8 ms·

Proof that Telstra Bigpond is Throttling Youtube Bandwidth in Australia (video)

51 points by SpacemanSpiff 16y ago

danudey 16y ago
Ouch, I feel for Australians. Even the best numbers there are pretty low, and the lowest ones (Telstra's, it seems) are atrocious. For comparison, here's mine: http://ss.corecursion.com/myspeed-20100509-142516.png http://ss.corecursion.com/myspeed-20100509-142516.png
- ianium 16y ago
  Who do you have for your ISP, if you don't mind me asking? Here's Telus (25Mb fiber): http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/349/chartchxtx2cychds3auwz1.png http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/349/chartchxtx2cychds3auw...
- cfpg 16y ago
  Here's mine, 10Mb connection: http://creamscoop.com/g/2a224c8333d7a3d8488da54fed77926e.png http://creamscoop.com/g/2a224c8333d7a3d8488da54fed77926e.png
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
- pierrefar 16y ago
  While we're at let's legislate against stupid comments.
ansonparker 16y ago
This is shocking. Let's hope this gets some media attention.
sheldonwt 16y ago
Have you ever met anybody with a more agitating tone in his voice?
- altzone 16y ago
  That's your only comment? My voice and accent is what it is. If you want the technical details, it's called a High Rising Terminal. Show us YOUR video blog and we'll all pass judgment on you. Dave.
  - daeken 16y ago
    Just wanted to say, thanks for the work you've put into EEVblog. I stumbled upon it while looking for info about the Rigol scope and have been following your stuff ever since. Keep up the good work.
robotkad 16y ago
While I don't agree with the tactic, it is actually a very clever way of reducing bandwidth usage by Telstra. Most youtube videos stream fine at 1Mb/s. I'd guess that a lot of youtube clips are closed before they are over and any buffered data is "wasted".
- PanMan 16y ago
  But Google does a lot of trafic shaping as well: If you Wget a video, you see the first bytes stream in really quickly, after which the speed goes down. No need for your ISP to do this as well. I assume Google tweaks it so your buffer doesn't get empty, but also not too full: if you decide the close the video, the buffer is wasted (which, on Youtube's scale, is a LOT of data).
heresy 16y ago
Telstra's subsidiary in New Zealand was also at the bottom of all rankings, but this week they installed the Google cache boxes to mask the issue. YouTube now hits 3-5Mbps for me. At start of playback it appears to burst a chunk of video, and as it gets close to needing to buffer, it bursts another chunk. Maybe the Australian parent should look into it, it helps a lot. I can actually watch 720p and higher without having to pause and come back in 10 minutes.
- andrewtj 16y ago
  Gut instinct is that's unlikely to be caused by anything that a cache box can fix as international connectivity isn't as big of an issue on this side of the pond¹. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Australia#International http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Australia... http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/3435625/Top-business-figures-in-bold-broadband-bid http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/3435625/Top-business-figures... ¹ I'm not saying international connectivity is great in Australia, just that it's a lot better than what the Kiwis have.
  - heresy 16y ago
    Good to know as I'm planning on crossing the ditch soon :)
noonespecial 16y ago
We've found that telstra throttles all kinds of things on the way into and out of Australia. So much so that a simple openvpn tunnel between our rack there and our rack in NJ (USA) makes just about everything better.
noibl 16y ago
Remember, these are averaged numbers. The Australian broadband market is highly segmented according to speed. Until quite recently Telstra Bigpond was offering a 256Kbit connection labelled 'ADSL broadband' with 512Kbit and 1.5Mbit connections priced significantly higher. The idea of an 8Mbit or 20Mbit connection would be almost science fiction to their traditional customer base. Now that FTTH is coming into play in some areas and Bigpond's market share is dropping, higher speeds are becoming more affordable but there are still a lot of people on those lower speed plans. I suspect this is what is skewing the graph labelled 'ISP', more than any selective throttling by the ISP (though I certainly wouldn't put that past them either). The comparison to other ISPs is not entirely fair either because their customers tend to be clustered in areas where the ISPs have their own hardware in Telstra's exchanges and can therefore offer higher speeds and attractive pricing. Elsewhere in the country, Bigpond and lower speeds are both much more prevalent.
10ren 16y ago
4.29 Mbps average, in melbourne, significantly higher than all the other rates (including my ISP, iinet). It bursts up to 8 Mbps. It's probably because I'm very close to the exchange (I checked before I moved). FWIW, it has made no impact on my life satisfaction whatsoever. People rave about highspeed internet, esp in Japan; it sounds cool, but the applications aren't there yet (not for me, anyway). I'd appreciate lower latency, though, for games.
- ippisl 16y ago
  If you look at future applications , there isn't a big benefit from higher bandwidth. For video , 720p takes 2mbit(youtube's 720p) , and the difference between 720p to 1080p isn't very big.if we go to 3D , it might be doubled , but with smart compression , might be less. For video conferencing , the compression is much more effective because of the small frame to frame changes, so i think you can get 1080p at 2mbit up + 2mbit down.if i recall right , in the right setting , 1080p is needed to give you the illusion of being in the same room. For bit-torrent,to make streaming possible(i think streaming is the most natural way of video consumption), probably what is needed is higher uploads ,and configuration such that uploading doesn't slow the download side , not a higher download bandwidth. For video game streaming(onlive.com) , what's important is the latency . i believe the speed is good enough. The other future application of fast bandwidth is using cloud storage as your HDD. not a very attractive application if you ask me. dropbox is good enough. So i don't see anything in the horizon requiring very high bandwidth internet for the home. 10-15 down / 4 up would be more than enough for any average family.
  - 10ren 16y ago
    "640K is enough for anyone" (misquote). When there's an excess of computing power of some kind, it may make possible that was previously inconceivable. And if you're the one to conceive and act on it... An easy one is 3D video (1080p x 2); but I like the idea of omni-video, on a spherical screen with you at the center (or like omniMax, like iMax, but hemispherical so it also covers your peripheral vision - I've experienced it, and the effect is amazing). Thought expt: what data is inconceivably massive to transmit?

51 points by SpacemanSpiff 16y ago

Ouch, I feel for Australians. Even the best numbers there are pretty low, and the lowest ones (Telstra's, it seems) are atrocious. For comparison, here's mine: http://ss.corecursion.com/myspeed-20100509-142516.png http://ss.corecursion.com/myspeed-20100509-142516.png

ianium 16y ago
Who do you have for your ISP, if you don't mind me asking? Here's Telus (25Mb fiber): http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/349/chartchxtx2cychds3auwz1.png http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/349/chartchxtx2cychds3auw...
cfpg 16y ago
Here's mine, 10Mb connection: http://creamscoop.com/g/2a224c8333d7a3d8488da54fed77926e.png http://creamscoop.com/g/2a224c8333d7a3d8488da54fed77926e.png

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

pierrefar 16y ago
While we're at let's legislate against stupid comments.

ansonparker 16y ago

This is shocking. Let's hope this gets some media attention.

sheldonwt 16y ago

Have you ever met anybody with a more agitating tone in his voice?

altzone 16y ago
That's your only comment? My voice and accent is what it is. If you want the technical details, it's called a High Rising Terminal. Show us YOUR video blog and we'll all pass judgment on you. Dave.
- daeken 16y ago
  Just wanted to say, thanks for the work you've put into EEVblog. I stumbled upon it while looking for info about the Rigol scope and have been following your stuff ever since. Keep up the good work.

robotkad 16y ago

While I don't agree with the tactic, it is actually a very clever way of reducing bandwidth usage by Telstra. Most youtube videos stream fine at 1Mb/s. I'd guess that a lot of youtube clips are closed before they are over and any buffered data is "wasted".

PanMan 16y ago
But Google does a lot of trafic shaping as well: If you Wget a video, you see the first bytes stream in really quickly, after which the speed goes down. No need for your ISP to do this as well. I assume Google tweaks it so your buffer doesn't get empty, but also not too full: if you decide the close the video, the buffer is wasted (which, on Youtube's scale, is a LOT of data).

heresy 16y ago

Telstra's subsidiary in New Zealand was also at the bottom of all rankings, but this week they installed the Google cache boxes to mask the issue. YouTube now hits 3-5Mbps for me. At start of playback it appears to burst a chunk of video, and as it gets close to needing to buffer, it bursts another chunk. Maybe the Australian parent should look into it, it helps a lot. I can actually watch 720p and higher without having to pause and come back in 10 minutes.

andrewtj 16y ago
Gut instinct is that's unlikely to be caused by anything that a cache box can fix as international connectivity isn't as big of an issue on this side of the pond¹. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Australia#International http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telecommunications_in_Australia... http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/3435625/Top-business-figures-in-bold-broadband-bid http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/3435625/Top-business-figures... ¹ I'm not saying international connectivity is great in Australia, just that it's a lot better than what the Kiwis have.
- heresy 16y ago
  Good to know as I'm planning on crossing the ditch soon :)

noonespecial 16y ago

We've found that telstra throttles all kinds of things on the way into and out of Australia. So much so that a simple openvpn tunnel between our rack there and our rack in NJ (USA) makes just about everything better.

noibl 16y ago

Remember, these are averaged numbers. The Australian broadband market is highly segmented according to speed. Until quite recently Telstra Bigpond was offering a 256Kbit connection labelled 'ADSL broadband' with 512Kbit and 1.5Mbit connections priced significantly higher. The idea of an 8Mbit or 20Mbit connection would be almost science fiction to their traditional customer base. Now that FTTH is coming into play in some areas and Bigpond's market share is dropping, higher speeds are becoming more affordable but there are still a lot of people on those lower speed plans. I suspect this is what is skewing the graph labelled 'ISP', more than any selective throttling by the ISP (though I certainly wouldn't put that past them either). The comparison to other ISPs is not entirely fair either because their customers tend to be clustered in areas where the ISPs have their own hardware in Telstra's exchanges and can therefore offer higher speeds and attractive pricing. Elsewhere in the country, Bigpond and lower speeds are both much more prevalent.

10ren 16y ago

4.29 Mbps average, in melbourne, significantly higher than all the other rates (including my ISP, iinet). It bursts up to 8 Mbps. It's probably because I'm very close to the exchange (I checked before I moved). FWIW, it has made no impact on my life satisfaction whatsoever. People rave about highspeed internet, esp in Japan; it sounds cool, but the applications aren't there yet (not for me, anyway). I'd appreciate lower latency, though, for games.

ippisl 16y ago
If you look at future applications , there isn't a big benefit from higher bandwidth. For video , 720p takes 2mbit(youtube's 720p) , and the difference between 720p to 1080p isn't very big.if we go to 3D , it might be doubled , but with smart compression , might be less. For video conferencing , the compression is much more effective because of the small frame to frame changes, so i think you can get 1080p at 2mbit up + 2mbit down.if i recall right , in the right setting , 1080p is needed to give you the illusion of being in the same room. For bit-torrent,to make streaming possible(i think streaming is the most natural way of video consumption), probably what is needed is higher uploads ,and configuration such that uploading doesn't slow the download side , not a higher download bandwidth. For video game streaming(onlive.com) , what's important is the latency . i believe the speed is good enough. The other future application of fast bandwidth is using cloud storage as your HDD. not a very attractive application if you ask me. dropbox is good enough. So i don't see anything in the horizon requiring very high bandwidth internet for the home. 10-15 down / 4 up would be more than enough for any average family.
- 10ren 16y ago
  "640K is enough for anyone" (misquote). When there's an excess of computing power of some kind, it may make possible that was previously inconceivable. And if you're the one to conceive and act on it... An easy one is 3D video (1080p x 2); but I like the idea of omni-video, on a spherical screen with you at the center (or like omniMax, like iMax, but hemispherical so it also covers your peripheral vision - I've experienced it, and the effect is amazing). Thought expt: what data is inconceivably massive to transmit?