Is your Web browsing as fast as it could be? Fifteen years after Microsoft introduced Internet Explorer to compete with Netscape Navigator, there are still browser wars going on, as Microsoft, Mozilla, Google, Apple, and others compete to create the software that loads Web pages the fastest. But the number one factor in page load speed (or any kind of download) isn't your browser. It's your Internet service provider (ISP). After all, a Web page can't finish loading until all the bits arrive.
Interestingly, while cable and phone companies compete to provide fast connections, 80 percent of Americans have no idea how fast their connection is supposed to be, according to a recent FCC study. Still, nearly three quarters of the respondents (71 percent) said that they felt their connection speed is as fast as their ISP promises most, if not all, of the time.
The reality is that no one is experiencing speeds anywhere near to what their ISP claims to offer, at least not when it comes to Web surfing. This isn't entirely the ISP's fault. The ISP's claimed throughput rates are for sustained downloads of an individual file. Web pages are typically made up of several files: the HTML code, graphics, Flash elements, and so forth. For each file, there's latency, essentially the time it takes from when your computer requests the element and when the Web site's server starts sending it to you. And then there are all the vagaries of the Internet as data from the Web site hops from router to router down to your computer. This is why, when ISPs advertise download speeds, they're only referring to downloads directly from their own servers.
There are several good bandwidth testers on the market to test connection speed, including Speedtest.net and Broadband.gov's new Consumer Broadband Test. But these tools typically test downloads of a single, very large file and provide a result that isn't very applicable to Web browsing. So to answer the question, "Is your Web browsing as fast as it could be?" PCMag created SurfSpeed, a free Web surfing speedometer. On a scheduled basis or on demand, SurfSpeed downloads Web pages from 10 popular Web sites, including Google, Apple, eBay, and Yahoo.
urfSpeed lets you compare your results to those of other people in your zip code, state, and country. It even lets you drill down by time period, ISP, and connection type. At the same time, it sends data to us for this story.
Keep in mind, when it comes to the speeds reported in this story, SurfSpeed takes into account the complete, real-world download time of a Web page to a browser. We're not saying your own ISP's claims of double-digit megabit-per-second (Mbps) throughputs or more are false. But those are marketing numbers, based on direct downloads from their own servers, using some abstract math like the number of users divided by the theoretical line speed. The numbers in the SurfSpeed tests compare everything you get in the download of a Web page, not just a single, contiguous file, so the numbers are smaller than the data-rate numbers quoted by your ISP. They provide an example of the real-world throughput you're experiencing when you browse and with speeds comparable to what others customers of the same ISP would get.
To help create a more complete picture, we also include the ISP Speed Satisfaction rating from our 2009 Reader Satisfaction survey. (Updated results for 2010 will be available late this summer.) In addition, we'll show you what people are paying on average for their broadband connection and what percent of eligible households has installed broadband, thanks to Centris, a research firm that gathers extensive data on the consumer purchase preferences and behavior for voice, video, and data services.
We report SurfSpeeds in Kilobits per second (Kbps) and Megabits per second (Mbps) since these are the units of measurement used for network throughput. A Kilobit is 1,000 bits and a Megabit is 1,000,000 bits or 1,000 Kilobits. File sizes, on the other hand, are typically reported in bytes instead of bits (measured in multiples of 1,024) and this can often cause confusion. The abbreviation for bytes is a capital B and for bits is a small b. One byte is eight bits.
To understand the difference, consider this example: Downloading a 10 megabyte (10 MB) file at 5 Megabits per second (5 Mbps) will take 16 seconds (10 MB equals 80 Mb (10x8=80) and 80 Mb traveling at 5 Mbps will arrive in 16 seconds (80/5=16)).
It's important to note that these numbers are from PCMag readers, not the entire spread-out population. The numbers here are a guide to help you pick an ISP, but they are not an absolute rating of the speeds you'll get from your local ISPs. This assumes that you even have a choice when it comes to picking broadband; we know not everyone does. (In our 2009 Reader Satisfaction survey, one in four respondents said their ISP was the only broadband ISP available to them.) That said, on the following pages, you'll find out which major broadband ISP in our tests provides the fastest browsing experience, both across the country and in the four major regions.
, sets the gold standard and that if you can't get FTTP, go with cable and lastly DSL. Only select satellite if you have no other alternatives. While we did not have enough SurfSpeed users on satellite connections to measure its throughput, the few PCMag readers who use satellite have typically given it very mediocre marks.
Perception and reality are mostly in sync here, though the differences may not be as great as you think. Verizon FiOS did, in fact, take the top spot, with a SurfSpeed score of 1.22 Mbps. Consumers are, by far, the most satisfied with FiOS' speed, giving it a 9.0 average rating on a scale of 1 to 10 in last year's Reader Survey.
However, the second and third spots were taken by two cable providers, Cox and Optimum Online, which scored SurfSpeeds of 1.14 and 1.12 Mbps, respectively. Both of these results are less than 10 percent slower than FiOS and are unlikely to be perceptible to any user. It's no coincidence that Cox and Optimum also had the highest satisfaction ratings last year, though at 7.9 and 7.8, respectively, they didn't come close to Verizon FiOS' superior satisfaction rating with our readers.
The fourth fastest ISP was AT&T U-verse, which just topped the 1 Mbps mark. Unlike FiOS, AT&T is providing fiber-to-the-node—the node being something like that that big junction box on your block, which then splits the signal around the neighborhood—rather than bringing a fiber optic line all the way into the home.
DSL brings up the rear. Earthlink was the fastest at 882 Kilobits per second (Kbps), edging out one cable provider, Charter. But none of the other DSL providers approached either of these ISPs speeds, ranging from AT&T's SurfSpeed of 722 Kbps down to FrontierNet's 544 Kbps. Not surprisingly, DSL providers also had the lowest speed satisfaction ratings.
The Fastest ISP in the Nation: Verizon FiOS
There's no doubt about it from info we get in our Reader Satisfaction Survey that fiber optic is loved by users. Our tests with SurfSpeed tell why. With a speed that's higher than anyone else nationally, across all areas it services, what's not to enjoy?
More @ http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2365347,00.asp
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