Comcast Upgrading Service
The Pitch
Comcast is upgrading its service, already the fastest by increasing speed. I've just learned that Oregon has completed the upgrade, which means the new higher speeds should be available. They claim the previous speed was 3,000 Kbps download. I got around 2,000 Kbps, (as compared to 256 Kbps or 512 Kbps for DSL, or 50 Kbps for dialup modem). Upload speed was increased from about 256 Kbps to 384 Kbps, or about 50%. A new premium option was added for 6,000 Kbps download and 768 Kbps upload.
My Actual Results
I now get 3,000-3,500, not quite what they promise, but really fast. I recently downloaded a 40 Megabyte file in about 100 seconds for 3,200 Kilobits per second. My upload speed increased from about 230Kbps to 340Kbps.
What it actually means
Does the slower upload speeds matter? Usually not. Normally, 95% of your traffic is from the Internet down to you, rather than from you up to it. Commercial connections can be different however. These connections are not set up to host Websites.
What speeds are necessary? About 200Kbps will play music and 300Kbps will do Internet video. No speed is ever always fast enough. Want to download movies? When you do, then the broader the bandwidth, the better.
How to Get it
If you don't see the improvements already, then you will have to recycle your modem.
- Turn off your computer
- Unplug the power cord from the back of the modem
- Wait 1 minute, re-connect power cord to the modem
- Wait for modem to come back online (usually about 1-5 minutes to come back online)
- Restart your computer
- Sometimes it doesn't work. If so, try again tomorrow
The bad
Testing Your Speed
It is difficult to accurately test your speed; especially when it is so fast. Usually the sending computer or those relays between, cannot send as fast as you can receive, so the test results are often lower than what your computer could do. However, you'll get some basic idea by testing. Try different sites. Try places nearer you physically.
Use the T1 line test.
And one in Portland