Okay Network guys explain DSL speed to me (1 Viewer)

[Gordon Moore]

When you go on these speedtest sites you see things like your relative speed expressed in Throughout usually around 970-990 kbps for my basic DSL service. However some sites break the number down expressed in a download speed of 136 kbps. This is consistent with what I get for a average download rate in explorer when downloading from bigger sites like Microsoft, Oracle, etc...

What is the difference in these 2 numbers. Is Throughput your max speed, burst rate or something and the other value your true download speed?

I hope I'm explaining this properly.

 

[James Zubb]

You are looking at two different units of measure. One is kilobits the other is kilobytes. There are 8 bits in a byte, so just divide the kilobit number by 8.

This is a pretty common point of confusion as the units are usually not well inidicated. I think the standard is KB for kilobyte and Kb or kbit for kilobit.

 

[Gordon Moore]

Makes perfect sense. Thanks for the explanation