Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Carrier What the point of having fast download speed but not fast upload speed ?
- Thread starter max2
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
no, the carriers decided in america “mostly” that download and upload are at some weird 95/5 split or even worse. i think some speeds in europe are almost a even 50/50 split.
all the throttling you see isn’t because of legitimate congestion of towers.
all the throttling you see isn’t because of legitimate congestion of towers.
Yeah slowly at least with high speed fiber internet home lines that is changing in the US. Though I think the reason for it with high speed internet is because cable can't do higher upload speed yet. I could be wrong. Where Fiber can.
That's how most providers handle download/upload. Cellular or regular old dsl/cable/fiber are mostly configured that way because most people spend more time browsing, reading and watching. Get on a closed system, i.e. wifi or internal network and it'll be different. It might change in the future, but old habits are hard to get changed.
True but I disagree about the fiber part.
Most if not all fiber is symmetrical in speed.
In London, I was on some crappy 8MB ADSL line. When we got the option of fibre I was so excited that the cheapest package was 30MB that I went for that. I didn't pay much attention to the 1MB upload speed.
Anyway, as soon as it was installed, FaceTime stopped working properly. I could see other people; they couldn't see me. "Poor connection". So I had to immediately upgrade to the 50/5 option (from 30/1). Problem solved.
Here in Switzerland I'm on a 1000/100 package. I never thought I needed that much speed until I enrolled in MacOS betas
I'm regularly downloading 4GB updates for those.
Anyway, as soon as it was installed, FaceTime stopped working properly. I could see other people; they couldn't see me. "Poor connection". So I had to immediately upgrade to the 50/5 option (from 30/1). Problem solved.
Here in Switzerland I'm on a 1000/100 package. I never thought I needed that much speed until I enrolled in MacOS betas
I'm regularly downloading 4GB updates for those.Yes that is why I said most but that sucks I wonder if it is true fiber ?
Your right though most people with only them living in a house only need max 30 Mbps mostly sense they will be the only one using it. Unless you download a lot or large files (games)
The problem like you said was the 1 Mbps upload.
To bad the 30 Mbps plan didn't come with at least 5 Mbps upload. 1 Mbps upload is nothing in this day and age.
Well, I'm sure they know what they're doing. They made me upgrade to the faster package, which I'm sure was their plan all along!To bad the 30 Mbps plan didn't come with at least 5 Mbps upload. 1 Mbps upload is nothing in this day and age.
Hyperoptic. They've been brilliant, actually. They're a dream to deal with over their online chat thingy.
It's not easy in London just to pick any company; you're reliant on whatever infrastructure has been provided to your building. In my previous place, there was no fibre, so any internet provider I chose would provide the same ADSL speeds.
Makes sense. That is how it is here in the US too kinda. It all depends on your location sadly with Fiber. Hopefully in the future everyone can get fiber. It is so reliable compared to cable modem internet or ADSL.
I know if Google wanted to they could afford to expand Google Fiber everywhere maybe. It would be a huge undertaking though.
Agree about fiber being 1/1, I should have specified that in the case of fiber, most of the US at least doesn’t have fiber. Only 30-40% depending on the source. My area doesn’t and probably won’t for quite awhile. I can only wish.
@teeshot44 summarized the reason well enough: people consume more than provide/produce. Therefore, telecoms don't need to worry so much about providing a symmetric infrastructure.
As for the details, in the U.S., landline Internet service upload speed is typically 10-percent of the plan's download speed. For example, a 100 Mb/s plan will have a 10 Mb/s upload cap, though someone paying for gigabit will have about 100 Mb/s of upload capability. I haven't seen this model in the wireless sector though. No doubt there is a cap, however, for mobile service, available upload speed does appear far more dependent on current network congestion. There are symmetric Internet speed service plans available for large scale organizations, businesses and educational buildings, but the cost is several thousand dollars per month. (Us geeky students were always jealous of that.)
EDIT: Apparently, I stand at least somewhat corrected. (Probably why finding these values nowadays is extremely difficult.)
broadbandnow.com
As for the details, in the U.S., landline Internet service upload speed is typically 10-percent of the plan's download speed. For example, a 100 Mb/s plan will have a 10 Mb/s upload cap, though someone paying for gigabit will have about 100 Mb/s of upload capability. I haven't seen this model in the wireless sector though. No doubt there is a cap, however, for mobile service, available upload speed does appear far more dependent on current network congestion. There are symmetric Internet speed service plans available for large scale organizations, businesses and educational buildings, but the cost is several thousand dollars per month. (Us geeky students were always jealous of that.)
EDIT: Apparently, I stand at least somewhat corrected. (Probably why finding these values nowadays is extremely difficult.)
Spectrum Internet Speed Test Tool | BroadbandNow
broadbandnow.com
Several years back, you had to look at the fine/small print to learn the upload speeds. Now, those aren't even advertised upfront, nor are the "standard price rates." ☹️😠
Last edited:
That's normal since the days of DSL, to have asymmetrical download/upload speed. Simply because most people are downloading/streaming content more than uploading large size files.
Unless we're talking about torrenting.