Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

If LTE Is So Fast, Why Does It Still Take Long to Download Stuff

kas23

kas23

macrumors 603
Original poster
Oct 28, 2007
5,629
288
Maybe I'm missing something here or looking at or calculating this wrong. When I test my LTE speed on Speedtest.net, I consistently get speeds of > 30 Mbps (or > 3.75 MB/s). However, when I try to download a file (even as small as 1-2 MB) on Safari on my iPhone 5, it takes about 10 seconds. That's an average of about 0.1-0.2 MB/s. What is the delay here? Shouldn't the DL be nearly instantaneous? It's not the website because I've tried multiple ones.
 
You also have to get the connection to the store's which requires several handshakes on both ends to gain a solid connection. Once your connection is achieved, the download should go fast. That usually takes a few seconds. You notice it kind of slow with small apps since that handshake takes a few seconds. If you download a larger file, you should notice a difference.
 
It's like when friends and family ask me if they should upgrade their wireless to N. I ask them what they do, and most of the time they just use their network to surf the internet. Great, so your bottleneck is still your internet speed and not your 54g wireless.

Same with LTE downloads, just because you can connect at blazing speeds to a very close server (that probably has a ridiculous amount of bandwidth) does not mean that you will get that blazing speeds connected to every server. Apple has a ridiculous amount of bandwidth at their data centers, but you have to share that between everyone in the world who are trying to download music and apps....
 
kas23 said:
Maybe I'm missing something here or looking at or calculating this wrong. When I test my LTE speed on Speedtest.net, I consistently get speeds of > 30 Mbps (or > 3.75 MB/s). However, when I try to download a file (even as small as 1-2 MB) on Safari on my iPhone 5, it takes about 10 seconds. That's an average of about 0.1-0.2 MB/s. What is the delay here? Shouldn't the DL be nearly instantaneous? It's not the website because I've tried multiple ones.
Click to expand...

You might be on the Autobahn with the ability to go 270 mph, but if your engine is a Yugo....you ain't gonna hit that 270. ;)

In other words, the pipe is only part of the speed formula. There are many points along the way that can throttle your speed, including the source server and every switch and router along the way.
 
kas23 said:
Maybe I'm missing something here or looking at or calculating this wrong. When I test my LTE speed on Speedtest.net, I consistently get speeds of > 30 Mbps (or > 3.75 MB/s). However, when I try to download a file (even as small as 1-2 MB) on Safari on my iPhone 5, it takes about 10 seconds. That's an average of about 0.1-0.2 MB/s. What is the delay here? Shouldn't the DL be nearly instantaneous? It's not the website because I've tried multiple ones.
Click to expand...

How long does it take to download the exact same file from a computer?

More than likely the problem is the server you are retrieving from....not LTE. I have been getting very fast speeds.
 
paulrbeers said:
It's like when friends and family ask me if they should upgrade their wireless to N. I ask them what they do, and most of the time they just use their network to surf the internet. Great, so your bottleneck is still your internet speed and not your 54g wireless.
Click to expand...

There are a number of benefits to upgrading to N other than speed.
 
I download apps from the app store instantaneously on LTE. It takes longer to actually install than it does to download.
 
kas23 said:
Maybe I'm missing something here or looking at or calculating this wrong. When I test my LTE speed on Speedtest.net, I consistently get speeds of > 30 Mbps (or > 3.75 MB/s). However, when I try to download a file (even as small as 1-2 MB) on Safari on my iPhone 5, it takes about 10 seconds. That's an average of about 0.1-0.2 MB/s. What is the delay here? Shouldn't the DL be nearly instantaneous? It's not the website because I've tried multiple ones.
Click to expand...

OMG! 10 seconds! Throw that piece of junk in the trash!

I do but jest, it's funny to think about the old days when we were on old dial-up modems and would wait an eternity to download the smallest file. A 2MB file download would be unthinkable. You might as well start it running and then go to bed and check in the morning. If you're really lucky, you didn't get disconnected. Oh the good old days...
 
Download speed is affected by
- LTE connection speed - if you're too far away withuot good signal you won't get full speed
- LTE cell congestion - too many users on one cell downloading stuff = bandwidth to that cell is over subscribed
- network core congestion
- remote web host congestion / throttling


LTE is not a silver bullet.

Where i am, we don't even get full speed 3G due to network conditions.
 
sarcosis said:
You also have to get the connection to the store's which requires several handshakes on both ends to gain a solid connection. Once your connection is achieved, the download should go fast. That usually takes a few seconds. You notice it kind of slow with small apps since that handshake takes a few seconds. If you download a larger file, you should notice a difference.
Click to expand...

Yep that's the exact reason why.
 
For small downloads, latency is almost always a bigger bottleneck than the download itself.

This is why when people develop apps, the best practice is to try to reduce the number of server / API calls and try to grab everything at once as soon as you have a connection.

Unfortunately, I don't think this is a problem wireless will resolve any time soon.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back