Broadband Speed test, how fast is your Broadband?

Here is a screen grab of the results of broadband speed test ran on my computer.
There are several of these speed test websites that you can use to test your broadband internet connection speed, some are better than others.
The speedtest.net site is one of the best I have found, You can even have this as an app on your iPod Touch which is handy if you are trying to find the fastest wi-fi connection if there are many to chose from.

As you can see in these results my Download speed is 9.58Mb/s and my upload speed is 0.49Mb/s

If you would like to test your connection speed then visit www.speedtest.net
Then wait for it to find your nearest server.
Click on the box above the map which changes to Begin Test, it will then perform a download speed test followed by an upload test.
Do not use the PC while its doing the test

After a few seconds it will display your results.


On Cable I.S.P.s the upload speed is always a fraction of the Download speed, ADSL broadband does not suffer from this. At the end of the day most people download stuff rather than upload stuff so it does not really matter.

Tips:
When you want to run a broadband speedtest it is important that you make sure your internet connection is completely idle. That means don’t have ANY programs running that are going to use your internet connection. i.e. e-mail clients such as Outlook, Outlook Express, other tabs on your internet browser, Instant messenger applications, P2P programs such as Vuse, Adobe updates, Java updates, Virus definition updates etc etc.

Make sure there are no Windows Automatic Updates going on, look for the yellow shield on status bar at the right of your desktop, If there are then let these complete downloading and install them and reboot your pc before starting the broadband speed test.

By the way if you want to know for sure if your connection is idle then you may want to turn on the "Modem status icon" (Just like a dial-up connection used to have)

I have found a way of making the modem status icon appear when using broadband. (Windows2000/XP only/Vista)
i.e.) The small flashing pair of boxes icon that you used to get on the bottom right side of the task bar when your old 56K modem used to establish a connection to the internet.

I found this very handy as it means you can now see traffic to the internet again and it ALSO has the added bonus of allowing you to kill all internet data packets by right-clicking on it and selecting disable. Thus stopping all connections to your pc.

For Windows 2000/XP/Vista systems only, with Ethernet connection to modem.

1) Minimise all windows so you can see the icons on the desktop.

2) Right mouse click on the "My Network Places" icon and select Properties from the pop-up menu. This should display a window showing Network connections.

3) Right mouse click on the "Local Area Connection" icon and select Properties from the pop-up menu.

4) In the Properties panel - General tab you should see a tickable option at the bottom with the description next to it....
"Show icon in notification area when connected."
On vista machines I think it says "show animated icon"

5) Enable (tick) this box and click the OK button.
Close the Network Connections window.

6) You should now see a status icon in the bottom right hand corner of your windows status bar which will allow you to see traffic.



Be aware that some I.S.P’s will throttle your bandwidth at certain peak times of the day if you have exceeded your allowed daily download limit. Using the Broadband Speed Test you will be able to see if they have done this to you.

Its funny how we accept broadband for granted these days, if like me you grew up in the days with dial-up internet then you will appreciate just how much technology has improved over the years. Back in 1997 a common connection speed for dialup would be 33600, on a good day it may have connected faster. Hard to have imagined back then that in 12 years time the speed would have increased by such a big amount.
Imagine trying to watch a HD Youtube video on dial-up.

Of course back then if you were on the internet then you could not use your phone line, how old fashioned is that !