Proxy/Cache complaint: SAIX,MTNBusiness

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fragtion

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Telkom (SAIX)'s network currently transparently forces all web traffic to pass through their proxy cache network. Now in theory, this should be a great feature because it allows commonly accessed static media to be 'cached' locally so that web browsing speeds are enhanced significantly for the end user, while international traffic costs for Telkom are reduced.
In reality however, being forced into SAIX's transparent proxy network does the complete opposite: I get downstream speeds no higher than 0.8Mbps - YouTube for example takes ages to buffer, and yet this is supposed to be broadband? Really, why am I paying for a 4Mbit line if must expect to see browsing speeds in the range of 0.5Mbps through a system that should be HELPING me utilize my line's full capacity?

I used to work around this problem by using my Verizon/MTN business account with their cache.uunet.co.za:3128 proxy, but that seems to have been completely switched off now for who knows what 'bright-spark' reason, and now mtnns accounts are pretty much just as useless for web browsing as SAIX's.

Am I the only one experiencing this headache?
...
Should we really be forced to use these transparent proxies which have been customized by Telkom to artificially SLOW DOWN our browsing? I'm seriously fed up.

Telkom: Seacom is here, time to optimize your distributed squid network and remove those delay pools that are keeping us all in the stone-age. Please allow us to actually experience the more broadband speeds our modems are actually syncing at?
 
fragtion_ said:
Telkom (SAIX)'s network currently transparently forces all web traffic to pass through their proxy cache network. Now in theory, this should be a great feature because it allows commonly accessed static media to be 'cached' locally so that web browsing speeds are enhanced significantly for the end user, while international traffic costs for Telkom are reduced.
In reality however, being forced into SAIX's transparent proxy network does the complete opposite: I get downstream speeds no higher than 0.8Mbps - YouTube for example takes ages to buffer, and yet this is supposed to be broadband? Really, why am I paying for a 4Mbit line if must expect to see browsing speeds in the range of 0.5Mbps through a system that should be HELPING me utilize my line's full capacity?

I used to work around this problem by using my Verizon/MTN business account with their cache.uunet.co.za:3128 proxy, but that seems to have been completely switched off now for who knows what 'bright-spark' reason, and now mtnns accounts are pretty much just as useless for web browsing as SAIX's.

Am I the only one experiencing this headache?
...
Should we really be forced to use these transparent proxies which have been customized by Telkom to artificially SLOW DOWN our browsing? I'm seriously fed up.

Telkom: Seacom is here, time to optimize your distributed squid network and remove those delay pools that are keeping us all in the stone-age. Please allow us to actually experience the more broadband speeds our modems are actually syncing at?
Click to expand...

I have real FAST youtube loading speeds and real fast web page loading speeds. How fast is your line, mine is 4mb a sec
 
Are you sure that it's not just SAIX's network (or, more specifically, their Internet transit links) that are causing this? Does your experience vary with time of day (and hence congestion)? Your comment about SEACOM may be closer to the truth than you think, since Telkom doesn't use it at all. If you're using Telkom Internet (or any other ISP using SAIX for transit), maybe it's just that the current capacity on SAT-3/SAFE (SAIX's capacity, not the whole cable) is saturating. YouTube traffic (amongst other things) has grown exponentially over the past year or so, so this wouldn't be all that surprising.

If you're not locked in, have you thought about using another ISP that doesn't use SAIX? Asking them when they're going to use SEACOM would probably be stirring, since they'd have to admit they're losing out to Neotel.
 
Here's the issue: when using SAIX's proxies, traffic to international sites is limited to around 512kbps. You're welcome to get a bandwidth monitor and test it yourself.
I have a 4Mbit line, and browsing on SAIX to international sites is never faster than that, when there's no reason why it shouldn't be at least just above 3Mbps.

Matthew: seeing everything is so dandy for you, can you do me this favour:
1. Set your browser proxy to cache.saix.net port 8080 (so that ALL web traffic goes through it, as normally only port 80 [standard browsing] would),
2. Go to www.speedtest.net and do a speed test to anywhere outside South Africa (UK/US..) using your telkom account, and please paste the results here.
Looking forward to the results from your speedy 4Mbit line. I can almost guarentee you won't get anything more than 1Mbps, when there's no reason why we should not be achieving at least 3.3Mbps.
 
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