Question:
Why is my download speed around 19 Mb/s but usually download files at 260's kB/s?
PJ
2010-04-19 14:16:13 UTC
Does this have to do with my ISP's bandwidth limit? When can I download at my mazimum tested speed of around 19 mB/s?
Five answers:
Nick M
2010-04-19 14:23:16 UTC
First of all, there's a big difference between b and B. You're download speed is likely rated in Mb/s where most programs rate as KB/s or MB/s, which would be 2.38 MB/s. However you are downloaded at a much slower rate. This can all depend on what/where you're downloading from. Torrents are capped by many ISP's, and other downloads can just depend on the number of users using from their servers, and they may also impose caps (ie. sites that offer paid subscriptions for download services).
Ben
2010-04-19 14:24:47 UTC
Okay, first of all the naming: a MB (Megabyte) is different from an Mb (Megabit) and an mB (millibyte) doesn't exist- it would be 1/100th of a byte, and we can't have fractional digits in a number. There are 8 bits in a byte, so 19Mb/sec (your reported speed) is about 2.4MB/sec.



As to why you get the slow speeds: When people say the Internet is the "information superhighway", that's actually a fairly apt description of how it works. You have the Internet backbone (the highways) that connect regions and networks together. That stuff is all super-high speed. Then there's the smaller roads- the points where information goes from the backbone to your home. The 19Mb/sec measured is the speed limit going from your house to the main hub. But there's a lot of road to travel between your house and the servers all over the globe, and if even one of those lines is congested (or has a less than 19Mb/sec available), you'll be slowed down.



There are ways to get almost the full bandwidth filled though. Really large companies like Adobe, Microsoft, Apple, and Google have way more bandwidth than you do. I've gotten great download speeds while downloading large files from them. The other option is torrents. I don't mean that you should start stealing stuff, but the concept works well. You have multiple servers hosting the same file, so you're downloading from multiple places at once. Even if all 4 or 5 lines get slowed a little bit, you'll still be able to use most of the 19Mb/s. I know Microsoft uses something similar to this for downloading large files. Many open source programs will post their own torrent links because this lowers their bandwidth cost and speeds up the downloads for the users.
no no
2010-04-19 14:23:41 UTC
It depends on the source of where you are downloading from. 260KB/s is approximately 2.6Mbit. Not quite but lets keep things simple. There can be a number of factors preventing you from getting the full speed. The place wehre you are downloading from may just not be capable of delivering things faster. Especially if you are downlading things from a limewire or torrent or other P2P based network things your speed can vary wildly from connection to connection. In addition the place where you are downloading from may very well be applying traffic shaping and bandwidth limiting techniques to restrict how much bandwidth any one connection consumes in order to provide an acceptable download experience for all users. The best way to test your speed is to use an online speed tester site to see approximately how fast you can get from various different access points around the world. Also, if you are on a wireless connection interference within your environment can further restrict your effective download speeds.



Some good test sites for this are:

http://www.dslreports.com/speedtest - Recommended



http://www.2wire.com - click on the speed meter test at the top of the page. Actually on second thought quite often 2wire speed test actually sucks and is very inaccurate. Scratch using 2wire just use the DSLreport.com link. :).
2016-04-12 16:51:39 UTC
Hi , nice to see you again! Well, in the past i was wondering the same thing.... You cant change the download speed, cause every site has a specific kb/sec download. People who have adsl with 8 or 24 mb/sec, cant download files with the maximum mb/sec. So, even if you change your internet connection (more mb/sec) you will increase kb/sec but you wont see impressive difference..... See you later....
2010-04-19 14:17:19 UTC
They cap download speeds for some stupid *** reason, unless it's on torrents.


This content was originally posted on Y! Answers, a Q&A website that shut down in 2021.
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