Need help picking fiber optic internet speed

[Lil'John]

Title states it.

Short: AT&T business class fiber optic 10M/10M vs 20M/20M. Mostly home usage with some consulting work. Currently using 10M/10M and I'm not largely unhappy. Only 'issue' is downloading ISOs for DVDs.

Long: I am using AT&T business class fiber optic at 10M/10M speed for my home because it is the only reliable option. My contract is up and 20M/20M is now available and cheaper than my current monthly amount.

Using one of the DSL tests, I am getting 10M downloads and about 8M uploads. Ping was 15 and 29.

I'm doing the standard home based activities of Netflix/Hulu type stuff plus forums. I've also got OOMA going on. I will be adding in remote viewing of security cameras in the near future.

I'm happy with the latency. The overall download speed doesn't bother me too much except when I am downloading Microsoft ISOs.

Will 20M/20M help drop my ping down a bit more(latency)?

 

[VirtualLarry]

My contract is up and 20M/20M is now available and cheaper than my current monthly amount.

Sounds like a no-brainer? Any drawbacks? Term commitment, monthly transfer caps, anything with the faster speed? Or just simply faster for less money straight-up?

Will 20M/20M help drop my ping down a bit more(latency)?

If you're currently on DSL, then fiber should have noticeably lower latency. If your current 10M/10M is already on fiber, then no, you won't notice much of a latency difference between 10M and 20M. Unless you're maxing your capacity, and connections / packets are being dropped, and having to be re-scheduled.

Edit: That said, as long as there's nothing onerous in the deal for the 20M/20M, I would go for it. Especially if it's actually cheaper than what you're paying right now for !0M/10M.

The reason being, that watching things like 4K UHD YouTube need a little more than 10M, but I think generally less than 20M. That would be my primary consideration. As well, your ISO downloads should go faster.

I'm on FIOS Gigabit right now, and while its in theory, really fast, the truth is, for downloading Linux ISO as I do sometimes, the servers for HTTP downloads seem a bit loaded-down, or throttled, or something, because the higher that they seem to go is around 100Mbit/sec for one connection. Still, I can have 10-15 downloads going at once, then, and they're not throttling each other much.

Can you get 50M/50M or 100M/100M? If you're really on fiber, I would think that would be offered. Although, if you're on business-class service, with some sort of SLA, the cost for those speeds might be a tad prohibitive.

I strongly recommend going with 100Mbit/sec or faster for consumer internet connections, if at all possible / affordable. Higher than that, doesn't help all that much, except possibly for downloads from Microsoft and NVidia's servers. Steam too.

 

[mnewsham]

Will 20M/20M help drop my ping down a bit more(latency)?

if it's provided the same way your 10/10 is provided, no, your ping will be identical.

Ping is a factor of distance and how many hops are inbetween. Getting more bandwidth will do nothing to change that.

 

[killster1]

if it's provided the same way your 10/10 is provided, no, your ping will be identical.

Ping is a factor of distance and how many hops are inbetween. Getting more bandwidth will do nothing to change that.

So your telling me, 10M stream of netflix while playing bf4 the ping will be the same on 10m and 20m line?

 

[Thebobo]

if it's provided the same way your 10/10 is provided, no, your ping will be identical.

Ping is a factor of distance and how many hops are inbetween. Getting more bandwidth will do nothing to change that.

yea well going between DSL and fiber it can.

 

[mnewsham]

yea well going between DSL and fiber it can.

I guess that's why I specifically said

if it's provided the same way your 10/10 is provided, no

he says specifically

Short: AT&T business class fiber optic 10M/10M vs 20M/20M

then later mentions DSL tests, which I assume is DSLReports speedtest, and not him saying he HAS DSL.

From my assumption, he already has AT&T fiber, and is looking to increase from 10mbps to 20mbps using the SAME service.



READING COMPREHENSION

 

[mnewsham]

So your telling me, 10M stream of netflix while playing bf4 the ping will be the same on 10m and 20m line?

With proper QoS, sure.

 

[killster1]

With proper QoS, sure.

More like if limited to not full bw of 10M then ping will suffer LESS.

 

[mnewsham]

More like if limited to not full bw of 10M then ping will suffer LESS.

I mean, with proper QoS, there is no reason your game ping would be effected.

Further, netflix maxes bitrate at around 7mbps for anything besides 4k. In which case, no duh 10mbps aint gonna be enough.

 

[Lil'John]

I'm already on fiber at 10M/10M. I have been for almost 2 years.

Both 10M/10M and 20M/20M under a new contract(2 years) will be cheaper than my current per month price. 20M/20M will be $50 per month more than 10M/10M. The pricing difference isn't double from one tier to the other tier.

A key word to pay attention to is: this is business class fiber optic. I do not have an option for residential fiber optic Business class means I'm paying an arm and a leg.

There are no caps on usage at all

Sadly, 10M and 20M were my only options.

The question on ping is result of my basic understanding with optic is each fiber into my house is ~10M so I'd end up with two fibers in use.

 

[mnewsham]

The question on ping is result of my basic understanding with optic is each fiber into my house is ~10M so I'd end up with two fibers in use.

That doesn't seem right at all.

I am on a single optical fiber and I get over 900mbps, there should be NO reason they'd need a 2nd optical fiber just to deliver another 10mbps. I don't know of any optical fiber tech still in use that would cap out at such a low speed.

 

[VirtualLarry]

The question on ping is result of my basic understanding with optic is each fiber into my house is ~10M so I'd end up with two fibers in use.

That makes NO sense. What @mnewsham said.

The only way that I can parse this is, you are on AT&T U-Verse "fiber", which is not FTTP, only FTTC (1), and the home/business is served via copper, most likely VDSL, and in order to bring in 20M, they would have to bond TWO VDSL lines together to do so.

In that case, IMHO, I would think that the latency would be WORSE. If latency is your primary concern, and NOT bandwidth (you are a stock trader, for example), then you would be better off sticking to a single line.

OTOH, if you want to watch 4K video, then bond away, latency doesn't matter so much for buffered video online, whereas sufficient bandwidth does.

Gaming would be a mixed bag. Downloads of games (on Steam, for example) would be faster bonded, but ping times to game servers would probably be better without the bonded line.

OP, are you SURE that they need to bond lines to double your speed? With a fiber-optic line (just one!), they can generally give you nearly unlimited bandwidth, given whatever optics on either end are needed.

I'm on FIOS, and I get 1Gbit/sec symmetric (really, 940Mbit/sec / 940Mbit/sec).

(1) I'm speaking of in the OP's case. They may well also offer FTTP, in some cases.

 

[Thebobo]

I guess that's why I specifically said



he says specifically


then later mentions DSL tests, which I assume is DSLReports speedtest, and not him saying he HAS DSL.

From my assumption, he already has AT&T fiber, and is looking to increase from 10mbps to 20mbps using the SAME service.



READING COMPREHENSION

Whoa there

 

[Lil'John]

I am in the middle of nowhere which is why my only 'reliable' internet was business class fiber optic service... or T1.

By middle of nowhere, I mean about 1.5 hours east of Sacramento, CA in the hills. Nearest 'town' is 10 miles from me(~2000 people).

'Unlimited' speed hasn't been offered as an option. And business class probably puts it in the several thousand dollars a month range more than likely. I'm am already WAY over standard $100 per month 100M Comcast rates.

My understanding from the install tech 2 years ago was they pull more than a single 'fiber line' in the bundle to my house. If more speed is needed, additional fiber lines are added. I make no claim to being a network technician... just a software engineer that dabbles to learn a bit about most computer topics

 

[Fallen Kell]

My understanding from the install tech 2 years ago was they pull more than a single 'fiber line' in the bundle to my house. If more speed is needed, additional fiber lines are added. I make no claim to being a network technician... just a software engineer that dabbles to learn a bit about most computer topics

They pull more than one fiber line because it is always possible a line goes bad/gets damaged. It is simply cheaper to pulled multiple lines at the initial hookup since they already dug the ground, or had the people/equipment to fish the lines (the cost of fiber lines is nothing compared to the labor cost of installing it correctly). And given that you have a business class connection, it usually includes things such as a service level agreement which calls out downtime/repair times... Getting a crew out to pull another connection (especially to someplace that is off the beaten path) is not something that comes cheap, and once they do the math for risk of damage to the fiber line, it far outweighs the material cost of the additional fiber lines (labor cost of the additional lines is minimal as it only adds the time it takes to test the additional runs).