latency/ping

[anz1066]

hi all, i`m thinking of migrating to Idnet. can anyone here give me an idea of the sort of ping they get when playing onling. and if you can the sort of speeds you get. my current provider is really bad with an average ping of 250ms. i won`t say the name, but the guys got a beard lol
thanks in advance

[Lance]

Welcome to the forum, anz1066 - have a welcome karma!

I don't play online but I know a few people round here do.

I normally ping IDNet around 17ms, and the BBC around 18ms. As for speeds, IDNet do not block, throttle or restrict your connection in any way, and guarantee no contention within their network. This basically means the speed you get is limited to what your physical BT line can support, and congestion at your local BT exchange.

[anz1066]

thanks for the reply, i am about 440 yards from my exchange, my line will take up to 7.5 megs ADSL max. there is no congestion.

[merlin]

hi anz1066 about the beard , i did,nt know colonel saunders of chicken fame ran an isp !!!

about idnet , do,nt hesitate, best thing i ever did with computers, full speed no restrictions, no throttling, go !! go!! and enjoy 

[anz1066]

lol nice one m8, very hard to choose ISP`S nowadays. i have made that many complaints, i`ve lost count.

[Simon]

If you join IDNet, you can stop counting. 

[anz1066]

i hope so, i`m waiting for my mac code. zzzzzzzzz
thanks

[Rik]

Then you're just a few days away from paradise. Welcome to the forum.

[anz1066]

thankyou, i`m hoping it`s a few days. my isp is very slow. bit like their trains.
there you go, a cryptic clue lol

[Rik]

Legally, they must give you the MAC in five working days - if they try and stall, just go straight to Ofcom, letting them know you are doing so.

This link will interest you:

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/cgi-bin/news/viewnews.cgi?id=EEAVpuZuZVVgTgGBRZ

[ducky22]

Where are you located in the UK?

The further you are geographically from London, the higher your pings will be.

I live in Scotland and I ping the bbc at 25ms. My previous ISP, UKOnline, pinged it at 35ms.

Make sure you ask for interleaving to be disabled when you move! That was latency will be at its lowest.

[anz1066]

thanks for the link m8, i did mention the rule in my email. that`s a big fine. they screwed up right from the start. recently they changed my payment details form direct debit to credit card. clever, considering i don`t use a credit card.

[anz1066]

hi ducky, i live in Fife scotland m8
my average ping is 250 ms, if i can get it down it is 60-80 ms

[Rik]

recently they changed my payment details form direct debit to credit card. clever, considering i don`t use a credit card.

If they did it without consulting you (which they must have done), they are probably in breach of contract. If you want to make them uncomfortable, have a word with your local CAB or trading standards. 

[Rik]

my average ping is 250 ms, if i can get it down it is 60-80 ms

OK, I'm nearer London, but with interleaving on, I ping at around 22ms to the BBC.

[Lance]

I've just done a ping to the Beeb (through my congested exchange)...

C:\Users\Lance>ping www.bbc.co.uk -n 10

Pinging www.bbc.net.uk [212.58.251.202] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=16ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=14ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=16ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=16ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=19ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=18ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=15ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=14ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=15ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.251.202: bytes=32 time=15ms TTL=250

Ping statistics for 212.58.251.202:
    Packets: Sent = 10, Received = 10, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 14ms, Maximum = 19ms, Average = 15ms

[ducky22]

hi ducky, i live in Fife scotland m8
my average ping is 250 ms, if i can get it down it is 60-80 ms

ahhh I used to be a fifer til I moved to Dundee. :-D.

Providing you don't have interleaving turned on you should get around the same as I do. As a note my exchange is congested badly at the moment.

250ms does seem very, very high... Have you checked there is nothing in the background using all your bandwidth? Not that I'm trying to get you to stay! I've only been with IDNet for a month and already love it.

[Rik]

ahhh I used to be a fifer til I moved to Dundee. :-D.

A Bonnie city.

I've only been with IDNet for a month and already love it.

It tends to get people like that. 

[merlin]

anz1066 have you ever heard of even one complaint about idnet ? my money says you have'nt

btw how can you tell if iterleaving is on, and if it is, how can you turn it off

trains,trains, did,nt know isambard kingdom brunel was still around, am i getting close

[Rik]

btw how can you tell if interleaving is on, and if it is, how can you turn it off

What router do you have? You can often get the information from the line stats. You can't turn it off yourself, you need to ask IDNet to get BT to do it (but BT may refuse if they have turned it on to stabilise the line).

[ducky22]

Check out http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=de&u=http://dmt.mhilfe.de/&sa=X&oi=translate&resnum=4&ct=result&prev=/search%3Fq%3Ddsl%2Bmodem%2Btool%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26rlz%3D1B2GGGL_enGB177.

Its the translated version of a download page for a program called DMT. It works with a huge number of routers now a days (just download the right version for your router) and it will tell you if interleaving is enabled and to what depth.

[anz1066]

hi again, thanks for the replies. i have interleaving on, they told me i could get it turned off. i know interleaving is for stability and correction, and also increases the latency slightly. i will be contacted in the next 48 hours regarding my MAC code. i have been in touch with Trading standards, they advised me to write to Virgin slowband asking for a full explanation. drat i said the name lol. i have also tried DMT, i have a Speedtouch 780 which they provided. i`ll still have to pay the remainder of the contract. it`s a pity i missed the trial period here.
thanks again peeps. 

[Rik]

One of the members can give you a referral, earning themselves and you a £10 credit.

Volunteers anyone?

[merlin]

not sure referal works, one of the administrators of idnet refered me, can't remember the name , maybe some thing like peter cross, so i told id net ,to my knowledge never did get my £10 , often wondered if he did ?

[Rik]

I've never come across a Peter at IDNet, but everyone who has been referred through the forum seems to have been happy with the outcome.

[anz1066]

is there no referral scheme then? early christmas present 

[Simon]

not sure referal works, one of the administrators of idnet refered me, can't remember the name , maybe some thing like peter cross, so i told id net ,to my knowledge never did get my £10 , often wondered if he did ?

Surely IDNet staff or management can't take part in the referral scheme? 

As far as I know, it is still up and running. When you sign up, there's a place to fill in your referrer details, and then the new customer and the referrer receive £10 credit.

[Rik]

is there no referral scheme then? early christmas present 

Details here.

I'm sure any member of the forum would be happy to oblige. As a staff member, I do not participate in the scheme as it would be too easy for me to abuse my position.

[anz1066]

thanks m8, i did notice it on the sign up form.

[ducky22]

thanks m8, i did notice it on the sign up form.

I volunteer!!

[merlin]

oopps i owe everyone on this forum an appology , due to a severe senior moment, i thought it was an administrator from this forum that reccommended me to idnet, but on careful thinking i now remember it was an administrator on another forum.
please accept my sincere appology.

but that does not detract from the fact that idnet is the best yet, even if i did my best to mess it up 

[Rik]

Nae bother. 

[lumi]

my ping is v good to uk dutch  fr and de servers

idnet network is also  in holland and france if i rem correctly

also if u see my thread on packet loss and above.net u will see how well idnet deals with issues

they fixed my issue in roughly week n a bit

It involved changing peering/routing to avoid above.net. (which they could do in this case and did)

how good is that i dont normally go into fanboy mode, being british n all hehe but after past experiences with other isps this was really impressive.

[anz1066]

thanks guys and girls, i`ll take you up on your offer ducky if you don`t mind. Virgin are running out of time for my MAC code. not sure if you are Scottish ducky, but good luck for the footy m8.

[ducky22]

thanks guys and girls, i`ll take you up on your offer ducky if you don`t mind. Virgin are running out of time for my MAC code. not sure if you are Scottish ducky, but good luck for the footy m8.

Oh I'm Scottish - I think we'll need more than luck tomorrow tho!!

I will send you a PM with my email address and name.

[anz1066]

thanks m8, i`m English but still wish them luck. i`m still waiting for my MAC code. i think it mentions your phone number aswell, not sure. if you don`t want to give it out that`s fine aswell m8

[Lance]

Name and email address should be fine for a referral.

[anz1066]

thanks, just need to wait for this code. 
as of writing this my download speed is:

[Rik]

Looks pretty good for VM, about twice as fast as dial-up.

[Den]

Wow, with speeds like that at least you have learned to walk  When you arrive at Idnet you will learn to Run 

[ducky22]

My ping is a little high in this test... I think it was because the site was causing my laptop to crash :-D.




Speed on IDnet is great tho.

[Rik]

I'm not sure I trust that site's ping results - partly because they seem to keep changing their mind about how far away I am. My 'reference' values are those to the BBC and IDNet. They will always show if there's an issue anywhere.

[anz1066]

as long as i can get low latency and reasonable speeds i will be happy. some servers i play won`t let me in if the ping is too high.

[Andy70]

thanks, just need to wait for this code. 
as of writing this my download speed is:

OMG! - Are Virgin a Tiscali re-seller?   

[Rik]

Worse, they're a rubbish re-seller.

[Lance]

What's the difference? Lol

[Rik]

Well, Tiscali occasionally deliver some speed, whilst VM (ADSL) rarely do.

[ducky22]

as long as i can get low latency and reasonable speeds i will be happy. some servers i play won`t let me in if the ping is too high.

What games do you play?

[lumi]

i wouldnt rely on speed test sites for acurate speed info they can get clobbered by lots of people testing esp peak times and give u false readings, u need to try a range of diff sites to get an idea and also try simultaneous dls from some download places u know have good bandwidth.


though agree VM adsl is def in the avoid list, and also so is VM cable in my area had 20% packet loss and they dont know why

and thats with top level infrastructure guy doing network sweeps and coming to my home etc etc

[Gary]

My ping times to bbc are average of 47ms and idnet was 32ms with 0 packet loss, not sure what's happening there at the moment, I seem to have some slow dns resolving at times and my router shows LCP down at six this morning, had this happen badly the other day from 2am right through to 4am attenuation is 48db and noise margin 7db

[Rik]

I had sync drop at 8:50, Gary, but I've been waiting for it for days as I was down to a 0db noise margin - re-synched higher, so should go up a profile step.

My pings are normal:

ping www.bbc.co.uk

Pinging www.bbc.net.uk [212.58.224.86] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 212.58.224.86: bytes=32 time=22ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.224.86: bytes=32 time=22ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.224.86: bytes=32 time=21ms TTL=250
Reply from 212.58.224.86: bytes=32 time=22ms TTL=250

Ping statistics for 212.58.224.86:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 21ms, Maximum = 22ms, Average = 21ms

ping www.idnet.net

Pinging www.idnet.net [212.69.36.10] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 212.69.36.10: bytes=32 time=22ms TTL=61
Reply from 212.69.36.10: bytes=32 time=25ms TTL=61
Reply from 212.69.36.10: bytes=32 time=22ms TTL=61
Reply from 212.69.36.10: bytes=32 time=22ms TTL=61

Ping statistics for 212.69.36.10:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 22ms, Maximum = 25ms, Average = 22ms

Maybe there's local engineering work? It's been affecting pings in the NE of late.

[Gary]

Could be I'll monitor it for the next few days and see how it goes, saying that the rain may not be helping

[Rik]

It could be worse, Gary, it snowed here (lightly) and much worse a bit north...

[Gary]

I didn't know that, its been grim down here. I did a BT speedtester check and my results were 448bs up, 5888kbs down and throughput of 1668kbs called IDnet and mentioned my latency issues and slow browsing they said they would get some tests done and now suddenly my throughput is 4234kbs, seems like something was sorted you don't get service like with many ISP's 

[Rik]

you don't get service like with many ISP's 

It's why we love them. 

[Gary]

Service like that puts other ISP's in the shade, they even called me on my mobile to have a chat about the issue, what other ISP would do that 

[Rik]

Very few, Gary, if any.

[TheMonkey]

This thread made me laugh.  I'm also with the bearded one. my ping is also that bad too 

I am now waiting for my MAC. can't wait to move, its like having a shower after using the same bath water for so long 

[Rik]

Interesting analogy. 

[Gary]

My ping time is down to 29ms to www.bbc.co.uk now which is better, think some water has seeped into a joint around here which caused the issues

[Rik]

I have the same problem when water gets into my joints, Gary.

[Gary]

I have the same problem when water gets into my joints, Gary.

Know that feeling

[anz1066]

still waiting for my mac code, i thought there was a complaint form on Ofcom. Can`t find it if there is one  we should have a name and shame site for ISP`s

[Rik]

Take a look here:

http://www.ofcom.org.uk/complain/internet/switching/switch/?itemid=309063

[anz1066]

that`s where i looked m8

[Rik]

I must admit, after that, it seemed to do anything but lead to a complaints form, despite the fact that they refer to them. Worth a phone call?

[anz1066]

could be m8, trouble is, it is 5 working days from when they receive the request.

[Rik]

At least, though, it's "in the queue" so to speak. It's all pressure to get things moving for you...

[anz1066]

i`m looking forward to moving to be honest. they have probably tried to phone and get me to stay.
they did it the last time i asked for my Mac code. my brother who is on cable with the bearded one has a ping of 100.

[Rik]

We're looking forward to you moving too, I'm sorry it's proving so difficult. Whatever they might want to say, they have to issue the MAC and are now in breach of Ofcom rules, so it's worth a complaint just to make life a bit uncomfortable for them. 

[anz1066]

what annoys me is the fact that these companies get away with treating customers badly.
btw what is above.net

[Rik]

It's one of the 'carrier networks' that ISPs use to move traffic.

[anz1066]

ok, that went right over lol

[Rik]

Every ISP has to use other networks to connect to the internet, just as we use ISPs to do it. So, IDNet, and others, will have agreements with various 'carriers' to put their traffic on the networks.

Where IDNet score is that their own network is bigger than most ISPs and they have direct presence in London, Amsterdam and Paris. (If I have that completely wrong, Simon will correct me shortly. )

[anz1066]

so in theory my service goes through the quickest route?

[Rik]

That's the hope. If a 'carrier network' gives problems, IDNet will try to route around it - we had a case here recently of just that being done.

[anz1066]

so what happens when connecting further afield, ie USA where the majority of servers are

[Rik]

Carriers like above.net are used, but if there's an issue at any time, Simon will aim to switch traffic to an alternative. We had a problem with Flickr or PhotoBucket at one time and Simon re-routed the traffic.

[anz1066]

thanks a lot Rik. i appreciate your feedback 

[anz1066]

this is just an update. i have now complained to Ofcom about the Mac code and billing issues.
i`ll keep you posted

[lumi]

yeah was done for me

simon routed around above.net for me for gaming servers in holland i connect to, done within a week

i was so impressed with that

i think above.net are pants, every time i mailed them about issues (with proof) they deny anything is wrong and reply issue resolved.

as soon as simon rearranged routing/peering, problem gone ..nuff said

[anz1066]

Hey Lumi, would you still recomend Idnet?

[lumi]

sure

pings are good Packet loss none

some of the best pings in server or equal too friends (apart from uber dutch ones)

pinging 35 on COD 4  i didnt check but i think it was in holland or germany

tend to play an older game but trying out COD 4 as it looks nice lol

only issue i ever had was with above.net to dutch servers and simon in this case was able to reroute/peer done within a week as i said, thats what i call good service.


i am only about 960m as crows flys from exchange and get near as dammit 7-8 meg dl speeds

havent tired adsl2 as ive heard theres no fast path available its only auotinterleaving (someone confirm?) fast path = less latency no error checking

and thats more important to me than approx 16 -24 meg dl speed

i have VM cable in as well at present took that down from 20meg as they were having issues to 4meg on cancelation now

and in evenings on VM i get upto 20% PL spikes, i managed to get in contact with a top CS guy who is v good and they did network sweeps and even sent out a main guru guy who was involved in the main installs in 98, and they still dont know why, say everything ok locally only 15% utilization etc and are not able to answer why in evenings only i get upto 20% and always around 5-10% PL

pretty obvious to me in my area (not all i add) that either there is something somewhere in man or bagu nodes or there traffic managent which should benefit me is somehow detrimental, who knows.

ah poo u got me going on a rant about VM again...aarrrrg

back to point well as u can see ident cant fault em


others i looked at where zen being in manc (and they link into the main computing watchy me call it in manchester with a pipe into tellihouse) but more pricey though look to be good also

and a recent look plus.net is supposed to prioritise gaming traffic and vent and ts in there network (obviously cant do anything outside it though)

they look tempting for  bit less money 10 gig cap for peak time no cap off peak though.

however i looked at where idnet have there network ( not sure about plus.net) and its also in france and holland. lots of gaming servers in holland so good for pings there and also good to germany one of the main reasons i picked idnet.

the fact they also listened to my issue with above.net (thx simon)and knew what the problem was gave me a rough time scale and fixed it near as dammit in that time scale cheered me up no end so im at present not leaving a good thing.

b**dy hell look at me waffle on and only on 3 pints , im such a cheap night out lol

excuse any sps

[lumi]

short version

YES

[anz1066]

thanks for the very detailed reply m8. as you might know i am still waiting for my Mac code after i emailed them on the 13th. i`ll be glad to get rid of them. i tend to play Cod uo on american servers, so i`m hoping the ping will be good. who knows?
cheers

[Rik]

short version

YES

[anz1066]

i have i just this minute ordered Idnet. so i am waiting inpatiently. my complaint to Ofcom worked, i had a voice message with my Mac code.
sorry ducky, i didn`t have your username and telephone number to use as a referrer.