Poor download speeds

freeair · 27-08-2005, 17:30

Is it possible to run some sort of test (ping, tracert, or similar) to check download speeds from a specific site?

I regularly download from the file library at www.avsim.com but for months now I get download speeds of no more than 10Kb/s (often drops to 0.2Kb/s) instead of 60Kb/s I had before.

When I have mentioned these poor speeds to avsim.com they say their end is serving the files just fine so I need some way of checking where the bottleneck is - if possible.

If I do a ping,or tracert to www.avsim.com the times are usually quite good, to my untrianed eye.

I have a 1MB connection through a Pace STB (not changed yet to new box for 2MB link), run ZA firewall and Win XP Pro SP1.

Any help appreciated.

Chris W · 27-08-2005, 17:33

Computer:~ Chris$ traceroute www.avsim.com
traceroute to www.avsim.com (205.252.249.32), 64 hops max, 40 byte packets
1 192.168.1.1 (192.168.1.1) 2.214 ms 1.166 ms 1.050 ms
2 10.0.0.138 (10.0.0.138) 2.244 ms 2.276 ms 9.341 ms
3 brnt-bam-1.inet.ntl.com (62.253.189.142) 20.176 ms 15.375 ms 16.826 ms
4 brnt-t2core-b-ge-wan63.inet.ntl.com (213.105.199.133) 262.866 ms 285.507 ms 106.967 ms
5 bre-bb-b-so-330-0.inet.ntl.com (62.253.185.61) 16.667 ms 11.833 ms 13.525 ms
6 bre-bb-a-ae0-0.inet.ntl.com (213.105.172.86) 15.503 ms 18.592 ms 13.103 ms
7 gfd-bb-b-so-700-0.inet.ntl.com (213.105.172.150) 14.762 ms 14.885 ms 13.764 ms
8 tele-ic-2-so-110-0.inet.ntl.com (62.253.185.74) 18.776 ms 21.457 ms 15.341 ms
9 cr02.ldn01.pccwbtn.net (195.66.224.167) 15.864 ms 15.454 ms 15.589 ms
10 www.avsim.com (205.252.249.32) 122.292 ms 124.620 ms 123.338 ms

--- www.avsim.com ping statistics ---
24 packets transmitted, 24 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 121.708/122.841/127.347/1.143 ms

are you seeing something similar to this?

Times seem to jump dramatically on the last hop...

IanUK · 27-08-2005, 18:23

Thats a similar trace I get to 3dgamers, a site I'm also getting very slow downloads from:

Target Name: www.3dgamers.com
IP: 209.8.17.25
Date/Time: 27/08/2005 18:21:59
2 7 ms 14 ms [10.82.176.1]
3 8 ms 7 ms wapk-t2cam1-a-ge-wan41-112.inet.ntl.com [80.1.170.57]
4 7 ms 11 ms popl-t2core-a-ge-wan62.inet.ntl.com [62.255.81.45]
5 9 ms 8 ms pop-bb-a-so-330-0.inet.ntl.com [213.105.174.113]
6 8 ms 9 ms pop-bb-b-ae0-0.inet.ntl.com [213.105.172.77]
7 9 ms 10 ms gfd-bb-a-so-500-0.inet.ntl.com [213.105.172.137]
8 11 ms 45 ms gfd-bb-b-ae0-0.inet.ntl.com [213.105.172.6]
9 11 ms 18 ms tele-ic-2-so-110-0.inet.ntl.com [62.253.185.74]
10 11 ms 14 ms cr02.ldn01.pccwbtn.net [195.66.224.167]
11 109 ms 110 ms www6.3dgamers.com [209.8.17.25]

freeair: Try changing proxy, it can make a massive difference.

freeair · 27-08-2005, 20:19

Chris & Ian,

Tracing route to www.avsim.com [205.252.249.32]

over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 9 ms 18 ms 11 ms 10.13.48.1

2 11 ms 7 ms 15 ms oldh-t2cam1-a-ge-wan52-122.inet.ntl.com [80.5.164.89]

3 10 ms 11 ms 10 ms mant-t2core-a-ge-wan81.inet.ntl.com [213.104.242.73]

4 9 ms 12 ms 12 ms man-bb-a-so-230-0.inet.ntl.com [62.253.184.57]

5 21 ms 10 ms 11 ms man-bb-b-ae0-0.inet.ntl.com [62.253.187.178]

6 13 ms 17 ms 16 ms win-bb-a-so-300-0.inet.ntl.com [62.253.185.138]

7 16 ms 16 ms 31 ms gfd-bb-b-so-500-0.inet.ntl.com [213.105.172.130]

8 19 ms 18 ms 21 ms tele-ic-2-so-110-0.inet.ntl.com [62.253.185.74]

9 19 ms 20 ms 39 ms cr02.ldn01.pccwbtn.net [195.66.224.167]

10 115 ms 114 ms 133 ms www.avsim.com [205.252.249.32]

Ian,
I have been reading your thread about the NTL proxies and now have the FF proxy add-in installed and so far added about 5 proxies from different areas.

There seems to be no speed improvement no matter which proxy I select?

I was experiencing browsing problems over the last few days but today browsing seems OK.
Some considerable time ago Greater Manchester area was experiencing major problems with the proxies and they were turned off for a while and I think we all found surfing and downloading much faster and more reliable, 'Th Engineer posted a lot on the problem at the time.

Couple of questions.

Does tracert give me a good clue as to where there may be bottlenecks during download?

Are the figures for that last hop bad enough to cause such a big drop in speed from 60-70Kb/s to single figures or less?

I have no idea if Avsim's server is being slow or it's something in the link between me and it. I suspect the latter because other people can download at 60-70Kb/s.

Thanks

IanUK · 27-08-2005, 20:39

Unfortunately I am no expert, I know that the 3dgamers servers are in the USA, so the ping increase is correct, the trace *seems* to look fine, no obvious slowdowns, but I get the same sort of traces to my Telia routed server and the downloads are *awful* via NTL proxies but fine via AOL proxies.

We would need someone from NTL to tell us why the speeds are slow.
All I know is they *are* slow, I don't know why.

I've raised this as you know from my other thread, I had someone from head office contact me on Friday, and I pointed them to my other thread, but it seems almost everyday there are new threads on here regarding bad download speeds from web browsing, so it seems there is something wrong somewhere.

28-08-2005, 15:54

@freeair...I know this has nothing to do with your present problem, but is 60kB/s your normal download speed from any site?

For a 1Mbps service it should be double that (around 120kB/s).

Is your download speed correct from this test:-

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/robin.d...speedtest.html

freeair · 28-08-2005, 16:15

Quote:

Originally Posted by XFS03

@freeair...I know this has nothing to do with your present problem, but is 60kB/s your normal download speed from any site?

For a 1Mbps service it should be double that (around 120kB/s).

Is your download speed correct from this test:-

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/robin.d...speedtest.html

That speed test gives me 1017kb/s - 1089kb/s

Most of my downloads are from Avsim so I can really only comment on that site. I have never had 120KB/s downloads but in the past have had 60 -80KB/s which I consider reasonable given possible server load and the vagaries of the 'Net.

Some sites I visit infrequently can give speeds towards 100KB/s but they are not much use as a benchmark as I don't visit them regularly.
Rgds

Chrysalis · 28-08-2005, 19:58

a download url for testing would be useful.

Safeman · 29-08-2005, 08:50

heres a link http://www.adslguide.org.uk/tools/speedtest.asp good little tester dont know if this will help but am getting a speed issues @ the mo make sure you have java installed

Ignition · 29-08-2005, 09:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chris W

9 cr02.ldn01.pccwbtn.net (195.66.224.167) 15.864 ms 15.454 ms 15.589 ms
10 www.avsim.com (205.252.249.32) 122.292 ms 124.620 ms 123.338 ms

--- www.avsim.com ping statistics ---
24 packets transmitted, 24 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 121.708/122.841/127.347/1.143 ms

are you seeing something similar to this?

Times seem to jump dramatically on the last hop...

Looks like they are using MPLS on their network, this can have the effect of removing several hops from the traceroute as the traceroute datagrams are encapsulated and don't reappear until they exit their network.

MPLS info: http://www.mplsrc.com/

freeair · 29-08-2005, 18:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

a download url for testing would be useful.

Not quite straightforward. To use the file library at www.avsim.com you need to register and log in, although registration is free.

If you select a file to download the browser status bar shows http://library.avsim.net/downlaod.php?DLID=xxxx where 'xxxx' is the file number.

Don't know if that helps?

Just attempted a download as a test and, using a NOTT proxy speeds were 5KB/s