What are they up to?
A report published by telco watchdog Ofcom has confirmed what most fixed-line broadband users already knew: real speeds fall significantly short of the ‘up to' speeds claimed by ISPs.
The research was carried out in conjunction with broadband performance tester SamKnows and market researcher GfK, and involved 60 million separate service performance tests in 1600 homes between November 2008 and April 2009.
It found that from an average ‘up to' claim of 7.1 Mbit/s, the average speed actually delivered was 4.1 Mbit/s - a 73 percent short-fall. Furthermore, the average speeds varied widely between ISPs.
Urban users got an average speed of 4.6Mbit/s, while rural ones only got 3.3Mbit/s. On average there was a 20 percent slow-down doing the 8-10 pm peak period.
Here's a video from Ofcom advising how you can improve your broadband speeds.
