New FTTH install in SF. 600 Mbps down / 800 Mbps up

[jiceman]

I'm new to Sonic fiber and enjoying the improvement in speed. However, I see that it falls a bit short of a Gigabit. I've run speed tests on a few sites (including Sonic's own) and see that it varies from 450-700 Mbps download and a upload does a bit better. Here is one that I just ran.

http://sonic.speedtestcustom.com/result ... 5e0dadbac0

I am testing in an up to date Chrome browser running on an iMac running 10.12.6. I am wired to the SmartRG with Gigabit compatible cable (Cat 5e). I have not modified any of the settings on the SmartRG.

That bandwidth is enough for me as of now; put perhaps someday in the future, I will need more. What should we check to determine the limiting factor? Note that the measured speed does vary over time and within a test (download) it starts high, falls a bit and then recovers. I suppose my compute could be a limiting factor. Anything I should look for physically? Bends in the fiber cable, etc?

I suspect that this is the standard newbie question.

[steelgaze]

How does it benchmark on the pace modem?

The SmartRG might not be able to handle the speeds despite it having gigabit ports.

[jiceman]

I don't have a Pace modem. I was provided a Smart/RG -- was told the Pace was being phased out (at least for FTTH). In either case, don't need the modem part, only the router/wifi. Perhaps there is a way to test connecting directly tot he ONT. Is that simple to try?

[steelgaze]

Interesting about the pace phase out.

If Smartrgs are being provided, you might just have to call support and see if they can see if anything is wrong on there end. You can definitely plug a computer directly to the ONT, just make sure the DHCP can pick up the IP.

[geogriff]

The RG (probably its NAT) is indeed slower than line speed for me. bypassing the RG, the bottleneck for the speed test was then actually the browser, esp. for the download portion. running iperf3 to iperf.he.net gets me to 900 Mbps, but upload is still faster. this could be bottlenecking on Hurricane Electric's side due to iperf generating random data.

point being, I personally wouldn't worry about bandwidth readings past a certain speed because for any application your bottleneck is going to be elsewhere, which is really the point of Gigabit, to remove the first hop as a bottleneck.

[anonymous4]

Try Speed test Desktop

[mkrueger]

I'm a new customer of FTTH in SF as well. One thing to note: Gig is actually the full bandwidth of the port on your computer, since it is a gigabit port. So now we are up against the efficiency of chipsets, cabling, HTTP protocol overhead, and low level OS drivers. In many scenarios, a gigabit port on your computer may not actually be able to transfer 100% of it's theoretical speed.

In my home I have a number of Macs and PCs. Most of my Macs are maxing out at similar speeds to what you are giving; and are oddly asymmetrical as well. The only computer in my home which is giving me 900 Mbps+ up and also 900 Mbps+ down is a Mac Pro with a $230 Small Tree professional gigabit card installed. The good news is that I can prove that Sonic is providing me with full service. The bad news is that many of my computers just aren't capable of saturating their gigabit port at 100%. I'm not too worried because there aren't any services out on the internet that provide me with anywhere near gigabit data other than speed testing sites.

Background: I used to run the IT department for a company with a lot of graphics designers and developers on Macs who wanted to be transferring their media to/from the server at the full 1 gigabit speed their computers provided. It was a significant challenge to get wiring, switches, chipsets, arrays, and software close to 100% saturation.

[mike.perlas]

@jiceman Good afternoon! I went ahead and checked out our installer's notes during the installation. It appears that we tested at the Ont a download of around 902 mbps. Have you tested plugged into the ONT? Furthermore, have you tested in Safe Mode with Networking? There might be a software bottleneck somewhere.

[jiceman]

@jiceman Good afternoon! I went ahead and checked out our installer's notes during the installation. It appears that we tested at the Ont a download of around 902 mbps. Have you tested plugged into the ONT? Furthermore, have you tested in Safe Mode with Networking? There might be a software bottleneck somewhere.

Thanks for the suggestions. In response:

• If I recall, he tested when connected to the SmartRG unit (at least when I was present) and he tried a few times on different speed test sites with slightly different results. Do you see the photo (or notes) and can remind me which speed test he used so that I can compare?
• I have not yet tested directly plugged into the ONT. I will do that.
• I am testing on an iMac. What is the equivalent of Safe Mode?

I agree with an earlier poster that there are many variables that could effect overall performance. It would be nice to have the visual (photo) of the test results that the installer obtained. Can you send that to me?

[jiceman]

As suggested, I connected directly to the ONT. Doing so, it does deliver marginally better bandwidth/speed. High 700 both down and up. And, seems more consistent (in limited testing). So, there does seem to be some diminishment caused by the SmartRG. Here is a link to some results when connected directly.

http://sonic.speedtestcustom.com/result ... 3912f5021b

screen_capture_2017-12-10 02.51.00 pm.jpg (47.9 KiB) Viewed 37261 times

UPDATE:
With repeated testing directly connect to the ONT, I now see more variability. Sometimes drops closer to 600 Mbps down as well.

Again, I'm not complaining (at this point, I have more than enough bandwidth), but would like to get a good benchmark to characterize performance in case it changes in the future. And, would like to know if it is inline with expectations and what others are observing.