what makes a connection fast?

[apologia]

What exactly are you looking at when you want to determine if a wireless connection will be fast or not?

 

[_-..zKiLLA..-_]

how much speed your ISP gives you is how much you get

 

[Atomic Rooster]

Throughput and bandwidth.

 

[apologia]

how much speed your ISP gives you is how much you get

So if you pay for 3Mbps then you should be getting that no strings attached? The wireless router model or the card in your laptop don't play any role?

And what are throughput and bandwidth?

 

[Atomic Rooster]

Throughput is the amount of data that can move through your LAN card. Proper throughput settings allow for the maximum level of transfer speeds as supplied by your connection.

Bandwidth is the speed which your ISP supplies to you.

Yes, if you are paying for 3Mbps, that's what you should be getting.

Most of today's current routers and modems are fully capable of giving you the maximum performance available from your ISP.

Here's an excellent broadband speed test: Speedtest.net

 

[J03]

So if you pay for 3Mbps then you should be getting that no strings attached? The wireless router model or the card in your laptop don't play any role?

And what are throughput and bandwidth?

Haha, Not in the UK!

 

[OTSS]

Maybe on a dsl connection lol. Cable is shared so even though I am getting 10Mbps I am actually only seeing about 7-8Mbps. Same with upload, I am paying for 1Mbps and am only getting about 850-950Kbps

 

[apologia]

I went to speedtest.net and these are my results.

Fastest Download:
2793 kb/s
Fastest Upload:
639 kb/s
Average Download:
1440 kb/s
Average Upload:
448 kb/s

Is this normal? I am paying for 3Mbps. Does 3Mbps include both upload and download time together? Or is each supposed to have 3Mbps individually?

 

[FlightSimBoy]

Those are about right for a 3Mbps connection.

Most 3Mbps connections have a 768Kbps upload speed.

What was your lowest down speed? The average seems a little low, but the fastest seems about right.

 

[Atomic Rooster]

The speed you pay for is download speed. Your upload speed will be much lower in most cases.

With 2793 kb/s, it looks like you're right in the ballpark for what you're paying for.