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Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

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Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#61

Lots of people here have already mentioned the Netflix fast.com test, which is indeed good. But also worthy of recommendation IHMO is the Cloudflare one (speed.cloudflare.com). Main reason I say that is its one of the few that measures jitter (or at least openly exposes the measurement).

Fast doesnt do upload

It actually does -- you just have to click "Show more info".

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#62

I was on the phone with a buddy trying to troubleshoot Local file transfer speeds vs Speedtest results. Speedtest kept reporting 100Mb/s range speeds (the tier he was paying for). Local file transfers however were stuck in the 1MB/s range. After some questions and troubleshooting he discovered that he had used a 10Mb/s hub instead of a 1Gb/s switch that was sitting right next to it. A simple mixup. His internet conne…

speedtest.net has a CLI version that is much more reliable than the web version.

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#63
post #46

> Is there a way I can test this more scientifically? How about the following?: 1. Choose a dozen or so public files on hosts known to have high bandwidth (Google or Microsoft perhaps). Maybe choose a couple of public legal torrents too. 2. Write a script to download all the chosen files (either sequentially or concurrently), and emit timing information. 3. Run that script a couple of times a day at random times. Try…

Just have ping running in the background. You can observe the difference yourself

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#64

I wonder if one could route all traffic through a speedtest site

That's basically what Netflix does with its fast.com service.

This could be an interesting business model for a VPN service. Host a popular speedtest and VPN endpoints on the same IP's. The challenge is to make the speedtest popular enough so ISP's will optimize for it.

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#65
post #19

I was cursing on my ISP for a long time till I understood that Im on a 100Mbit wifi. Then added a wire connection to my server and instantly 10x the speed :^] Dont be like me, have wires set up everywhere where needed.

Wires are great, and I try to use them when possible, but you can saturate most home Internet with decent midrange WiFi hardware. I get over 1Gbps between local machines just using the stock Comcast/Xfinity WAP, and about 330Mbps to the Internet (capped by service plan). I splurged a little on a ~$120 4-antenna NIC but even my cheap older ones can saturate the WAN link.

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fast doesnt do upload

> Fast doesnt do upload It does but it's hidden, you have to hit "Show more info" (once the main test has finished). A bit stupid, but I'm sure some committee thought it was an awesome idea to do it that way.

Where is this on mobile? I went to fast.com

Is it after the speed test is over?

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#67
post #52

Yes, this is true. This is why Netflix runs fast.com: it serves Netflix content from Netflix servers, so if ISPs want to prioritize fast.com content they'll have to prioritize Netflix content as well. Of course, that doesn't help non-Netflix sites...

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why net neutrality is important.

*should be an option that you can book at your ISP.

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#68
Unlikely your suspicions are correct. Provisioning high QoS to the speedtest site is common practice (see fast.com for countermeasures), but changing the entire subscriber QoS because traffic to one particular destination is detected seems like too much work and doesn't really achieve anything useful.

If you are on a wireless network (either your upstream from a WISP, or internally on your own network), then I'd suspect some wireless air access control syndrome is the cause -- e.g. stations are usually randomly fighting for air, but when you pull down your big speed test file that ends up putting the network in a state where your station gets all the air time. Lo and behold all your traffic has better QoS. Basically your speedtest traffic, because it is a constant stream, shoved everyone else off the air and allowed your other traffic to get through at the same time as a result.

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#69
post #46

> Is there a way I can test this more scientifically? How about the following?: 1. Choose a dozen or so public files on hosts known to have high bandwidth (Google or Microsoft perhaps). Maybe choose a couple of public legal torrents too. 2. Write a script to download all the chosen files (either sequentially or concurrently), and emit timing information. 3. Run that script a couple of times a day at random times. Try…

Just have ping running in the background. You can observe the difference yourself

Ping measures latency, not bandwidth.

Re: Ask HN: Internet magically gets faster when opening speedtest?

#70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fast doesnt do upload It does but it's hidden, you have to hit "Show more info" (once the main test has finished). A bit stupid, but I'm sure some committee thought it was an awesome idea to do it that way.

Where is this on mobile? I went to fast.com Is it after the speed test is over?

> Is it after the speed test is over?

Yeah, you have to let it run thorough first, then the button appears.

(At least on desktop, I can't remember what it does on mobile)

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