not work for you but just wanted to note that much of what you list has nothing to do with Telstra's product (Torrent download speeds).

freitasm

BDFL
43650 posts

Uber Geek

Administrator

Trusted

Geekzone

Subscriber

Reply # 668805 7-Aug-2012 11:24
Ford: While I could attain around 93mg download maximum my 7 year old Intel p4 machine CPU would sit at 100% constantly. So the most I could attain was around 55mg downloa What operating system? Anything before Windows 7 will have trouble with high speeds. Ford: I have a 1.5yr old laptop with a dual core processor, no problem with cpu but speed still fluctuated from 30mg to 93mg Average speed over time being around 65megs. Are you testing this laptop over WiFi? I get 90 Mbps on my laptop when plugged directly to a router, and about 40 Mbps when over WiFi. WiFi is just not suitable for speedtest as you might have a lot of interference. Also, what router are you using? Some routers really are not suitable for high speeds due to either low memory or not enough processor capacity to move all the packets around. Ford: But even with popular torrents the most download speed I could ever get was about 1.5mb download per sec. Again this could be the router. When downloading torrents with a high number of connections older routers will stall or became very slow. You might overcome this by correctly configuring the number of connections in your torrent program. As for torrent configuration, if you have to check that you haven't wrongly configure the bandwidth. I see you using "mg" instead of "Mbps". It's easy to get confused. For example torrent programs are configured in kB/s (kilobytes per second) so you have to correctly configure the program converting from Mbps (megabits per second) to KB/s (kilobytes per second). Not that "bits" and "bytes" are different. Also if your router has QoS you have to correctly set the speeds, again taking note that "Mbps" is different than "MBps" and different than "KBps". Mauricio Freitas (Geekzone Admin, Devil's Advocate, my blog, technology disclosure, my tweets, Web Performance Optimization) Geekzone Price comparison \| Amazon Kindle order page \| How to get the best out of Geekzone \| New Zealand IT Jobs \| Geekzone News \| Jinglebugs

cyril7

5672 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Subscriber

Reply # 668818 7-Aug-2012 11:43
Have you also not considered that there are two endpoints in a connection, who says all servers are configured to give you max out speeds, I suggest most servers are configured (via some method or other) to limit connection speeds to any individual connection to prevent being swamped. Cyril

Ford

48 posts

Geek

Reply # 668828 7-Aug-2012 11:57
Hello Thanks for your replys. All test results I noted were with the computer or laptop plugged directly into the modem. No router or wireless was required. However for comparision I did try using the router and ran the same tests with the same result. The speed still fluctuated wildly whilst plugged into the modem only with cable and my newer XP Acer machine showed the same result except it didn't bottleneck with the cpu. Again, torrent speed was the same when downloading torrents just with the computer plugged into the modem or if I had used the router. Sorry for the config errors. Normally I can obtain 1000 kB/s. downloading torrents with my old motorolla modem when I have it plugged into my router. So downloading with the new speed I was able to attain 1500 kB/s. Regardless of wether I am using my new machine or old. My router does not have Qos. My operating systems are both windows XP Home and Pro SP3. But the main issue was the huge speed fluctuations even when I was only connected to the modem with cable. The telstra tech person set it up for me. You are saying that most of my issues are not because of the telstra product. Are you saying that if I change my OS to windows 7 I will then be able to obtain a constant greater speed, because I can't see what else to change. My machines were virus free and clean and I don't have any add-ons running on my browser that could cause a problem. I told Telstra about my issues when I asked that it be disconnected. They just said thanks for the feedback. My torrent programme is always configured to allow max connections. Even on my old machine I didn't have any downloading issues. That I was aware of. But I was never able to attain greater download than around 1000kBps from either machine on my 15000KBps plan. Ford

cyril7

5672 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Subscriber

Reply # 668831 7-Aug-2012 12:02
Hi Ford, changing to Windows 7 may well help, the XP TCP stack is pretty old and had no/static windowing ability which means on higher speed connections with anything but very small latency it would under perform. Windows 7's stack fixed that, took them sometime as Linux and other OS's have had dynamic windowing for centuries. Edit, but I would try borrow another machine with Win7 or nix (maybe try a LiveCD nix run on your current machine) on it try confirm first. As mentioned you also have to consider that between you and the server you are talking to is a lot of hardware that can restrict speeds, that includes the server you are talking to. Obviously not all of these are TCL's to control. Cyril

freitasm

BDFL
43650 posts

Uber Geek

Administrator

Trusted

Geekzone

Subscriber

Reply # 668832 7-Aug-2012 12:03
What I am saying is that a lot of people using the WarpSpeed service do not seem to be having these problems. If it was a specific web site it could be TelstraClear's proxy farm again, but torrents are not touched by that. In other words: maker sure your side is not at fault first... We can't tell you exactly what it is, as you imagine there are lots of different variables - down to the network driver in your adapters. Anything can make a difference. Good luck. Mauricio Freitas (Geekzone Admin, Devil's Advocate, my blog, technology disclosure, my tweets, Web Performance Optimization) Geekzone Price comparison \| Amazon Kindle order page \| How to get the best out of Geekzone \| New Zealand IT Jobs \| Geekzone News \| Jinglebugs

Ford

48 posts

Geek

Reply # 668838 7-Aug-2012 12:10
Hello I did update the network card drivers and my newer Acer has a 1G card it even will connect to a wireless router at more than the usual 54kpbs. Well maybe I will look into it again at some point in the future when I decide to upgrade to windows 7. Honestly, if telstra had bothered to even mention that in the first place I would not have gone to the trouble of having it connected to warp in the first place. Maybe their terms and conditions say you need a windows 7 machine with at least a dual core processor for it to work properly. Perhaps I wrongfully assumed that once it was connected all would work as it should without too much modification of my own setup. Well, my 15000Kbps worked great from the first time I had it installed. Perhaps not the case with the newer technology. Ford

cyril7

5672 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Subscriber

Reply # 668839 7-Aug-2012 12:12
Hi as mentioned give a liveCD nix distro a try and see how that goes. http://www.ubuntu.com/download/help/try-ubuntu-before-you-install Cyril

Ford

48 posts

Geek

Reply # 668841 7-Aug-2012 12:14
Thanks for the Nix suggestion Ford

freitasm

BDFL
43650 posts

Uber Geek

Administrator

Trusted

Geekzone

Subscriber

Reply # 668843 7-Aug-2012 12:14
Yes, that's a great idea. Mauricio Freitas (Geekzone Admin, Devil's Advocate, my blog, technology disclosure, my tweets, Web Performance Optimization) Geekzone Price comparison \| Amazon Kindle order page \| How to get the best out of Geekzone \| New Zealand IT Jobs \| Geekzone News \| Jinglebugs

michaeln

164 posts

Master Geek

Trusted

Reply # 668961 7-Aug-2012 13:46
Ford: ... Also the modems are locked down so you can’t configure any settings ... What settings did you have in mind? Bear in mind that the cable modem is essentially a later 2 bridge, so apart from speed, which is obviously controlled as part of your plan, what else did you want to configure?

sbiddle

16694 posts

Uber Geek

Moderator

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Subscriber

Reply # 669037 7-Aug-2012 14:31
Ford: Maybe their terms and conditions say you need a windows 7 machine with at least a dual core processor for it to work properly. You don't need Windows7, but if you haven't updated the XP TCP registry settings to support the faster speeds things won't work well. A patch to do this is listed on the TelstraClear website. *Need help configuring your Linksys ATA or IP Phones for New Zealand? Check my blog post

Ragnor

6887 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Subscriber

Reply # 669202 7-Aug-2012 18:34
Ford: My operating systems are both windows XP Home and Pro SP3. Windows XP was first released over 10 years ago, in the tech world it's an antique. This registry change may help http://www.telstraclear.co.nz/residential/inhome/internet/cable-broadband/warpspeed-download.cfm You may want to run Speed Guides TCP Optimizer too http://www.speedguide.net/downloads.php/

halfbaked

202 posts

Master Geek

Reply # 669923 9-Aug-2012 08:36
I have had warpspeed for some time now and I go over my 150gig cap every month easily. What I have found in that time that almost no single task will do the connection any justice, instead when I first got connected it was my mission to flood the connection with as many different sources as possible to try and saturate the 100mbps line. It was never easy, like you a lot of my torrents only went at 1.5MB/s which I could get on the 25mbps plan I was on before. But if I added a virus update, a windows update, game downloads, some direct downloads and maybe some youtube streaming I could reach about 12MB/s which is doing a good job to fill the connection. It was a game for the first 2 months maybe but I kept blowing my cap so now I used it in pretty much the same way as I did the 25mbps plan. Now I pretty much only have the 100Mbps plan for bragging rights, a small decrease in my gaming pings and the peace of mind that nothing that me, my flatmates, my partner or my cat are doing online is going to slow me down. I dont think theres a lot wrong with your connection but just the rest of the internet. Edit: I do however have a windows 7, AMD 6 core pc with 8gig of ram and a capable router with a gigabit WAN port so I dont have the possible hardware bottleneck you do. PS3 Trophies

sbiddle

16694 posts

Uber Geek

Moderator

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Subscriber

Reply # 669924 9-Aug-2012 08:43
halfbaked: What I have found in that time that almost no single task will do the connection any justice, instead when I first got connected it was my mission to flood the connection with as many different sources as possible to try and saturate the 100mbps line. It was never easy, like you a lot of my torrents only went at 1.5MB/s which I could get on the 25mbps plan I was on before. But if I added a virus update, a windows update, game downloads, some direct downloads and maybe some youtube streaming I could reach about 12MB/s which is doing a good job to fill the connection. And that's exactly how things work in the real world. The biggest problem with giving people faster connections such as UFB fibre and Warpspeed is that many people will instantly expect every single download will hit 100Mbps, no matter where in the world it's coming from. Unfortunately this isn't the way the internet works. *Need help configuring your Linksys ATA or IP Phones for New Zealand? Check my blog post

1 | 2 | 3 | 4