Tom's Hardware > Forum > General Networking > Network General Discussions > What's the "connection"?
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zig92   09-11-2009 at 08:59:39 AM

Hi everyone

I've just been wondering (I don't know alot about this stuff), what is the actualy connection between the term "2mbit" internet (which is what I currently have), and the actual download speed, which for me is 250kb/sec.

Please, enlighten me!

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vibe   09-11-2009 at 10:54:00 AM
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Mb = Megabit MB = Megabyte

byte is 8 times bigger then a bit so a 8Mb conection is only 1MB

It's also a theoritcal max speed - most of the time you dont get all the bandwidth depend on your georaphical location and the physical network cables in your local streets.

There is also the issue of who you are downloading from - if i have a very poor internet connection and yours is amazing, say I have a 100 KB/s upload speed and you have a 10MB download speed - the system will go as fast as the slowest side. There is then the issue of the cable it has to go down - in the same example, say the trafic has to go down a cable with a 10 kb/s max - all we would end up getting is 10 kb/s.

For marketing reasons (big numbers sound better) ISPs normaly use Mb to advertise their speeds - most other computer parts and systems will use MB as a standard.

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zig92   09-11-2009 at 11:05:11 AM
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Ah, that sure helped me out!

Thanks a bunch :wahoo:

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zig92   09-11-2009 at 11:07:41 AM
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Just want to be 100% sure. If I go out and get myself a 25Mb connection, I can expect my actual download speed to be around 3MB?

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vibe   09-11-2009 at 12:55:46 PM
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Maybe - again depends very much on the local area you are in, if your "out in the sticks" a long way away from the exchange you can still get a much lower conection speed.

Most good ISPs should be able to test the lines in your area by postcode/zip code and tell you what kind of service they can actualy give you. Some ISP even have this function on their websites. There are a few sites I think that will test all ISPs for you and compair results but I dont know any (or how good the results are)

Also 3MB download speed is crazy fast - I have a 50Mb line and I have never seen my downloads go faster then 3.2MB a second (I keep a score sheet) and thats from sites like micro$oft.com (clearly they pay for good internet line) and also it's when downloading older files (not many people want the windows 98 patch files at any one time so I'm one of a few people accessing that server at that moment) If your downloading the newest Windows 7/vista patch then odds are so are a load of other people - hence Micro$oft have to share out the bandwidth.

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