Best ISP for Gaming Latency?

[ArtiXim]

After some recent sadness with Afrihost, I went through the process of testing quite a couple of different options, to see which ISP would end up giving me the most consistent latency for gaming. I thought it may be useful for those in s similar boat, and I would also like to see what other users are finding to be the best.

Bear in mind these tests were all performed from Cape Town, on a 4Mb line. I've gone through the process of also trying to factor in the cost of these options, cost rating A is cheap and C is expensive. For the international ping, I've tried to measure both using Speedtest and ingame Pings to the Dota2 EU server.

Afrihost MTN Capped
Cost Rating: A
Best Local Ping: 40ms
Best Int. Ping: 225ms
Avg Local Ping: 50ms
Avg Int. Ping: 240ms
Worst Local Ping: 200ms
Worst Int. Ping: 500ms

MWeb Capped
Cost Rating: C
Best Local Ping: 19ms
Best Int. Ping: 180ms
Avg Local Ping: 21ms
Avg Int. Ping: 190ms
Worst Local Ping: 30ms
Worst Int. Ping: 233ms

Openweb Gold Capped
Cost Rating: C
Best Local Ping: 15ms
Best Int. Ping: 160ms
Avg Local Ping: 17ms
Avg Int. Ping: 170ms
Worst Local Ping: 19ms
Worst Int. Ping: 178ms

Openweb Budget Unshaped
Higher contention ratio and no redundancy.
Cost Rating: A
Best Local Ping: 17ms
Best Int. Ping: 165ms
Avg Local Ping: 19ms
Avg Int. Ping: 190ms
Worst Local Ping: 22ms
Worst Int. Ping: 200ms

WebAfrica Home Pro Capped
Cost Rating: C
Best Local Ping: 17ms
Best Int. Ping: 170ms
Avg Local Ping: 20ms
Avg Int. Ping: 175ms
Worst Local Ping: 22ms
Worst Int. Ping: 199ms

WebAfrica Home Capped
Less priority on gaming traffic.
Cost Rating: B
Best Local Ping: 20ms
Best Int. Ping: 187ms
Avg Local Ping: 22ms
Avg Int. Ping: 199ms
Worst Local Ping: 31ms
Worst Int. Ping: 235ms

Cybersmart Capped
Cost Rating: B
Best Local Ping: 20ms
Best Int. Ping: 199ms
Avg Local Ping: 22ms
Avg Int. Ping: 205ms
Worst Local Ping: 25ms
Worst Int. Ping: 210ms

Obviously these tests are not stone solid, as latency will vary based on your location, but they aim to give a bit of an index which may help gamers make a choice. I did the tests over a space of 2 days, so it's not like this is concrete stuff - just trying to give you guys a bit of a comparative idea. I've found the levels of support to be mostly the same on all of these, but the ones who have dedicated support on myBB seem to have the best turnaround. Currently I am making the most use of the Openweb Budget Unshaped account, as I have a really massive cap so I can download on it (speeds are pretty great, even during high use), and the latency is very solid.

If anyone has additional feedback they can provide, or holes they need to poke in my tests, please do so and I will amend my post accordingly.

 

[Keegan]

Hi,

I have a little question,
With gaming on XBOX i assume it uses different ports for connectivity, Do you know which ISP or if it is considered as a gaming port
when ISP's prioritize for gaming,
I.e, openweb had an advert for gaming ADSL recently, are xbox ports part of this?

Regards
Keegan

 

[ArtiXim]

I will see what I can find out in this regard, but I would definitely think that console traffic would be prioritized, if gaming traffic were being given priority by the ISP in question.

 

[Ipwn 4]

Good post, it does differ very much from location to location. On my line the best ping I have ever had is 6ms with 7-8 being my average, in my area different ISP's have very little effect on my latency so long as they have a jhb IPC.

WA performs horrible from jhb as they don't have IPC up here, my best ping on WA is 50ish constant to cpt or jhb(due to routing).

For gaming the best ISP is IS, just sign up with any of their resellers.

 

[ArtiXim]

Good post, it does differ very much from location to location. On my line the best ping I have ever had is 6ms with 7-8 being my average, in my area different ISP's have very little effect on my latency so long as they have a jhb IPC.

WA performs horrible from jhb as they don't have IPC up here, my best ping on WA is 50ish constant to cpt or jhb(due to routing).

For gaming the best ISP is IS, just sign up with any of their resellers.

Thanks for the feedback, pretty much backs up why I explained that latency differs from one person to another. I would not blanket statement that any ISP on IS will give you the best performance. I know for a fact that there are a couple ISP's in Cape Town, on IS, all of which have an IPC, and their latencies definitely differ on the international routing. It is not by much at all, but when it comes to international stuff you want to squeeze out the best ping even if it is just by 2ms.

 

[ArtiXim]

Hi,

I have a little question,
With gaming on XBOX i assume it uses different ports for connectivity, Do you know which ISP or if it is considered as a gaming port
when ISP's prioritize for gaming,
I.e, openweb had an advert for gaming ADSL recently, are xbox ports part of this?

Regards
Keegan

I've done some scratching around, and thus far I can confirm that Openweb definitely prioritize console traffic, as part of their gaming consideration. I am fairly certain this type of thing is a no brainier, your actual investigation would need to be what level of priority you are getting from your ISP on gaming traffic.

PS: I am in no way affiliated with Openweb, they were just the 1st to get back to me.

 

[bokka1]

Thanks for the great post. I am also looking for an alternative ISP after the Afrihost debacle.

 

[Chevron]

I can definitely say that my Openweb Gold uncapped performs much better than the Afrihost Rage account I had.

 

[ClintonExsteen]

As I only really play WoW, how would gaming priority affect me? consoles clearly work on different ports but can the ISp identify when I am on WoW??

 

[[s]uNq]

As I only really play WoW, how would gaming priority affect me? consoles clearly work on different ports but can the ISp identify when I am on WoW??

Yes, they would be able to. Priority is essentially like having a road with 4 lanes, and saying even though we have buses, cars, bikes, and taxis, the buses are allowed to have 2 lanes all to themselves, because they have priority.

 

[rhettstar]

I have been so disappointed in this Afrihost move to the MtN network. Today I decided I am finally gong to move after putting up with shocking latency in games. I clearly remember getting 180ms in WoW before the move, since then I havent been under 240ms! And what makes it worse is the constant lag spikes! Today I bought a 1 gig budget capped account from OpenWeb and I have noticed a marked difference already. Feels so good to be back on the IS backbone!

Tests I did this afternoon while pinging bbc.co.uk i get 188ms on OpenWeb and 230 on Afrihost.

Its a no brainer for me. I am also interested in trying Mweb sometime. I need to find an account to replace my Afrigamer 35GB package and am a bit reluctant to try an uncapped package. What do you guys recommend in the the price range of about R300.

 

[Praemon]

I have been so disappointed in this Afrihost move to the MtN network. Today I decided I am finally gong to move after putting up with shocking latency in games. I clearly remember getting 180ms in WoW before the move, since then I havent been under 240ms! And what makes it worse is the constant lag spikes! Today I bought a 1 gig budget capped account from OpenWeb and I have noticed a marked difference already. Feels so good to be back on the IS backbone!

Tests I did this afternoon while pinging bbc.co.uk i get 188ms on OpenWeb and 230 on Afrihost.

Its a no brainer for me. I am also interested in trying Mweb sometime. I need to find an account to replace my Afrigamer 35GB package and am a bit reluctant to try an uncapped package. What do you guys recommend in the the price range of about R300.

I'm also moving off Afrihost at the end of this month. It just went downhill after they moved to the MTN network, and I've had continuous lag/connection issues on Xbox LIVE with them. I've been trying out a bunch of trial accounts, and so far IS Plugg and Openweb performed the best for me, closely followed by Mweb. All of them outperformed the Afrihost account.

 

[rhettstar]

Okay I will check Plugg out. Does anyone know if the new WebAfrica offering for 4 meg uncapped is any good?

 

[StevenC]

Though I am not an Openweb subscriber at the moment, I had the opportunity to test their Gold Uncapped account late last year for an entire month and let me tell you it was the best ISP experience I have had to date since getting ADSL. I am an online gamer (MMOs mainly) and I am hypersensitive to latency. Openweb did an excellent job with regards to that.

 

[cavedog]

Okay I will check Plugg out. Does anyone know if the new WebAfrica offering for 4 meg uncapped is any good?

That will be a good choice too. IS backbone.

One thing i noticed with IS is NO MATTER what. The latency is always pretty damn good local and international. You can be shaped to death for very high usage but the latency is very low and stable.

So I'm thinking of ditching Telkom. My decicion is between Webafrica,Openweb Vanilla or Gconnect all IS based and priced pretty damn well.

 

[Drifter]

Excellent post. Well done. If I may ask, what time of the day were the tests conducted. I found that druing peak, from say 15:00 - 19:00 , when MWEB apply shaping, online games are unplayable. As a test, I would connect with a trial account from another ISP and I am in the game instantly, switch back to MWEB, and it's a no go situation.

 

[Cicero]

Openweb Gold Capped
Cost Rating: C
Best Local Ping: 15ms
Best Int. Ping: 160ms
Avg Local Ping: 17ms
Avg Int. Ping: 170ms
Worst Local Ping: 19ms
Worst Int. Ping: 178ms

This is INSANE! That international ping difference from the other ISP's is huge. I'm gonna just try it out and see what its like for me personally, where I have to play BF3 on international servers, I currently get 230ms roughly international ping. If I can drop that by 50ms it might make a big difference.

 

[rhettstar]

So I'm thinking of ditching Telkom. My decicion is between Webafrica,Openweb Vanilla or Gconnect all IS based and priced pretty damn well.

I am very interested in OpenWeb Vanilla but worried about whether o not the latency will be good enough for gaming. The price is looking pretty good tho, I believe Web Africa is the same @R339/pm. I think next month ill activate a few trial accounts to test them each. One thing is for sure, the IS backbone is superior to the MTN network. I cant speak for MWeb yet.