Please suggest a low intl latency ADSL ISP

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Timber_MG

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Hi All

Which ADSL ISP provides the best latency and jitter to EU based servers? Afrihost is fairly consistent in the low 200ms range, but of late packet loss and jitter have caused problems. I spotted a brief period of latency in the 160s but it was accompanied by packet loss, so which ISPs can provide that level of latency to EU servers? It makes EU hosted VOIP a real option for me and would be great for the wife's gaming.

Are there test accounts available (capped) one could try? I would run my usual Afrihost capped for most day-day internet and route low latency things over this ISP, don't need much data, just good stable latency.

Thanks
 
Where are you situated?

I've noticed, that in Cape Town at least, there is very little difference between the major ISPs these days.

I've had good results with IS based accounts (e.g WebAfrica, Plugg) when it comes to line stability. I also have constant packet loss on my AH connection, it's been like that for ages now.
 
Timber_MG said:
Hi All

Which ADSL ISP provides the best latency and jitter to EU based servers? Afrihost is fairly consistent in the low 200ms range, but of late packet loss and jitter have caused problems. I spotted a brief period of latency in the 160s but it was accompanied by packet loss, so which ISPs can provide that level of latency to EU servers? It makes EU hosted VOIP a real option for me and would be great for the wife's gaming.

Are there test accounts available (capped) one could try? I would run my usual Afrihost capped for most day-day internet and route low latency things over this ISP, don't need much data, just good stable latency.

Thanks
Click to expand...

http://www.webafrica.co.za/home/adsl/
 
You're best bet is buying "premium"/unshpaed capped accounts.

Opinions vary on this front so I'd suggest buy a gig of each and decide for yourself.
 
I am in Pretoria East. Time to hook up that Mikrotik setup again with the router in bridge mode with a small buffer only.

I'll give the WA and IS accounts a go.
 
WA 1GB ordered, Cybersmart accounts contacted for a test account and let's see from there as otherwise it'd be a 2 month test. It appears as if they have a better offering than Afrihost atm for my usage pattern.

Cybersmart states contention of 5:1 on capped and 15:1 on uncapped, that is very interesting. I wonder how they calculate that (certainly not incorporating Telkom's distribution network). I wonder whether it's IPC capacity oversold or international capacity?
 
WA has around 13-15ms lower latency compared to Afrihost to EU servers and what appears to be less jitter on IS versus the MTN network. Interesting first result. Interested in what Cybersmart can offer.

Edit:

Doing a few more tests it seems like the jitter was a fluke. Perhaps a WA home pro account is better. will have to retest after hours.
 
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Cybersmart came through with a test account and their jitter seems very solid, though latency to EU servers is around 180-190ms end-end. They seem to transit with borwood and from Jhb to London seems to be a latency of around 165ms (add 10ms for my DSL to Jhb and 10-30ms for the other side). Surprisingly German and UK servers have very similar latency.
 
Unfortunately the Cybersmart test account isn't performing with packet loss causing glitching, actually worse than Afrihost atm. The WA/IS account is running well sofar.
 
Timber_MG said:
Unfortunately the Cybersmart test account isn't performing with packet loss causing glitching, actually worse than Afrihost atm. The WA/IS account is running well sofar.
Click to expand...

I am guessing that Cybersmart is getting their international sorted out with a large upgrade which is currently being installed - read the Crystal Web thread, they are running on the Cybersmart backbone for their current ADSL accounts. They expect installation to be finished any time now.
 
They gave me an uncapped account first but I asked them to change that to a capped account. Latencies were fairly similar but jitter was a bit lower on the capped when I tested this afternoon. Packet loss is a bit out of hand, so let's see.

The lowest latency I've yet seen was a brief period on Afrihost when I got pings in the 160s, but that came with jitter and packet loss. Still wonder how that happened.
 
So I compared some accounts on WA, Afrihost and Cybersmart and for low latency from my testing WA currently comes out tops for low latency, jitter for low throughput applications like gaming and VOIP. Afrihost isn't bad if it weren't for the packet loss of late. Cybersmart had some issues too, I believe they are amidst an upgrade.
 
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