My internet connection is thru time warner. I think the speed sucks. Have difficulty downloading anything in a reasonable amount of time. Just ran speedtest and 1.08 mbps download and 1.11 mbps upload respectively.
Are those numbers considered generally acceptable? First ran the test the other night and both numbers were around .15.
What does Time Warner give as your mb/s rating that you can expect and what type of service is it (cable internet I assume)?
Those numbers are really bad in general for broadband these days. I just ran a speed test on mine and it came in at 21 mb/s down and 11 mb/s up. Mine is above average for the U.S. in general but still not even close to the fastest available.
I would assume that speeds as slow as yours would not work well with most streaming video like Netflix or Hulu let alone high definition streaming. You generally need speeds 5 - 10 times faster than you are seeing to get good performance on those. I think you have a right to be upset with your speed.
Is it just one computer or device or do you have multiple ones that show the same result. Also, are you hooked into a wired connection or are you sending the signal wirelessly? Those facts can help determine if it really is Time-Warner’s fault or if there is a hardware or software issue on your side causing the poor performance.
Did you really get a result that said 0.15 mb/s the last time or was that a typo? If so, that is beyond horrible and worse than some old dial-up speeds. That would indicate a serious problem with the line if that is really the case.
Time Warner in my area has several packages:
2Mbps “everyday low price”
6Mbps “basic”
15Mbps “standard”
20Mbps “turbo”
50Mbps “ultimate 50”
300Mbps “extreme”
My experience is that every time I check the speed I am getting about 5% to 10% above the level I am paying for.
So measured 1Mbps is lower than what you should be getting.
Obviously you need to compare this against the plan you’re paying for, but offhand it looks broken and, as already said, this is very very poor for a typical broadband service. Reason I suspect it’s broken is that download speed is usually many multiples of the upload speed on a home broadband service, and in my experience when quality deteriorates download is usually hit much harder than upload. For cable broadband, it can happen if the segment is overloaded and there’s too much traffic contending for bandwidth, or just from a bad signal level. Cable companies deal with this by (eventually) re-segmenting the network. You can tell if it’s likely a traffic problem if it gets better in the off hours. Some cable modems let you look at signal levels and signal quality through a web interface.
remember to do speed tests when you have no traffic on your connection. it is easy to forget some background download in progress, a paused download automatically resumed on startup, a automatic program update in progress.
Running their “roadrunner lite” service for $35. a month. Think their quoted speed is higher but need to check. Back later,
no, those numbers are shitty. most consumer internet connections are asymmetric; meaning the download speeds are far faster than the upload speeds. they do this mostly to keep people from running commercial web servers on a consumer connection.
I don’t know what download speeds you should be getting, but I’d expect it to be more than 1 megabit/s.
Besides making sure you aren’t generating any traffic that would affect the test as johnpost suggests, see if your cable modem and/or router can handle the rated speeds. I found that cable companies are raising the speeds they offer on a regular basis, but the equipment at home lags behind.
If Time Warner offers it, there might be a free upgrade. Charter has supplied me with 2 modems in the last 5 years at no cost, and each one gave a significant boost in throughput.
You have to eliminate the bottlenecks.
Spent a couple of hours on the phone with Time Warner this morning. Ran speed tests 3 or 4 times and got same results. The default answer from tech support was "it’s OK because you’re paying for “internet lite” and only 1 mbps is provided. Checked the packages they offer currently and we were paying $3. per month MORE than their current “standard” package! Got transferred several times and ended up with a customer satisfaction specialist who changed my service to standard, reduced my bill by $3. per month and bumped up speed to 15 mbps. Ran a speed test 15 minutes later and by golly, it worked! Upload was around 1.5 but I don’t upload anything except personal email so I don’t care.
Yeah, that’s cable alright – pay more and get less.
Seriously, I’ve had that kind of experience with mega-companies like AT&T and Charter in the past. They often change service pricing and options, but don’t (deliberately, I suspect) inform their customers, who keep on paying the old rates out of ignorance. I’ve gotten in the habit of calling up my suppliers at least once a year to see what new packages they have, and I usually end up with a better deal.