MWEB Uncapped Subscribers Feedback

[Lounger]

In so far as it's possible yes it is a reasonable expectation and in so far as it's possible we do try to keep this experience the same, shaping policies are kept the same, the ratio in terms of capacity to customers is kept the same and all services such as DNS and news are replicated in both data centers. I would again put the question back to you though which is:

Is it possible for any ISP operating a nationwide network to offer their customers an identical experience in different parts of the country considering the complexities of such a venture and the external factors that influence the customer experience.

When I say external factors consider that our IPC links break out of the Telkom infrastructure in JHB and Cape Town and that as a customer you must be routed to one of these points so just in terms of physical distance traversed on the Telkom backhaul a customer in KZN has a different set of external influences to one who is in Midrand.

Also if you consider that as far as I know we are currently the only ISP operating IPC links in both Cape town and JHB, what is your point of comparison?

Will, I have noticed a dramatic increase in complaints recently. Though you clearly have not. Do you think it's a coincidence.

Perhaps as a contended service, Mweb is oversubscribed and once again you aren't allowing for it in your bandwidth.

All I know is the complaints are always the same and the response is always the same and I predict in future there will be no alteration in behaviour from your company. I just wish Mweb would stop making claims that they've improved this and fixed that and are listening to complaints, because clearly you are not.

 

[Will@MWEB]

Will, just a question. Is there a major speed difference between major cities? Because if a place such as Bloemfontein, PE or East London are getting the same speeds as Durban then I buy your argument but if not it cannot be because you have to reroute.

If I had monitoring stations with radio controlled customers at each of those points that would be an easy question to answer - if anyone would like to volunteer for a painless implant process? Seriously though it is difficult to answer that outright.

the IPC architecture is centralized in nature, in other words the closer you are to the two central links in either JHB, or Cape town the more likely you are to get a clean run across the Telkom backhaul and onto those links.
Bear in mind that this holds true for any ISP who uses this architecture and I don't want to name names, but I have heard customers of another ISP who only have a link in one major city mention that the performance in other regions is noticeably different.

The other challenge is in terms of the manner in which Telkom routes our customers onto these links. We have a loosely geographical split in place which is to say that northern customer go north and southern customers go South, but this split is based on the distribution of Telkom's edge service routers and we have encountered numerous instances of individual DSLAMs in the north routed via ESR's in the south and vice versa. These are routing and load balancing decisions made by Telkom and they are entirely out of our hands at this point in time.

 

[Lounger]

please understand that I cannot change the underlying nature of the product you signed up for.

Kind Regards
Will

You can change the description to reflect more accurately what customers can expect. P2P will be very very slow most of the time. Gaming will be problematic with high and varying pings etc etc

 

[PerfectBlue]

Will what happens when the account we signed up for is no longer the account we are receiving?

+1

I am livid regarding how casually this entire situation is being treated. Speeds have been on and off since the beginning of this year.

P2P is not performing as it should be during off-peak hours (and I can assure you that I don't download half as much as some people on here).
HTTP is shockingly bad recently. I am on a 4096 Kbps package and I'm getting speeds averaging 30 KB/sec on HTTP!

Why did the service drastically decline in 2011?

We understand that the underlying nature of the product we signed up for can't be changed, but we're not expecting miracles with the packages we're on - we're expecting the service we were getting before and the service we pay for.

 

[Will@MWEB]

Will, I have noticed a dramatic increase in complaints recently. Though you clearly have not. Do you think it's a coincidence.

Perhaps as a contended service, Mweb is oversubscribed and once again you aren't allowing for it in your bandwidth.

All I know is the complaints are always the same and the response is always the same and I predict in future there will be no alteration in behaviour from your company. I just wish Mweb would stop making claims that they've improved this and fixed that and are listening to complaints, because clearly you are not.

Lounger thanks as always for your insightful input, definitely food for thought. I have actually been very aware of the increased amount of complaints here as I've said in previous responses it has been a challenging few weeks which is why I have dedicated as much time as I am able to to these forums as opposed to leaving it all to poor MWEB Guy. I thought you would have noticed this as I know that you are a faithful visitor to this thread.

 

[StNick]

In so far as it's possible yes it is a reasonable expectation and in so far as it's possible we do try to keep this experience the same, shaping policies are kept the same, the ratio in terms of capacity to customers is kept the same and all services such as DNS and news are replicated in both data centers. I would again put the question back to you though which is:

Is it possible for any ISP operating a nationwide network to offer their customers an identical experience in different parts of the country considering the complexities of such a venture and the external factors that influence the customer experience.

When I say external factors consider that our IPC links break out of the Telkom infrastructure in JHB and Cape Town and that as a customer you must be routed to one of these points so just in terms of physical distance traversed on the Telkom backhaul a customer in KZN has a different set of external influences to one who is in Midrand.

Also if you consider that as far as I know we are currently the only ISP operating IPC links in both Cape town and JHB, what is your point of comparison?

Thanks for your reply Will.

I certainly don't mean to imply that it is an easy undertaking to provide an equal service to all parts of the country; I am sure that there are many factors that must be considered and dealt with. However, as the provider of said services, it is up to MWEB to overcome these obstacles if they are to charge the same price to all customers.

From what you have said, it seems to me that we can draw an analogy between MWEB's policy and a company that sells loaves of bread.

Lets say that Albany have two bakeries, one in Cape Town, and one in Midrand. The bakery in Midrand has to supply both Johannesburg and Durban with their bread, whilst the Cape Town bakery supplies only the Cape. Due to the increased demand on the Midrand bakery, Albany decides that customers in JHB and Durban can only buy half-loaves of bread. Importantly however, since it is still the same bread, the price remains the same. Cape Town just gets more bread for their money. As you can imagine, it wouldn't be long before customers in JHB and DBN started buying from a different bakery! Unless of course Albany decide to upgrade their Midrand bakery to meet the demands of the areas it services, OR, they start supplying some customers in JHB and DBN from their Cape Town bakery!

Lets not forget too, that we're talking about the difference between 65KB/sec and 300+ KB/sec. If you told me that I should realistically expect a 5-10% variation across the country in performance, I could accept that.

There comes a time when all these questions about the hardships that MWEB faces and the external factors that it has to overcome, should fall by the wayside, and only one question should remain. What are they going to do about it? Because if we in JHB and DBN are to expect up to five times slower performance than Cape Town due to factors that are out of MWEB's control, then its time to find another ISP. Ultimately as a customer, I don't want to concern myself with the technical issues behind the product I am paying for. All I am concerned about is the end result, and right now I'm getting a helluva lot less bread for my money than the guys in Cape Town!

 

[killadoob]

Will it is great to hear that you are on the job, however this does not change our situation one bit.

I will give it one more month if nothing changes well it's time for something else i guess .

 

[avert]

Will it is great to hear that you are on the job, however this does not change our situation one bit.

I will give it one more month if nothing changes well it's time for something else i guess .

that would be 2 more months due to their retarded cancellation policy

 

[Will@MWEB]

Will it is great to hear that you are on the job, however this does not change our situation one bit.

I will give it one more month if nothing changes well it's time for something else i guess .

killadoob I really would hate for that to happen and I have to ask although I'm sure it will result in some flamethrower reaction here, but I know for a fact that we looked at congestion issues on your line in the past - to what extent is that still a factor in your experience?

 

[killadoob]

killadoob I really would hate for that to happen and I have to ask although I'm sure it will result in some flamethrower reaction here, but I know for a fact that we looked at congestion issues on your line in the past - to what extent is that still a factor in your experience?

Well axxess ran very well last night, that problem before was a gaming ping problem which was the exchange but this is not an exchange problem, many people are saying in the last two weeks things have bad. Youtube is going awesome during the day so i dunno why at night it changes? I don't do anything but email and http during the day and it flies, after 5 or 6 well youtube is slow and browsing is slow.

 

[vaalpens]

Update 13h00
international http multithread links jumping between 200 and 350KB/s
and youtube 720p played without buffering.

awesome for during business hours will see how this keeps up over the weekend, hopefully i can cancel my afrihost account then

Edit : location JHB, Edenvale

 

[GhostriderTC]

oh bollocks

pls pls pls tell me Microsoft have not taken over MWEB as well and not told anyone :wtf:

 

[killadoob]

Update 13h00
international http multithread links jumping between 200 and 350KB/s
and youtube 720p played without buffering.

awesome for during business hours will see how this keeps up over the weekend, hopefully i can cancel my afrihost account then

As well, runs like a dream during the day. After 5 it changes.

 

[vaalpens]

As well, runs like a dream during the day. After 5 it changes.

yes but they made some changes today again, so we will all have to test over the weekend and report back
A LOT better than the last few days/weeks 30-110KB/s speeds, regardless of time of day

 

[StNick]

yes but they made some changes today again, so we will all have to test over the weekend and report back

I have had no issues on weekends in the past, so I wouldn't base anything on the performance this weekend.

 

[Anthro]

Yes it is a very big internet out there, and you as an ISP should position yourselves to cope with the demand for this 'piece of the pie' coming into the country - if you are incapable to do so - leave the business.
Because it is a shark tank out there.

I am operating on a contended service,yes - but the contention ratio depends on the capacity available - and currently you are placing me on a higher contention because of a lack in capacity (too much marketing selling a product that is under performing?)

I am not comparing the speeds of my 'highly contended service' with a capped service, but I cannot speak for others.
Axxess uncapped as well as OpenWeb Gold uncapped is producing a much higer yield in download speed and stability.
As well as a gaming latency to international sites that you can only dream of

What is holding me back 'from the big internet out there' ?
A new device you implemented between me, London - and the greater slice of the pie.
And might I add, the Nvidia servers - and all others I access run on some scary speedy servers, and are not 'always busy' as you might be implying.
Telkom congestion out the window - the congestion will not change when I swap to either mentioned alternate ISP's available in the country - so that renders that argument invalid (in my case).

BUMP**

 

[Will@MWEB]

I certainly don't mean to imply that it is an easy undertaking to provide an equal service to all parts of the country; I am sure that there are many factors that must be considered and dealt with. However, as the provider of said services, it is up to MWEB to overcome these obstacles if they are to charge the same price to all customers.

By the same token then would you hold cellular and wireless networks to a similar standard, where service levels can fluctuate wildly from neighborhood to neighborhood due to poor coverage, or over subscription on high sites and base stations? Just curious

Lets say that Albany have two bakeries, one in Cape Town, and one in Midrand. The bakery in Midrand has to supply both Johannesburg and Durban with their bread, whilst the Cape Town bakery supplies only the Cape. Due to the increased demand on the Midrand bakery, Albany decides that customers in JHB and Durban can only buy half-loaves of bread. Importantly however, since it is still the same bread, the price remains the same. Cape Town just gets more bread for their money. As you can imagine, it wouldn't be long before customers in JHB and DBN started buying from a different bakery! Unless of course Albany decide to upgrade their Midrand bakery to meet the demands of the areas it services, OR, they start supplying some customers in JHB and DBN from their Cape Town bakery!

Lets not forget too, that we're talking about the difference between 65KB/sec and 300+ KB/sec. If you told me that I should realistically expect a 5-10% variation across the country in performance, I could accept that.

Not another food analogy

Like I said insofar as it's possible we endeavour to keep the experience the same in both regions, in other words we make sure that the factory in both regions is capable of producing 2 loaves of bread per day per customer, bear in mind that this is not something which can be microcontrolled though as bandwidth is purchased in fairly sizeable chunks so there is bound to be some leeway, in terms of a difference as radical as the one you quote above obviously that would not be acceptable to us and would be given attention, but let's make sure we clarify:

If we talk about a difference in performance between the two network segments, vs a problem for the individual customer due to external influences these two issues have very different solutions.

So if you're still only getting half a loaf of bread today and we are looking at general reports, not just here, but in other channels as well of an improved situation then isn't it time that we took a close look at your situation in isolation and did some good old fashioned troubleshooting?

 

[Will@MWEB]

Well axxess ran very well last night, that problem before was a gaming ping problem which was the exchange but this is not an exchange problem, many people are saying in the last two weeks things have bad. Youtube is going awesome during the day so i dunno why at night it changes? I don't do anything but email and http during the day and it flies, after 5 or 6 well youtube is slow and browsing is slow.

Please drop me PM with your contact number and I'll discuss some options with you in terms of additional monitoring we can put in place on our side to try and help understand what's causing this.

 

[Lounger]

isn't it time that we took a close look at your situation in isolation and did some good old fashioned troubleshooting?

This seems to be the stock response, Will.

Half your customers are screaming that service is below par and you want to tell them to reboot individual routers for 30 mins (or is it 20 ) or blame telkom.

This is why people get upset.

 

[GhostriderTC]

So in effect I am paying R1000 a month for a 4MB to get the line speeds of a 384kb during the day and nothing is being done about it just because I live in Durban?