Results
"The fact that many of them cannot accurately measure speeds of 20Mb, and some cannot even accurately measure speeds of 10Mb, demonstrates there is a clear need for more transparency," James continued. As ultrafast services such as 50Mb become more mainstream, this issue will need to be addressed quickly."
"Many of these sites profess to be ‘experts' and some even generate sales from broadband providers so I am sure that consumers would find it alarming that they are unable to accurately represent speeds accurately. We are pleased, however, that our campaign has kick-started most of these sites into action and we will continue to work with those that are non-compliant to get them to the standard that they need to be," he concluded.
Here's a table summarising the results of Virgin Media's testing
|
Speedtest Site |
|
10Mb |
20Mb |
50Mb |
|
Notes |
|
|
||||||
|
speedtest.net (London) |
|
YES |
YES |
YES |
|
Has been 50Mb ready since start of campaign, however have made improvements to testing algorithm and plan to introduce Northern server |
|
speedtest.net (Maidenhead) |
|
YES |
YES |
YES |
|
Hosting/Server change at Maidenhead site coupled with changes to algorithm have improved results. |
|
thinkbroadband.com |
|
YES |
YES |
YES |
|
Has been 50Mb ready since start of campaign |
|
broadband-expert.co.uk |
|
YES |
-- |
YES |
|
Site was unavailable during 20Mb testing, however use same technology as speedtest.net (by Ookla) |
|
ispreview.co.uk |
|
YES |
YES |
YES |
|
Now using thinkbroadband's technology. |
|
|
||||||
|
numion.com |
|
YES* |
YES |
YES* |
|
*Inconsistent results on 10Mb and 50Mb |
|
speedchecker.org |
|
YES* |
YES |
NO |
|
*Unable to measure 50Mb, with inconsistent results during 10Mb tests |
|
broadband.co.uk |
|
YES |
NO |
NO |
|
Unable to measure over 10Mb accurately. Releasing monthly results using inaccurate data. |
|
broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk |
|
YES |
NO |
YES* |
|
*Inconsistent results on speeds above 10Mb. Currently working on improvements to test. |
|
|
||||||
|
broadbandchoices.co.uk |
|
NO |
NO |
NO |
|
Working on improvements to testing system. |
|
broadbandgenie.co.uk |
|
NO |
NO |
NO |
|
Working on improvements to testing system. |
|
broadbandwatchdog.co.uk |
|
NO |
NO |
NO |
|
Working on improvements to testing system. |
- Tests were carried out during December 2008 - January 2009
- A desktop PC (minimum spec 2GHz+, 512MB RAM) using Windows XP Operating System with RWIN optimised for the tiers of service was used for testing.
- The PC was directly connected to the Cable Modem to eliminate local/wi-fi networking issues
- The Virgin Media "Next Generation" platform was used to ensure that there are no contention or capacity issues introduced on the Virgin Media side.
- A speed test receives a pass mark if it is able to consistently report 90% or over of actual throughput