Ever had a sneaking suspicion that your broadband download speeds never quite measured up to the “up to” speeds trumpeted by your ISP—and that everyone around you was probably in the same boat? If so, you now have some solid empirical evidence that this is indeed the case.
UK telecoms regulator Ofcom today released the results of a lengthy study that compared advertised download speeds with the actual speeds received by home users, and the results are shocking—average speeds are only half what is advertised.
Geeks have always understood that the top line speeds promoted by ISPs are rarely going to be seen by a home user, and ISPs are careful to include “up to” language in their advertisements, knowing that actual speeds will be affected by everything from a home’s distance from the local exchange, network congestion, Internet congestion, server problems a particular websites, and even issues with old home wiring. Still, they don’t typically reveal that people who subscribe to 8Mbps plans have average download speeds of only 4.1Mbps.
Originally Syndicated via RSS from Ars Technica
