help needed - state of california needs a benchmark

[swmike at swm.pp.se (Mikael Abrahamsson)]

On Sun, 30 Jan 2011, Don Gould wrote:

> Ok, that's enough for now.  I hope this helps and let me know if you 
> need any more assistance.

In Sweden, "Bredbandskollen.se" (translates to "Broadband check") rules 
supreme. It uses two parallell TCP sessions to measure speed, and the 
whole industry has agreed (mostly product managers were involved, little 
attention was given to technical arguments) to set a minimum standard for 
each service and let people cancel contracts or downgrade if they didn't 
get that level.

For instance, an ADSL2+ connection sold as "up to 24 megabit/s" now let's 
you cancel or downgrade if you don't get 12 megabit/s TCP throughput. For 
100/10 service the lower limit is 40 megabit/s. There is a requirement for 
the user to not use wireless and to put their computer directly into the 
ethernet jack (ETTH) without the use of a NAT router, because these can 
heavily affect service speed. It also features a guide to how to diagnose 
why you're getting a lower than expected speed.

Customer complaints are down so generally this seems to increase customer 
satisfaction. My biggest objection is that with a 100/10 service download 
speeds can vary a lot depending what browser vendor and version one is 
using, TCP settings of course also play a role.

The upside is that the sevice is extremely easy to use.

-- 
Mikael Abrahamsson    email: swmike at swm.pp.se