Afrihost Uncapped ADSL Feedback (Pt3)

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cronjec said:
Hi Afriman,

You state that uncapped accounts are shaped between 07H30 and 22H00 and the DSL product page on your website do state "semi-shaped" for uncapped accounts. While searching through the forum this morning I found this article from last year March (http://mybroadband.co.za/news/adsl/71908-afrihost-uncapped-adsl-now-unshaped.html) stating "Afrihost said that its upgraded network is performing at excellent levels, which gave them the confidence to “completely unshape all uncapped ADSL traffic”."

What happened to that plan?
Click to expand...

MTN acquired them. They are the new majority shareholders, so they will come with new ideas on how the company should be run, as well as new expectations. MTN will want the maximum profit possible from Afrihost. Upgrading networks and IPCs is extremely expensive and doesn't generate a profit, so I'm sure that they'll upgrade the network is only when they absolutely have to.
 
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Orihalcon said:
Currently the only thing that @$#%@ me off is that image loading is being shaped. Forget about browsing wallpaper or art gallery sites. Holy hell...

Nah. I'm done I think. Testing other ISPs now and finding a better experience and pings elsewhere.

My account problem has been solved however - I've been given another uncapped account which runs as it should. So I am happy for that :)
Click to expand...

So in the end they just gave you a new account and that sorted it out? After all that testing that was the solution?
 
It's great that you are giving clients unshaped goodness, its a pity you doing it whilst 95% of the country is asleep :p . So for the time they are awake, most protocols are shaped.

I see that Afrihost has to run a business, and once you consider the cost per Gig that ISP's runat, it makes total sense. However, you also have to look at it from a client perspective. Saying you giving them unshaped goodness between 12 and 7 isn't a major perk.

I think you guys should just re-word the product description a little, thus leading to less confusion. :)

AfriMan said:
I don't think that should be the case. Most Uncapped users are unshaped between 10pm and 12am, and then only shaped again at 7:30, which is at least 7.5 hours of unshaped service, which is a lot more than 20% of the 24 hour cycle (it's over 30%, and possibly more depending on when you are unshaped). As a semi-shaped product, the concept is that priority realtime services are prioritised over non-realtime downloads so it's maybe not the ideal product if the intended use is mainly for downloads and torrents, though you can still pull down those services, slowly during the day, but for 7-8 hours overnight as unshaped.
Click to expand...
 
I just noticed something really interesting.

Using HTML 5 as my video player the maximum bandwidth I could pull to watch video streams was 120kB/s odd. When I switched back to flash player - current version is 14.x.x I think? - I had full speed of 450kB/s.

Interesting. Could be the reason why some people have been having a bad video streaming experience from some sites? On youtube however using HTML 5 yields full speed though.

I invite anyone and everyone else to test this as well please. Used traileraddict as my test site to switch between html 5 and flash.

Perhaps this could be a looked at for other streaming sites besides youtube as I'm sure many people are not aware of the embedded player being used on zxy streaming site?
 
AfriMan said:
We don't want to move towards a punitive throttling system.We had something similar before we moved networks and we were never very happy about it. We'd also get complaints who would move a certain amount of bandwidth who would be throttled to the extent that their connection was not really useable for them. Our aim is to always have a useable connection and get priority services all the time. This way we don't "jail" our clients and ask them to not use the internet for 30 days before they can use the internet again. We've always wanted a system where people can get as much bandwidth as we can possibly give them safely without impacting the network or other users negatively.
Click to expand...
I am not saying throttle them to a stand still. Use the current testing policy on those that have been abusing. Everyone else gets old shaping method.

You say that you don't want to have such negative feedback because of throttling but the current shaping is from what I have read just as bad.

I think it would be best to have a blend of the different shaping policies.

Everyone gets full speed for streaming and realtime traffic. Abusers get heavily shaped during day for non realtime. Everyone else is shaped as network needs.

Everyone except the abusers would be satisfied with that I think.

Anyone else agree with this idea?
 
Is it correct to assume that any capped account on Afrihost is unshaped 24/7? Just a quick question as I am reading through all this.

And one should get full line speed on downloads across all the protocols all the time, as long as the exchange isn't too utilised, and the stability of your line permits it?
 
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Orihalcon said:
I just noticed something really interesting.

Using HTML 5 as my video player the maximum bandwidth I could pull to watch video streams was 120kB/s odd. When I switched back to flash player - current version is 14.x.x I think? - I had full speed of 450kB/s.

Interesting. Could be the reason why some people have been having a bad video streaming experience from some sites? On youtube however using HTML 5 yields full speed though.

I invite anyone and everyone else to test this as well please. Used traileraddict as my test site to switch between html 5 and flash.

Perhaps this could be a looked at for other streaming sites besides youtube as I'm sure many people are not aware of the embedded player being used on zxy streaming site?
Click to expand...

That's very interesting. I don't think I have tested this myself but I've asked the guys here to test this. If this helps up improving streaming, we'll definitely look into this.

Thanks for the heads up :)
 
DeathStrike said:
I am not saying throttle them to a stand still. Use the current testing policy on those that have been abusing. Everyone else gets old shaping method.

You say that you don't want to have such negative feedback because of throttling but the current shaping is from what I have read just as bad.

I think it would be best to have a blend of the different shaping policies.

Everyone gets full speed for streaming and realtime traffic. Abusers get heavily shaped during day for non realtime. Everyone else is shaped as network needs.

Everyone except the abusers would be satisfied with that I think.

Anyone else agree with this idea?
Click to expand...

We're definitely open to different ideas, but we obviously want to have simple system in terms of implementation as well as being able to explain to clients why they are on the policy that they are. But at the moment we haven't made any permanent AUP changes just yet.
 
drkd3vil said:
Is it correct to assume that any capped account on Afrihost is unshaped 24/7? Just a quick question as I am reading through all this.

And one should get full line speed on downloads across all the protocols all the time, as long as the exchange isn't too utilised, and the stability of your line permits it?
Click to expand...

Yes, that's correct. So the only things that affect your bandwidth performance are your line's stats, congestion on your exchange or potentially contention on our network (which is generally not the case at the moment, except for a short period in the evenings in the South, which we're busy addressing)
 
Getting poor poor speeds on international, pages are just hanging. Google is also just hanging but the traceroute seems odd to it? Afriman/guy do you think that international is having issues?

I am on a capped account by the way.

Tracing route to facebook.com [173.252.110.27]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
2 6 ms 5 ms 6 ms 105-236-14-65-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.
14.65]
3 8 ms 8 ms 8 ms ipc-recieve-rb-3a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.178
.77]
4 8 ms 7 ms 8 ms rb-cr-1.za--rb-dca-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.0.14
6]
5 8 ms 8 ms 7 ms jh-cr-2.za--rb-cr-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.31.95
]
6 8 ms 8 ms 8 ms qux-jh-dca-2.za-b.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.165
.115]
7 198 ms 202 ms 199 ms br01.ams1.tfbnw.net [195.69.145.115]
8 198 ms 197 ms 197 ms ae1.bb01.ams2.tfbnw.net [31.13.29.86]
9 213 ms 214 ms 213 ms ae3.bb01.lhr2.tfbnw.net [31.13.29.85]
10 303 ms 302 ms 302 ms be11.bb01.ewr2.tfbnw.net [31.13.30.98]
11 288 ms 318 ms 288 ms be44.bb02.iad3.tfbnw.net [31.13.26.5]
12 289 ms 287 ms 287 ms be14.bb02.frc3.tfbnw.net [31.13.24.38]
13 304 ms 304 ms 303 ms ae88.dr04.frc1.tfbnw.net [173.252.64.193]
14 * * * Request timed out.
15 * * * Request timed out.
16 287 ms 288 ms 287 ms edge-star-shv-13-frc1.facebook.com [173.252.110.
27]

Trace complete.


Tracing route to soundcloud.com [93.184.220.127]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
2 6 ms 5 ms 6 ms 105-236-14-65-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.
14.65]
3 8 ms 7 ms 8 ms ipc-recieve-rb-4a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.178
.89]
4 8 ms 7 ms 7 ms rb-cr-1.za--rb-dca-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.0.14
6]
5 7 ms 7 ms 7 ms jh-cr-2.za--rb-cr-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.31.95
]
6 8 ms 7 ms 8 ms qux-jh-dca-2.za-b.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.165
.115]
7 214 ms 214 ms 214 ms xe-4-1-0.edge5.Amsterdam1.Level3.net [212.72.41.
89]
8 * * * Request timed out.
9 197 ms 196 ms 197 ms ae-129-3515.edge6.Amsterdam1.Level3.net [4.69.16
2.234]
10 197 ms 197 ms 198 ms NTT-level3-4x10G.Amsterdam.Level3.net [4.68.63.2
18]
11 215 ms 215 ms 214 ms ae-5.r03.amstnl02.nl.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.4.1
86]
12 198 ms 197 ms 197 ms edgecast-0.r03.amstnl02.nl.bb.gin.ntt.net [81.20
.69.146]
13 214 ms 214 ms 214 ms 93.184.220.127

Trace complete.

Tracing route to google.com [74.125.233.9]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
2 6 ms 6 ms 6 ms 105-236-14-65-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.
14.65]
3 8 ms 8 ms 8 ms ipc-recieve-rb-1a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.178
.53]
4 7 ms 7 ms 8 ms rb-cr-1.za--rb-dca-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.0.14
6]
5 8 ms 7 ms 7 ms jh-cr-2.za--rb-cr-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.31.95
]
6 7 ms 7 ms 7 ms qux-jh-dca-2.za-b.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.165
.115]
7 12 ms 11 ms 12 ms 72.14.194.74
8 18 ms 18 ms 19 ms 72.14.237.239
9 28 ms 29 ms 29 ms jnb01s07-in-f9.1e100.net [74.125.233.9]

Trace complete.

Tracing route to afrihost.com [197.242.144.102]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.0.1
2 6 ms 6 ms 6 ms 105-236-14-65-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.
14.65]
3 8 ms 8 ms 9 ms ipc-recieve-rb-3a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.178
.77]
4 8 ms 8 ms 8 ms rb-cr-1.za--rb-dca-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.0.14
6]
5 9 ms 8 ms 8 ms jh-cr-2.za--rb-cr-1.za-a.mtnns.net [196.44.31.95
]
6 8 ms 8 ms 8 ms qux-jh-dca-2.za-b.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.165
.115]
7 9 ms 9 ms 8 ms 196.44.31.99
8 9 ms 9 ms 9 ms 196.30.1.53
9 9 ms 9 ms 8 ms 196.31.220.25
10 9 ms 8 ms 8 ms 196.31.63.206
11 9 ms 9 ms 16 ms vl9-ah-ha-2.za.mtnbusiness.net [196.30.42.133]
12 11 ms 14 ms 9 ms cms-gm.afrihost.com [197.242.144.102]

Trace complete.
 
AfriMan said:
What kind of throughput are you getting? Also, what DNS settings are you using?
Click to expand...

Local


Test to San Francisco


Test to LA


Test to Miami


Test to Boston


Test to Landon


I decided to do a few tests to the US it seemed a little bumpy at first but the more i tested the more normal it became.

I am using the normal Afrihost DNS settings its getting obtained automatically from the router.

What i have noticed is it comes and goes. It will be fast and then it just dies out and the page hangs.

Maybe a port reset will do im not sure.
 
adam_g said:
Local


Test to San Francisco


Test to LA


Test to Miami


Test to Boston


Test to Landon


I decided to do a few tests to the US it seemed a little bumpy at first but the more i tested the more normal it became.

I am using the normal Afrihost DNS settings its getting obtained automatically from the router.

What i have noticed is it comes and goes. It will be fast and then it just dies out and the page hangs.

Maybe a port reset will do im not sure.
Click to expand...

Lets see what we can do :)
These results look good! PM me your info and I'll see if I can spot anything.
 
I was asked to test my own uncapped account again to see if the problem still persists. It does.

Code: 
C:\Windows\system32>tracert google.com

Tracing route to google.com [74.125.233.6]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  192.168.0.1
  2     *        *        *     Request timed out.
  3     7 ms     7 ms     7 ms  105-236-5-1-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.5.1]
  4     8 ms    10 ms     9 ms  41.181.221.254
  5     8 ms     8 ms     8 ms  tb-dca-2.za--qux-a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.184.28]
  6     8 ms     8 ms     8 ms  compj-cpt-1.mtnns.net [196.44.18.2]
  7    10 ms    10 ms    10 ms  ct-cr-2.za--tb-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.134]
  8    31 ms    31 ms    30 ms  rb-cr-1.za--ct-cr-2.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.69]
  9    29 ms    30 ms    31 ms  41.181.139.109
 10    40 ms    39 ms    38 ms  72.14.194.74
 11    32 ms    31 ms    31 ms  72.14.237.239
 12    31 ms    32 ms    32 ms  jnb01s07-in-f6.1e100.net [74.125.233.6]

Trace complete.

C:\Windows\system32>tracert youtube.com

Tracing route to youtube.com [74.125.233.14]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  192.168.0.1
  2     *        *        *     Request timed out.
  3     8 ms     7 ms     7 ms  105-236-5-1-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.5.1]
  4     9 ms     8 ms     8 ms  41.181.51.182
  5     8 ms     7 ms     7 ms  tb-dca-2.za--qux-a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.184.28]
  6    27 ms     8 ms     8 ms  compj-cpt-1.mtnns.net [196.44.18.2]
  7     9 ms     9 ms     9 ms  ct-cr-2.za--tb-cr-1.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.134]
  8    33 ms    30 ms    30 ms  rb-cr-1.za--ct-cr-2.za.mtnns.net [196.44.31.69]
  9    30 ms    31 ms    29 ms  41.181.139.109
 10    32 ms    31 ms    34 ms  72.14.194.74
 11    31 ms    30 ms    31 ms  72.14.237.239
 12    35 ms    33 ms    32 ms  jnb01s07-in-f14.1e100.net [74.125.233.14]

Trace complete.

C:\Windows\system32>tracert bbc.co.uk

Tracing route to bbc.co.uk [212.58.246.103]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  192.168.0.1
  2     *        *        *     Request timed out.
  3     7 ms     7 ms     7 ms  105-236-5-1-esr-lo.mtnbusiness.co.za [105.236.5.1]
  4     8 ms     9 ms     9 ms  41.181.201.94
  5   149 ms   152 ms   166 ms  tb-dca-2.za--qux-a.za.mtnbusiness.net [41.181.184.28]
  6     8 ms     8 ms     8 ms  unc-cpt-1.mtnns.net [196.44.18.8]
  7    10 ms     9 ms     8 ms  196.44.31.106
  8   152 ms   151 ms   152 ms  am-cr-1.am--lt-cr-1.uk-a.mtnns.net [196.44.31.221]
  9   152 ms   151 ms   153 ms  ls-pr-1.uk--ls-cr-1.uk-a.mtn.net [209.212.111.83]
 10   152 ms   156 ms   151 ms  bbc-linx.pr01.thdow.bbc.co.uk [195.66.224.103]
 11     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 12   154 ms   153 ms   153 ms  ae0.er01.cwwtf.bbc.co.uk [132.185.254.93]
 13   154 ms   153 ms   154 ms  132.185.255.165
 14   153 ms   153 ms   154 ms  fmt-vip132.cwwtf.bbc.co.uk [212.58.246.103]

Trace complete.

C:\Windows\system32>PAUSE
Press any key to continue . . .





That is a clearly imposed rate limit. Starts great for 5 seconds, then get's shaped, throttled, limited or whatever to 260kB/s. *sigh*

Back to the alternative account I was given till this is sorted. What I don't understand is that if the alternative account I was given is identical to the one I have - so I was told - then what possible explanation is there for this behavior? There is clearly something wrong with my account.
 
I have a 20mbs adsl line. I have been experiencing slow internet speeds especially in the evenings for the past week. I have not been able to reach my max speed for the past 3 weeks.

I called in yesterday and the technician reset my port but it has not helped. I called in a few minutes ago and was advised to send snapshots using My Afrihost Business account and Telkom Guest account.

Snapshots were taken with both accounts which are attached. The Telkom account cannot resolve to international sites as its not open.
From the snapshots, you will notice that the Telkom guest account speedtest is terrific.

Please assist in resolving the problem.

My afrihost username is: [email protected]

Afrihost account.jpg
Telkom Account.jpg
 

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Supreme Element said:
I have a 20mbs adsl line. I have been experiencing slow internet speeds especially in the evenings for the past week. I have not been able to reach my max speed for the past 3 weeks.

I called in yesterday and the technician reset my port but it has not helped. I called in a few minutes ago and was advised to send snapshots using My Afrihost Business account and Telkom Guest account.

Snapshots were taken with both accounts which are attached. The Telkom account cannot resolve to international sites as its not open.
From the snapshots, you will notice that the Telkom guest account speedtest is terrific.

Please assist in resolving the problem.

My afrihost username is: [email protected]

View attachment 150060
View attachment 150062
Click to expand...

ALL AH accounts are suffering at the moment...

MWEB
http://speedtest.ookla.com/result/2706298414.png

WEB AFRICA
http://speedtest.ookla.com/result/2706299282.png

TELKOM
http://speedtest.ookla.com/result/2706301306.png

AH BUSINESS 10MB
http://speedtest.ookla.com/result/2706303433.png

AH CAPPED 40GB
http://speedtest.ookla.com/result/2706305238.png
 
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