StarHub, SingTel and M1 refuses to reveal surfing speed

[†††††]

Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no
They object to Govt's proposal, arguing many factors affect Net speeds
By Jessica Lim

THE three major Internet service providers (ISPs) here have objected to the Government's proposal to get them to disclose average surfing speeds to market their broadband.

StarHub, SingTel and M1 currently market their plans based on their rarely achievable maximum speeds.

In response to the Government's proposal, all three argue that multiple factors affect Internet speeds, making it impossible for them to define an average speed. Any attempts to do so would be inaccurate and misleading, they say.

The proposal came in a consultation paper published last month, which invited public feedback.

In it, the Infocomm Development Authority (IDA) said ISPs here have historically sold their fixed and mobile broadband plans by advertising their top speeds, which are not usually achievable under normal Internet conditions.

By 5pm yesterday, the deadline for submissions, the technology sector regulator had attracted 18 views.

The bulk of respondents were ISPs including the three major players, but there was also a smattering of Internet companies such as Google, ESPN Star Sports, and Skype, as well as two individuals.

In a 20-page statement, SingTel pointed out that average Internet speeds experienced by users vary depending on how many are using the network at any given time. Speeds are also dependent on radio signal quality which can be affected by external interference, it said.

M1 aired similar views. In its response, it said it strongly objects to the proposal for ISPs to state average Internet access speeds as 'there is basically no sound, objective and equitable basis to do so considering the many variables involved'.

It said computer processing speed and power supply would also affect Internet connection, as would the type of operating system used. Instead, it urged the IDA to improve public education on broadband Internet services.

In its response, StarHub said 'requiring operators to disclose expected average Internet access speeds would serve to create even more confusion and disputes with end-users'.

However, players such as Skype applauded the IDA's move to 'improve transparency', provided the information disclosed would help users make an informed choice.

They also agreed with the other point the IDA raised in its consultation paper - that ISPs should not unilaterally block legitimate online content or services. Rules against this are already in place.

For example, an ISP cannot limit the bandwidth for Skype telephone calls to avoid losing out on fixed-line revenues.

The telcos say they agree with the IDA's current policy on this matter.

Mr Foong King Yew, research director with technology research firm Gartner, agreed that there are many factors affecting Internet speeds. However, he said ISPs can do more.

'The companies should still be able to come up with a better gauge of Internet speeds. Providing the maximum speed is vague and it does not give any indication of what paying customers can expect.'

He added that it was predictable that ISPs would be against the proposals because they make it 'easier for consumers to make comparisons'.

The IDA said the responses have generally been positive. It added that it will review the feedback and decide whether its current position is appropriate, and if regulations need to be enhanced or relaxed.

Individuals who submitted feedback, including a Mr Khong Heng Poh, support the average surfing speeds proposal. 'If ISPs are indeed providing the actual speeds as advertised, why not disclose them?' he asked. 'What's there to hide?'

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[hotbot]

Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

ISPs play punk with IDA.

http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/Singapore/Story/STIStory_618111.html

my take: if ISPs can publish top speed,why can't they reveal average surfing speed. I remember when i started work after graduation, i did tests on IP messaging for peak and off-peak hours. the results can be used to show to clients on what to expect of the delivery time like if there is any delay or not.

so it's possible to publish average speed, it's just that they refuse to do so cos' it's easier to publish top speed to con consumers.

 

[ThePlen]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

it's obvious. as sinkies are getting the less than promised speed by the ISPs

 

[Char_Azn]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

The idiot asking for this kind of figure obviously don't know anything about how the internet works. Speed of the ISP is not the only thing that affects the speed of surfing the internet. NO ISP IN THE WORLD can guarantee a given speed of surfing the internet. The only thing that the ISP can guarantee is the speed between your point to their Network backbone which will almost always what they state in the contracts(you can do simple speedtests and pings to verify this)

Speed of the internet a.k.a speed to watever server you are connected to that is hosting the website depends on a lot of factors

1)Your internet plan
2)Your ISP infrastructure
3)international connections between your country to the country hosting the server
4)ISP infrastructure hosting the web server
5)internet plan subscribed by the web service

No ISP in the world can guarantee items 4 and 5. The good ones can probably give U up to number 3. I can understand if an idiot from the public ask an idiotic question like this, but the government asking for this? Someone needs to sack that idiot for suggesting this

 

[hotbot]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

i disagree! the purpose of asking the figure is to ensure that the ISPs do not shortchange their customers. if ISPs publish 10 Mbps for one of their plan,they should live up or honour it.
If not ISPs will not or ever upgrade their infrastructure to cater to their growing customer base.

if they can't produce speed figures accessing foreign sites, at least ISPs should have the decency to show what speed can be achieved accessing local sites at different times of the day.

the way ISPs are doing it now is like for instance, bringing your car to garage for repair, the repair man tell you it will cost 500+,end up you receive a bill of 599. How will you feel???

The idiot asking for this kind of figure obviously don't know anything about how the internet works. Speed of the ISP is not the only thing that affects the speed of surfing the internet. NO ISP IN THE WORLD can guarantee a given speed of surfing the internet. The only thing that the ISP can guarantee is the speed between your point to their Network backbone which will almost always what they state in the contracts(you can do simple speedtests and pings to verify this)

Speed of the internet a.k.a speed to watever server you are connected to that is hosting the website depends on a lot of factors

1)Your internet plan
2)Your ISP infrastructure
3)international connections between your country to the country hosting the server
4)ISP infrastructure hosting the web server
4)internet plan subscribed by the web service

I can understand if an idiot from the public ask an idiotic question like this, but the government asking for this? Someone needs to sack that idiot for suggesting this

 

[Char_Azn]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

i disagree! the purpose of asking the figure is to ensure that the ISPs do not shortchange their customers. if ISPs publish 10 Mbps for one of their plan,they should live up or honour it.
If not ISPs will not or ever upgrade their infrastructure to cater to their growing customer base.

if they can't produce speed figures accessing foreign sites, at least ISPs should have the decency to show what speed can be achieved accessing local sites at different times of the day.

the way ISPs are doing it now is like for instance, bringing your car to garage for repair, the repair man tell you it will cost 500+,end up you receive a bill of 599. How will you feel???

There is a difference between average speed of your connection and average speed of surfing the internet. NO 1 ISP can guarantee the speed of serving the internet to a foreign site. ALL ISPs in the world can only guarantee the speed within their own backbone which is within their control.

Take for example U have a server hosted in UK or one in US, No ISP in SG, HK, TW, CN, AU, US or even the UK themselves can guarantee you the speed of which u can reach anyone of these servers. The major ISPs like AT&T can probably give you a better level of guarantee but even they will be unable to provide 100% confirmation of the speeds to a site outside their sphere of influence. Unless a single ISP manages to take over the world, anyone who gives U any sort of guarantee is downright lying

And if you want to know your own speed to a give site

Check this site

http://www.speedtest.net/

You should get close to if not higher to your max speed to the local station but once out of SG, there is no guarantee. You should be able to get even higher speeds if you know where to connect to for your local speedtest(check with your ISP)

 

[KNNBCCB]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

KNNBCCB ISPs...

last time i use mobile broadband 7.2mbps . speed cb ridiculous.. pay so much somemore.
after that i downgrade to 2mbps. speed no change at all.. download movies also smooth. must choose the right time lah.

dun waste so much money getting higher speeds.. all the speeds advertised are fcuking bullshits !

 

[†††††]

maybe the actual speed only 56k

 

[aurvandil]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

The idiot asking for this kind of figure obviously don't know anything about how the internet works. Speed of the ISP is not the only thing that affects the speed of surfing the internet. NO ISP IN THE WORLD can guarantee a given speed of surfing the internet. The only thing that the ISP can guarantee is the speed between your point to their Network backbone which will almost always what they state in the contracts(you can do simple speedtests and pings to verify this)

IDA wants ISP to reveal the AVERAGE speed so that Singaporeans consumers can make an informed decisions about the plans they buy. There was nothing in the paper to ask ISP's to guarantee a speed.

The current practice of advertising impossible to achieve "top" speeds is highly misleading. Optus under Singtel got into legal trouble in Australia recently for using the same type of misleading advertisements that they use in Singapore.

 

[hotbot]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

your foreign sites crap, who dun know that!

my main point is:

1. ISPs need to upgrade their infrastructure if they know that their customer base is growing. for instance, my singtel MB, i can tell you if no one make noise to IDA then, i think for my 7.2Mbps plan, i will still be like getting maybe 1 Mbps. this is my true account. at least now, i have decent surfing speed.

There is a difference between average speed of your connection and average speed of surfing the internet. NO 1 ISP can guarantee the speed of serving the internet to a foreign site. ALL ISPs in the world can only guarantee the speed within their own backbone which is within their control.

Take for example U have a server hosted in UK or one in US, No ISP in SG, HK, TW, CN, AU, US or even the UK themselves can guarantee you the speed of which u can reach anyone of these servers. The major ISPs like AT&T can probably give you a better level of guarantee but even they will be unable to provide 100% confirmation of the speeds to a site outside their sphere of influence. Unless a single ISP manages to take over the world, anyone who gives U any sort of guarantee is downright lying

And if you want to know your own speed to a give site

Check this site

http://www.speedtest.net/

You should get close to if not higher to your max speed to the local station but once out of SG, there is no guarantee. You should be able to get even higher speeds if you know where to connect to for your local speedtest(check with your ISP)

 

[Char_Azn]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

your foreign sites crap, who dun know that!

my main point is:

1. ISPs need to upgrade their infrastructure if they know that their customer base is growing. for instance, my singtel MB, i can tell you if no one make noise to IDA then, i think for my 7.2Mbps plan, i will still be like getting maybe 1 Mbps. this is my true account. at least now, i have decent surfing speed.

http://www.speedtest.net/

Check this site and see what you are getting

 

[KNNBCCB]

maybe the actual speed only 56k

all the speeds advertised are fcuking bullshits... dun waste your money. my 2mbps mobile broadband can download many hamdai.

 

[silverfox@]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

Speed of the internet a.k.a speed to watever server you are connected to that is hosting the website depends on a lot of factors

1)Your internet plan
2)Your ISP infrastructure
3)international connections between your country to the country hosting the server
4)ISP infrastructure hosting the web server
5)internet plan subscribed by the web service

No ISP in the world can guarantee items 4 and 5. The good ones can probably give U up to number 3. I can understand if an idiot from the public ask an idiotic question like this, but the government asking for this? Someone needs to sack that idiot for suggesting this

I beg to differ. When I was using starhub lowest maxonline plan, I keep getting disconnections and very low speeds. That was about 2mbps. So I called them, and they asked me to upgrade to faster speed and these problems would disappear. Upgrade 16mbps already still the same thing. And the situation became even worst now. Every other day disconnection. Call them they also say their side shows ok.

Always tell you, please take out from router, put direct connection. Until I have to tell them, router take out, direct connection already still same thing. They ask technician come down check, check already say no problem. Then how come always disconnect? They also cannot answer.

 

[Char_Azn]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

IDA wants ISP to reveal the AVERAGE speed so that Singaporeans consumers can make an informed decisions about the plans they buy. There was nothing in the paper to ask ISP's to guarantee a speed.

The current practice of advertising impossible to achieve "top" speeds is highly misleading. Optus under Singtel got into legal trouble in Australia recently for using the same type of misleading advertisements that they use in Singapore.

The speed of which they advertise is the speed to their own backbone which I can tell U is almost 100% guarantee they can provide proof that you will usually go over the speed they promise(I loss more then my fair share of arugments with them)

Like I said you can test your speed here

http://www.speedtest.net/

I suggest you guys test the speed to SG then test it to another country like the US and you will understand what I mean. What the ISP can promise you is the speed to the local sites, no ISP in the world can give you promise of speeds outside their sphere of influence

 

[KNNBCCB]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

my msian frens home 1mbps also faster than ccb Sinki ISPs... this cb land crowded with FTs lor.. line also slow lor...

 

[Char_Azn]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

I beg to differ. When I was using starhub lowest maxonline plan, I keep getting disconnections and very low speeds. That was about 2mbps. So I called them, and they asked me to upgrade to faster speed and these problems would disappear. Upgrade 16mbps already still the same thing. And the situation became even worst now. Every other day disconnection. Call them they also say their side shows ok.

Always tell you, please take out from router, put direct connection. Until I have to tell them, router take out, direct connection already still same thing. They ask technician come down check, check already say no problem. Then how come always disconnect? They also cannot answer.

Your problem then is something else altogether. Either Starhub is outright lying to you or they have issues with their infrastructure which I do think you should complain to CASE. If you are not getting the level of service you should be getting.

Again releasing figures of internet surfing solves nothing. Starhub can always turn around and claim that the ISP on the other end is slow. I suggest you arm yourself with some basic network knowledge, perform some basic network test e.g. ping/trace test to internet, to starhub(their gateway and DNS) take down those test results and prove to them that they have a problem

 

[silverfox@]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

Like I said you can test your speed here

http://www.speedtest.net/

I suggest you guys test the speed to SG then test it to another country like the US and you will understand what I mean. What the ISP can promise you is the speed to the local sites, no ISP in the world can give you promise of speeds outside their sphere of influence

Just tested. and the result I gotten was below the ISP average

 

[Char_Azn]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

my msian frens home 1mbps also faster than ccb Sinki ISPs... this cb land crowded with FTs lor.. line also slow lor...

You MYsian friends must be paying 100 times everyone else to get the kind of speed coz my MY colleagues and MY office all experience something different altogether

 

[Char_Azn]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

Just tested. and the result I gotten was below the ISP average

You should be looking at the download and upload speed. From that pic I am guessing download speed of 2mbps. BTW Starhub is a shared bandwidth so they can always claim that a lot of pple using and choking the bandwidth. Which is why I move to Singtel years ago. Singtel cannot give you that kind of BS excuse

 

[silverfox@]

Re: Reveal average surf speed? ISPs say no

Your problem then is something else altogether. Either Starhub is outright lying to you or they have issues with their infrastructure which I do think you should complain to CASE. If you are not getting the level of service you should be getting.

Again releasing figures of internet surfing solves nothing. Starhub can always turn around and claim that the ISP on the other end is slow. I suggest you arm yourself with some basic network knowledge, perform some basic network test e.g. ping/trace test to internet, to starhub(their gateway and DNS) take down those test results and prove to them that they have a problem

What I think is if the govt wants the average speed to be shown, then I think there is nothing to hide. We know it never hits optimum speed, (maybe but seldom), but if there is an average speed, at least it lets people tweak their expectations.