Mweb - Shaping Policy's Clarification please

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KinsZA

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Hi

Definately need some clarification on what MWeb defines as "shaping"

I see the need for shaping to maintain a good quality of service as everyone cant have 1:1 bandwidth however just where do you draw the line.

I'm sitting here looking at a usenetserver's news service going at a hole 0.5KB/s max, now considering I have 4mbit line with 4mbit uncapped which generally means max of 440KB/s on anything that means I am getting roughly 0.0012% of my possible max speed so 99.9978% shaped.

I'd LOVE for you guys to justify this.
 
Hi KinsZA

Shaped traffic is given a lower priority and will always give way to meet the demands of high priority and unshaped traffic, all types of P2P, file sharing (one-click-hosting) and binary newsgroup traffic are placed into this category.

Kind regards
MWEB Guy
 
Haha 0.5Kb isn't the speed you're meant to be getting, how about trying some other shaped services if that news server works out this badly for you. If you really want a paid news server and it doesn't get better then dump MWeb. One click hosters and torrents will at least run better than 0.5Kb though. Maybe use the mweb news server when possible too.
 
Thankyou for the prompt response mwebguy. Its good to know how things work

Alestorm I have never been able to connect to news.MWEB.co.za and it's only been recently that I have gotten non max speeds on my news server.
 
although mweb denies that they use throttling, only shaping, we see the throttling daily in practice...
 
mika1000 said:
although mweb denies that they use throttling, only shaping, we see the throttling daily in practice...
Click to expand...

I disagree totally; though I guess it depends on how you define throttling (and this debate is getting old). There is no evidence in my experience that at a certain GB usage that MWEB slashes my speed on regular HTTP or P2P. My understanding is that to throttle is to rate limit a users account in its ENTIRETY, irrespective of the protocol used. The shaping on P2P and other non-regular HTTP is sometimes severe, i'll grant you that much. However, I said it first and I'll say it again, one cannot look at second-for-second speeds; but rather the total GB pull over an extended period.

Generally NNTP access is sporadic and if you are lucky enough to connect the speeds are unpredictable. BitTorrent and RapidShare et al. are generally more stable; and you'll easily get max speed over weekends and between 11PM and 8AM. At least I have been. During the day is another story because the speeds are unpredictable; but I've got used to BitTorrent/RS etc. coming down at 30kB/s at a minimum.
 
I must admit, while I understand that torrents and whatnot need to be shaped, I think MWEB need to expand their network a little, as torrents during the day, simply don't work at all most of the time.

Low speeds I'm cool with, sure, that was expected from the outset. In the beginning though, it was great, used to get sort of half my max speed on a 384 which was wonderful.

Now it's just as dead as a doornail, which is pathetic.
 
KinsZA said:
Hi

Definately need some clarification on what MWeb defines as "shaping"

I see the need for shaping to maintain a good quality of service as everyone cant have 1:1 bandwidth however just where do you draw the line.

I'm sitting here looking at a usenetserver's news service going at a hole 0.5KB/s max, now considering I have 4mbit line with 4mbit uncapped which generally means max of 440KB/s on anything that means I am getting roughly 0.0012% of my possible max speed so 99.9978% shaped.

I'd LOVE for you guys to justify this.
Click to expand...

0.5/440*100 = 0.11%, so 99.89% is not used.

Or if you take 400kB/s, then it's 0.125%, so 99.875% is not used.

I'm not making a judgement on your post, but the actual percentage is two orders of magnitude higher.
 
If shaped traffic gets whatever bandwidth is available after the unshaped protocols have been considered, and shaped traffic appears to be heavily shaped at the moment, then this obviously means that one or both of the following applies: (1) there is currently heavy unshaped usage -- lots of people are downloading over HTTP, streaming YouTube, etc. and/or (2) there is heavy shaped usage, so that whatever bandwidth remains is being contested over by everyone who is using a shaped protocol. So, to take both cases: it's a Sunday afternoon so many people are online streaming YouTube, downloading Windows updates, etc. This means that a small percentage of the total capacity remains for shaped protocols which is then divided between everyone who is downloading something over a shaped protocol.
 
Sabre i would have to disagree, mweb was perfect up until about two weeks ago. I doubt they have suddenly run out bandwidth :p

They have changed their rules and they are shaping/throttling far heavier.
 
SabreWolfy said:
If shaped traffic gets whatever bandwidth is available after the unshaped protocols have been considered, and shaped traffic appears to be heavily shaped at the moment, then this obviously means that one or both of the following applies: (1) there is currently heavy unshaped usage -- lots of people are downloading over HTTP, streaming YouTube, etc. and/or (2) there is heavy shaped usage, so that whatever bandwidth remains is being contested over by everyone who is using a shaped protocol. So, to take both cases: it's a Sunday afternoon so many people are online streaming YouTube, downloading Windows updates, etc. This means that a small percentage of the total capacity remains for shaped protocols which is then divided between everyone who is downloading something over a shaped protocol.
Click to expand...
As I keep saying - and who has control over this limited bandwidth - only Mweb. So they are ultimately causing the problem.
 
Lounger said:
As I keep saying - and who has control over this limited bandwidth - only Mweb. So they are ultimately causing the problem.
Click to expand...

How many ISPs have -- literally -- unlimited bandwidth? How should they manage their bandwidth differently? Increase the pool for shaped protocols so that no-one can stream YouTube or do Internet banking or surf? Every ISP has a limited amount of bandwidth to allocate to their users.
 
SabreWolfy said:
How many ISPs have -- literally -- unlimited bandwidth? How should they manage their bandwidth differently? Increase the pool for shaped protocols so that no-one can stream YouTube or do Internet banking or surf? Every ISP has a limited amount of bandwidth to allocate to their users.
Click to expand...

Do they now? So what is the limit? I mean you know such much you must surely know how much bandwidth they have :D.

Come on break it down, did mweb suddenly get 50000 new customers in the last two weeks and then realized o shyte bandwidth failure imminent?
 
SabreWolfy said:
How many ISPs have -- literally -- unlimited bandwidth? How should they manage their bandwidth differently? Increase the pool for shaped protocols so that no-one can stream YouTube or do Internet banking or surf? Every ISP has a limited amount of bandwidth to allocate to their users.
Click to expand...
Again a completely false direction to take the argument. Mweb must ensure that their customers have enough bandwidth. It isn't about being unlimited or not (which they do claim btw). They appear to be taking on more and more customers and increasing shaping, which doesn't make sense. Some would call it profit taking.
 
Lounger said:
Again a completely false direction to take the argument. Mweb must ensure that their customers have enough bandwidth. It isn't about being unlimited or not (which they do claim btw). They appear to be taking on more and more customers and increasing shaping, which doesn't make sense. Some would call it profit taking.
Click to expand...

The only solution to your line of argument is for MWEB to have infinite bandwidth. Anything less means that bandwidth will be limited and will have to be managed. If MWEB doubled their bandwidth tomorrow, everyone would download/stream/torrent/p2p/etc twice as much, so MWEB would have to manage (shape) their bandwidth, unless they doubled it again next week, which would be followed by everyone once again downloading more (because they can, because it's fast, because it's uncapped, because they've paid for it), etc.

Shaping is in place precisely to ensure that customers can make fair use of the available bandwidth. I would agree that excessive and continual shaping to the point where the connection is almost unusable becomes difficult to justify. However, they do have a specific account for this type of usage. Complaining about the speed of shaped protocols on a shaped account is probably not going to get you very far (as has been seen on these forums repeatedly). If you want to torrent 24/7/365, but the account designed specifically for this type of usage. If you don't want to do that, then contend with the shaped pool on the shaped accounts. I do, however, accept that it seems that MWEB is not playing fair and in a good spirit when they shape certain protocols on shaped accounts to 1kB/s or whatever.
 
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Only if they have an infinite number of customers, by your own argument. (pwnd ;))

Admit that Mweb is shaping more intensely now, give them enough to keep them happy and it will return to normality. This is preferable to cutting corners with the extra shaper implementation trying to save a buck or two.

Nobody expects to torrent 24/7 (and please state your source for this reductio ad absurdum). What they do expect is a consistent experience. i.e. if you could once do it from 7pm, then from 1am next day - there will be an outcry.
 
Ok, not an "infinite" amount of bandwidth unless they have an infinite number of customers of course, but so much more bandwidth so that each and every customer can download at line speed 24/7/365 (on shaped accounts?). Therefore, to all intents and purposes, "infinite". Especially if their customer base continues to grow and they don't manage/shape their accounts... Unless bandwidth is "infinite", it's a limited resource, pure and simple.

Doesn't everyone who torrents do so 24/7? Whether they get 1kB/s or 100kB/s surely. Or is it absurdium to assume that people will torrent only a file or two...

How can you expect a constant experience from a dynamic system like "The Internet"? If you want good performance on the shaped protocols on a shaped account, get an unshaped account.
 
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