Why do people use speedtests?

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How come people use speedtests to test their interned connection speeds when it is already shown in the router menu? :confused: i.e.

router.png
 
That's kinda the point! People use speedtests to check if their line is performing in accordance with their connection speed. If an ISP is oversubscribed in a particular area, the actual download speed is often not close to the connection speed, especially at peak times. The worst tend to be ISPs which use BT's network in areas where they can't provide LLU service and are often chronically over capacity - O2 Access, Virgin ADSL, etc.
 
As above ^^

That just shows the speed of your line when it's synched, but it doesn't tell you if your connection is working at that speed, which is what most people use Speedtest for :)
 
Oh right so the speed the router says can be different from the actual speed?

yes

If you've got a good ISP you'll get exactly what your paying for. Like you do on virgin cable:



When i left bethere, my router was syncing at 11/12mb, but i rarely got more than 8mb download from any website or speed test. Proving that even though i was paying for 24mb, i was only getting 8 :( But now i'm with Virgin and pay for 50 and get 50 which makes me :D

Althought finding a website that has a pipe phat enough to give you 50mb is a hardship. Only one that has got anywhere near close so far has been downloading from Steam. Get a constant 5.5 MB/s from that.
 
Althought finding a website that has a pipe phat enough to give you 50mb is a hardship. Only one that has got anywhere near close so far has been downloading from Steam. Get a constant 5.5 MB/s from that.

Depending on what it actully is you want to download, Usenet may be an option, should easily be able to max 50Mb.
 
Speedtest sites are rarely reliable for me though, the routers connection speed is far more reliable imho than the speed test sites. For example the speed test site says I have 4 mb, while I an constantly download at 750 kb/sec from utorrent for hours, and from good servers, often microsoft.com or so, I can also reach 700+ kb/sec averagely for a large 200+ mb download... If my routers says I'm atm synches at 6.7 mb, or 8mb, that's the speed I'm getting, and not the speedtest speed.

Same at uni, it tells me 40 mb/sec, while often I can download at least 80 megabits /s there.

The tests at speedtest sites are too short, by the time it is finished, my speed, both download and upload was still climbing. Especially upload seems way too short, by the time it is done it says 40kb/sec, while I'm uploading at 100+ kb/sec constantly on utor ( except when doing the speedtest ofc or gaming.

Ping test same story, I get far better pings on google.nl than the speedtest sites, even if they're based in the NL.
 
no because blueyonder are cheap :(
Code:
Maximum Downstream Data Rate : 	20480000
Maximum Upstream Data Rate : 	768000

2.2mb/s download and only 90kb/s upload
 
Uptime: 5 days, 11:10:52
Bandwidth (Up/Down) [kbps/kbps]: 1,321 / 15,139



I do well over 1.7MB/s, 1.5MB/s is what I get when 3 other people are connected to the network at the same time :) Speedtest was never too accurate for me.
 
I mainly useded it when i first signed up with VM 20Mb link, and was only getting 4Mb, it help prove they was at fault...Now use it to test if my 50Mb slows down...
 
Best speedtest is to set a large download and get the average, all the speedtest is doing is giving you a burst rate.
 
I generally use http://www.cachefly.com/ for download speed tests. It provides one of those flash based speed tests as well as some files for you to download also.

Shame it doesn't show upload speed but I've downloaded one of their test files from my VPS and get 50MB/s and that's probably limited by my VPS...
 
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