BigPipe's UFB contention ratio.

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › BigPipe's UFB contention ratio.

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6434 posts

Uber Geek

#1646228 5-Oct-2016 22:05

jimbob79:

Wow! it's starting to sounds like a presidential debate "CALL SEAN HANNITY.. SOMEBODY CALL SEAN HANNITY.... BUT THEY WONT!!!".

I don't think he was misinformed at the selected providers would pitch there proposals based on a number of factors including 'Contention Ratio'. Lower the ratio high the cost for the circuit.

Anyway is seams to me that BigPipe don't over saturate the connections to work at a price point.

Also it is annoying that you can't change posts (before a set time limit) due to spelling mistakes and I do understand why, but come on.

well, Bigpipe only sell residential connections, so they wouldn't have done a proposal for whatever it was your friend worked on. So yes, sounds like your friend is misinformed :)

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unsignedint

69 posts

Master Geek

#1646272 5-Oct-2016 23:42

Interesting discussion. I guess "contention ratio" is one interesting measure. But also International internet bandwidth is not a typical utility like water or electricity. As with most things in life there is a measure of *quality* depending on the providers used which probably has a big impact on price (to the ISP) and performance I suppose. I would be curious to know the difference in cost for bottom of the barrel bandwidth and the good stuff and if its even measurably better to the end user? :) Personally, I'm not a fan of whatever bandwidth mix Spark (and Bigpipe) use internationally, but maybe its just my inner geek talking!

Jase2985

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#1646315 6-Oct-2016 05:23

unsignedint:

Personally, I'm not a fan of whatever bandwidth mix Spark (and Bigpipe) use internationally, but maybe its just my inner geek talking!

Care to explain why?

ubergeeknz

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Vocus

#1646508 6-Oct-2016 11:35

unsignedint:

Personally, I'm not a fan of whatever bandwidth mix Spark (and Bigpipe) use internationally, but maybe its just my inner geek talking!

Super odd statement there, does it taste funny or something? How does one have any preference for one kind of bandwidth over another kind, outside of objective measurements?

robjg63

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#1646560 6-Oct-2016 12:09

ubergeeknz:

unsignedint:

Personally, I'm not a fan of whatever bandwidth mix Spark (and Bigpipe) use internationally, but maybe its just my inner geek talking!

Super odd statement there, does it taste funny or something? How does one have any preference for one kind of bandwidth over another kind, outside of objective measurements?

Agree - Probably like a gold plated HDMI cable versus a cheapo copper one.

He likes his noughts and ones extra shiny!

Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself - A. H. Weiler

Jase2985

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#1646732 6-Oct-2016 16:02

@unsignedint

yitz

2052 posts

Uber Geek

#1646738 6-Oct-2016 16:19

Jase2985:
@unsignedint

I'm guessing they are referring to peering and upstream transit partners used.

Some people complain about routing international wise and prefer certain routes to specific server/locations. Essentially all the big players have capacity over the Southern Cross system and they plug into global transit partners at each end who provide DDoS protection and exchange traffic with the wider Internet.

unsignedint

69 posts

Master Geek

#1646777 6-Oct-2016 16:49

OK, well... the last thing I want is to be wrong on the Internet. Science to the rescue!

https://gist.github.com/unsignedint/6aa9b35d0202509f91b38a7957d6a3e6

I hope this is "objective" enough. @Jase2985

Lias

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#1646853 6-Oct-2016 18:20

I just had a sudden realisation. I think OP's friend is confusing BigPipe (Really good ISP that just happens to be owned by Spark Ventures) with Big Time (Fairly crap unlimited plan offered by Telecom many years ago before unlimited became "normal")

I'm a geek, a gamer, a dad, a Quic user, and an IT Professional. I have a full rack home lab, size 15 feet, an epic beard and Asperger's. I'm a bit of a Cypherpunk, who believes information wants to be free and the Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it. If you use my Quic signup you can also use the code R570394EKGIZ8 for free setup.

Jase2985

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#1646910 6-Oct-2016 20:15

unsignedint:

OK, well... the last thing I want is to be wrong on the Internet. Science to the rescue!

https://gist.github.com/unsignedint/6aa9b35d0202509f91b38a7957d6a3e6

I hope this is "objective" enough. @Jase2985

its a start but need to know how/what you used to achieve it. ie the variables

where were the connections, were they all the same speed etc etc.

unsignedint

69 posts

Master Geek

#1646920 6-Oct-2016 20:45

Jase2985:

unsignedint:

OK, well... the last thing I want is to be wrong on the Internet. Science to the rescue!

https://gist.github.com/unsignedint/6aa9b35d0202509f91b38a7957d6a3e6

I hope this is "objective" enough. @Jase2985

its a start but need to know how/what you used to achieve it. ie the variables

where were the connections, were they all the same speed etc etc.

Oh, bummer, I thought it was fairly convincing. Global Gateway was the worse for over 50% of the test that covered over 300 sites around the world.

All measurements taken around 2pm today, with each result being the best measurement out of 10 pings, normalised as "a fibre connection from Auckland". There is a 10ms threshold before I call one measurement worse than another which should compensate for any other minor variations.

Like I said, I've posted the exact code that I used to generate the data, and moreover you can pick a host and ping it yourself to compare with your own connection.

I'm not saying BigPipe are no good. I'm not saying latency is the be all, and end all of network performance. But, IMHO, it can serve as a proxy for network quality (best path vs cheapest path?), given all else is equal (that is, there are no congestion/capacity issues).

Jase2985

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#1646924 6-Oct-2016 20:55

where are the connections? what devices were used?

im just trying to see if you are comparing apples with oranges or not

unsignedint

69 posts

Master Geek

#1646931 6-Oct-2016 21:19

Jase2985:

where are the connections? what devices were used?

im just trying to see if you are comparing apples with oranges or not

You criticised me for making a baseless statement and not providing any data, which was fair enough (though my exact words were "I'm not a fan of.."). So to appease you and not look foolish, I literally:

1. wrote a program to scrape all the Ubuntu CD mirrors (which I think is a fairly good cross-section of the Internet, Ubuntu being the most popular Linux distribution and probably powering half the servers that are online anyway)

2. ran said program to collect data from hosts, connected via Ethernet, that I have access to on those three networks. Vibe and GG were Ubuntu VMs (one at Sitehost, one at my office), and 2degrees was a FreeBSD NAS box residential. I believe the measurements in my results should be what one would expect if they were on a fibre connection to that ISP in Auckland.

3. wrote a program to analyse the results and declare the "worst" if the 10ms difference threshold was exceeded (to once again, account for possible "fuzz" and really if they are all within 10ms I think its fair to say there is no difference).

4. posted results AND the program in public (so anyone can run it and compare with their own results)

Bananas?

Thankfully, the results seems to substantiate my originally baseless claim. I don't have a vested interest in any ISP here. I don't have affiliate links in my signature. So these are the results I found today, it could be completely different tomorrow, but I would suspect not :)

meesham

973 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1646935 6-Oct-2016 21:36

Truenet use multiple devices/connections to test with and don't agree with your results... https://www.truenet.nz/websites

Bobdn

222 posts

Master Geek

#1646936 6-Oct-2016 21:36

unsignedint:

Jase2985:

where are the connections? what devices were used?

im just trying to see if you are comparing apples with oranges or not

You criticised me for making a baseless statement and not providing any data, which was fair enough (though my exact words were "I'm not a fan of.."). So to appease you and not look foolish, I literally:

1. wrote a program to scrape all the Ubuntu CD mirrors (which I think is a fairly good cross-section of the Internet, Ubuntu being the most popular Linux distribution and probably powering half the servers that are online anyway)

2. ran said program to collect data from hosts, connected via Ethernet, that I have access to on those three networks. Vibe and GG were Ubuntu VMs (one at Sitehost, one at my office), and 2degrees was a FreeBSD NAS box residential. I believe the measurements in my results should be what one would expect if they were on a fibre connection to that ISP in Auckland.

3. wrote a program to analyse the results and declare the "worst" if the 10ms difference threshold was exceeded (to once again, account for possible "fuzz" and really if they are all within 10ms I think its fair to say there is no difference).

4. posted results AND the program in public (so anyone can run it and compare with their own results)

Bananas?

Thankfully, the results seems to substantiate my originally baseless claim. I don't have a vested interest in any ISP here. I don't have affiliate links in my signature. So these are the results I found today, it could be completely different tomorrow, but I would suspect not :)

Wow, I don't understand any of this but someone just got served (don't know who) and it's on!!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0_qShAZg2Zw

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