WiBe testing on a hill

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Read more! Headed up the hill to one of the few places that seems to get 3G round here. Although I still couldn't see it on my iPhone, except very sporadically, when I managed to get a quick test in, the WiBe settled in pretty quickly.

This blog post can be read at 5tth.blogspot.com



The initial euphoria at finding a far better connection speed than ADSL can offer in Upper Eden has not yet worn off! Am seriously debating finally going into agriculture and setting up a WiBe farm with lots of them in my attic.

WiBe test

3G Test on iPhone




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UK Broadband speedtest - if only!

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Read more! Just been playing around with the broadband speedtest on Top 10 broadband after reading the BBC article and....

I'm sorry but I think these guys need to open up about how they are measuring speed because there are some very major inconsistencies showing up and if this site is used to even approximate what Broadband Britain looks like, there are many who will get completely the wrong idea.

The tech behind speed tests has long been the subject of arguments, as we saw last year when Virgin tried to pre-empt false speedtest data just before the launch of their new 50Mbps service, and the reality is that the only halfway accurate speed test is like that which, for instance, SamKnows used to produce their recent report with Ofcom.

The point is that if false measurements are pinned to a map such as this which is publicly available, there are going to be uninformed journalists, MPs, quangos and who knows who else leaping onto the data saying, "We told you it wasn't as bad as you thought," or individuals, journalists, MPs etc getting lost in pointless discussions and arguments about the inconsistencies between one house and next door/the rest of the street etc. It's a red herring 'cos the stats are wrong and hence misleading.

Unless the Laws of Physics have just become very elastic, there is no way that the figure shown for my connection (4.6Mbps) is possible this far from the exchange (5 km according to BT exchange checker though I'm not sure that even a crow could manage to physically get it to that short a distance!) Whilst I am sure there are few other insomniacs online between myself and the exchange right now, something doesn't quite ring true! In another rural area that I know down in Lincolnshire, one of my friends' neighbours is showing at 56.8Mbps. Ho hum. See the problem?!

The real point here though is that whilst we have numpties in government and elsewhere who believe 2Mbps will be sufficient in 2012, this type of data can only mislead them and lead to aggregated and averaged speeds for the UK which are used to make people feel warm and fluffy. The point is that even if the average speed across the UK was 10Mbps, that would mean that there are a) many people who fall below the median line eg in rural areas where the economy desperately needs better broadband and b) everyone would still be on asymmetric connections. It isn't sufficient for Internet use in the 21st century and the sooner this key message reaches those in charge of purse strings, be they industry or public pursestrings, the better.

Speed tests such as the one on Top 10 broadband do little to help matters if the data they reveal is based on inaccuracies in measurement and then further adds to The Big Lie that we live in a Digitally Enabled Britain.
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Now that's what I call broadband

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Read more! Earlier this week, I was called to a house in the village having problems with their PC and internet. (Everyone is having problems here at the moment, due to a very shaky rural electricity supply playing havoc with IT kit - for which we pay exactly the same as anyone in an urban area, but I digress). I ran some speedtests.......




You can't argue at that, can you?! I nearly went and dug up their drive looking for the fibre in our village that has so far eluded me...

So, even though I know it is a 1/2Mbps service because of the poverty of the copper, distance from the exchange etc, I now have to explain to an average householder that this isn't the service she is actually receiving, nor ever likely to out here in the sticks.

But it would make my life complete if it were! Even I could be happy with that....

Have a good weekend.
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How good is UK broadband today?

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Read more! Samknows will beat Ofcom to conducting the most comprehensive review of broadband in the UK, and has already put out the first report. Available hereInteresting results, need to consider some of what is revealed here before posting more, would welcome comments. Initial reaction though is about the fact that Samknows (not an over-funded Government agency) has found a way to overcome the problems caused by many speedtests which are whitelisted by the ISPs to 'falsify' the results, using hardware run by consumers, and hence this report makes for far more interesting reading than the majority of reports about UK broadband speed. Well done, Sam!! Read more!

Despair not...

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Read more! Ofcom is undertaking.... ".... the UK's most authoritative and comprehensive broadband speed survey to identify actual broadband performance across the country and its relationship to advertised headline speeds". 2000 homes.

Oh goody. That is truly comprehensive and will give a really clear picture of what is required now and in the future. Not. Despair! Read more!

Fiberevolution

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Read more! I would say that we are in no way affiliated with Fiberevolution.com, but of course we are, because they are covering the same issue, but from a more global perspective.

However, we are 1) British (and therefore spell 'fibre' correctly!) and 2)looking from a consumer/citizen/community angle whilst Fiberevolution are industry. Since the very early days of Digital Dales events, I have pursued the formula of Industry + government + community/citizen/consumer, and with Fiberevolution's existence comes one way of ensuring that all stakeholders communicate in these times of fibre evolution and revolution.

Not one to miss opportunities to plagiarise (read:link to) other people's resources, here is the Ofcom Consumer Panel video "Contrasting experiences of broadband" which begins to give a picture for consumers of how others feel about the current situation.

"It’s absolutely pants – but there’s nothing I can do about it” is of course the statement which got not a round of applause as Dave Brunnen states in his article but laughter, sighs of frustration, a smidgen of desperation and, seemingly, may have turned a few lightbulbs on in that hellish hot conference room. At long last. I suspect that a few lightbulbs may have also been extinguished - those who feel the time is not right (no proof of demand), those who constantly make the case for 'investment but not now', or those who think that their next ADSL 2+ or asymmetric broadband product is going to cut the mustard.

After all, when customers over La Manche are getting speed tests like this, it is hardly likely that UK consumers are going to be slow in saying that our speed tests showing a download speed of 0.5-4Mbps and an upload fo 256kbps are just, well, too slow.

"There's nothing I can do about it" is of course the reason for the original Access to Broadband Campaign, Community Broadband Network, and this latest attempt to chivy regulators, consumers, and industry to action. Read more!