Should I upgrade my broadband plan?

Forums › New Zealand Broadband › Should I upgrade my broadband plan?

jacobnz

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#26150 13-Sep-2008 14:35

Hi guys,

I'd appreciate any advice you could throw my way.

I am currently on the Telecom Go-Large plan. The reason I have stayed onthis plan for so long is the unlimited data. However I have started to play an online MMO where the server is being hosted in Australia. If I want to play at any time after 2pm (depending on the day) it becomes almost impossible. When I play in the morning it is fine.

Here is my DSl line infi:

DSL Path Mode:	Interleaved
Downstream Rate:	7616 kbps
Upstream Rate:	160 kbps
Downstream Margin:	19 db
Upstream Margin:	24 db
Downstream Line Attenuation:	5 db
Upstream Line Attenuation:	1.5 db
Downstream Transmit Power:	2 db
Upstream Transmit Power:	11 db

From the reasearch I have done this seems fine, i.e. there is no problem with my line. Am I correct?

I have done speedtests to Melbourne and get about 800-1200 downa nd 128 up.

I am using a Linksys WAG200G ADSL router.

A few questsions:

1. Does my phone line appear to be fine?
2. Is it simply a matter of the exchange I connect to getting clogged up in peak times? (therefore it would matter what plan I was on)
3. If I should switch to a better plan/ISP do you have any suggestions? (I live in Hamilton)

Thank you for you insight :)

manhinli

2483 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#164239 13-Sep-2008 16:58

Yep - your phone line conditions are excellent
Exchange congestion could be a factor, but Telecom would probably be also constricting your bandwidth somewhat too.

Do note that a 128k upload restricts download to around 4mbps.

But 1.2mbps to Melbourne doesn't sound too good with such a healthy line.
As above, switching ISPs may help.

Find me on Twitter!

I posted 1, 2 x 10^3 times!

stu28

273 posts

Ultimate Geek

#164253 13-Sep-2008 17:43

manhinli:

3. As above, switching ISPs may help.

or even switching to a different Xtra plans may help as well.

jacobnz

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#164275 13-Sep-2008 20:45

Thanks guys, good to know my line is fine.

I'm looking at switching to the xnet torrent plan. I have friends in the hamilton using it and they say it is fine.

richms

28198 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#164280 13-Sep-2008 21:40

Your lines more then fine, its about as good as anyone will ever see. Do you live next to the exchange or something?

Richard rich.ms

jacobnz

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#164288 13-Sep-2008 23:56

I think maybe 50 m.

I assumed it would be fine but just wanted to check :P

I guess I'll have to upgrade my plan. Although the unlimited cap was awesome.

Ragnor

8223 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#164455 15-Sep-2008 10:47

Gaming uses a small amount of bandwidth usually around 6-15 KB/s but it needs a reliable connection, low packet loss and low latency are what you want.. basically you won't get this on torrernt/leecher plans and isps imo.

Xnet does not prioritize gaming traffic so you will get the same problem.

There is an interesting article here on why bit torrent increases latency so much... a lot of the article is opinion not fact, I personally think it's the number of connections not the burstyness of bit torrent that causes the problems.
http://www.formortals.com/Home/tabid/36/EntryID/57/Default.aspx

richms

28198 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#164487 15-Sep-2008 11:58

Yeah, the quantity of connections and the fact that to get good speeds the recieve window has to be massive means that there can be several megabits of data trying to compete for space in the transmit queue to come down the dsl line, without something to allow the important stuff to jump the queue then it just has to wait behind all the torrent stuff.

When I am maxing my line out here, I cant even get webpages to open... I suspect that when running that many connections the queue on the ISP router is overwhelmed and a hell of a lot of data is getting dropped and retransmitted needlessly, which is something I dont like about bittorrent is that it doesnt seem to get the senders to pace themselves like a few threads of http do.

Richard rich.ms

Quic Broadband

Move to New Zealand's best fibre broadband service (affiliate link). Free setup code: R587125ERQ6VE. Note that to use Quic Broadband you must be comfortable with configuring your own router.

pistolpower

139 posts

Master Geek

#165183 17-Sep-2008 20:57

OMG!!!!!

Lol when i made this account i wanted that name but someone had allready taken it lol. And omfg look at his line attenuation. So so jelous. :( he got everything lol. no fair.

Oh and if youre on the go large plan and having problems then it would be most likely related to ip routing. Where everyone on the go large plan is routed seperatly from there other custermers. They route you all through a cheap international fibre line with no bandwidth. That way it doesnt affect there standard custermers. So its the plan your on. Allso some isps route trafic better to and will get you a better ping overseas.

jacobnz

4 posts

Wannabe Geek

#165244 18-Sep-2008 06:47

Yeah I was pretty sure my line was ok.

Just a update. I have changed to Xnet's torrent plan and my speeds have been perfect.

I found out what Telecom had been doing tho. I guess to stop torrent users they would drop some packets from certain IP's if you were connected to them for too long. I noticed this because I ran a packet capture and noticed I got a lot of TCP retranmissions. Funny thing was was that this happened from 8am to 12am. I noticed that b4 8am I got good speeds, however aftewards it turned to crap.

I was connected to a game server and halfway through the day I noticed that I was lagging terribly so for some reason I switched servers and the lag dissapeared! No TCP retransmissions at all. I switched back and started to get them again :P I just wish they would have told me, they may not have lost a customer if I had known, I would have switched to another plan.

Cheers for all the responses guys.