On 04/12/2013 22:44, therustyone wrote:
A bit OT, just tested my downlink speed on 4 different web sites and got

4.5
5.25
7.5
9.06
(Mbit/sec)

and uplink varying from 300 kb/sec to 1 Mbit/sec.

How can they be so different and are any credible ?

rusty

It depends how close the site is to your entry onto the internet. If you
choose an underpowered server on the other side of the world then you
get a much slower speed than to a core server close to your ISP.

When I benchmark mine I get a pretty solid result +/- 10% on any
reasonable UK based tester. I have spent a while tuning my system up to
get the BRAS up to 5Mbps on a rural line.

BT speed tester with advanced diagnostics and BBC iPlayer diagnostics
are both reasonably powerful servers that can really exercise a link.

If you are streaming it over congested local WiFi all bets are off.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown