tork91

I'm not particularly dissatisfied with my cable service, but I often heard of people saying that the speeds are comparable in my area, in which case the cable customers are definitely being taken for a ride. Has this actually been documented anywhere? It would seem like it would be a pretty big deal if someone could show that cable customers are getting ripped off. Again, I've tried looking for more academic work on this subject but haven't really found anything, so I appreciate your guys' intuition and expertise.

That all makes sense. I currently live in DC, and I'm a fair ways out from the center of the city but still in a very dense residential area - lots of tall apartment buildings. Is the distance from city center factor because people generally work downtown during the day so there's usually bandwidth available at night when people aren't at work? Or is it just because there tends to be more backbone infrastructure downtown? Also - does that factor even make a noticeable difference in speeds? Would I receive notably better service on my laptop if I took it to my friend's place downtown who has the same tier of service from the same ISP? Sorry if these are hard questions - I've just never heard of this particular factor before. Thanks for satisfying my curiosity.

Hi all! I'm somewhat new to the whole connection quality game and I've enjoyed reading some of the topics on this forum. It's been reassuring to confirm some of my suspicions about the pitfalls of other speed tests out there - especially the inherent flaw in testing my connection quality to a server that's right up the road from me. I'm hoping someone can answer more of a big picture question for me, though. Exactly what factors determine the overall quality of your connection, and which are the most important? For simplicity's sake, let's ignore all the host-based complications (most of which are rendered irrelevant from the speed test on this site, from my understanding). The only factor I'm really aware of is the tier of service you purchase from your ISP - though does that even make a big difference when it comes to regular web surfing and streaming videos? Another factor I've always been curious about is the subscriber density of your geographic area. If you live in a city or a big apartment building with lots of subscribers connected will that cause your individual connection to run into more conflicts than if you lived in the suburbs or the country? I've tried Googling to get some answers to these questions but I can't seem to find the right keywords, and you all seem like experts on the matter. Thanks a lot!