6th August 2002
This isn't really a tip as much as it is information. With the downfall of the @home network, many cable modem users were switched to networks provided by their local cable companies. When Mediacom converted their users from a @home to their MCHSI network, a lot of people complained because the bandwidth was throttled down to 1.5 MB as opposed to the 10 MB they had before. Many people don't understand that the speed of their broadband connection is influenced by several different factors. Tim Foster, President and Owner of Aledo Broadband, defines three of those issues very well for us: "Throttling (where the ISP forces the upload and/or download to be slower than it could be), network congestion (where there are so many users that everyone has to go slow, like a traffic jam during rush hour. This is often beyond the reasonable control of the ISP) and bandwidth metering (where the ISP forces you to not download more than a certain amount of GB per month or charges you more for exceeding your bandwidth quota). As an ISP, I have two ways of dealing with the abuse to my network: force users to have a slower connection (thereby freeing up the rest of the pipe for other users and also discouraging users from downloading huge files [since they won't want to wait]) and force users to pay more money if they exceed certain download thresholds (thereby encouraging people to take it easy on my network)." All in all, very informative! Thank you Mr. Foster. Hopefully this will shed a little light on why your ISP does what it does in relation to network speed.