[selowitch]

I know it's possible to test the overall speed of one's Internet connection (at broadbandreports.com and many other places), but I'd like to test certain local aspects of my setup, e.g., whether I'm getting any extra speed from switching to an optimized build of Camino or by updating my router's firmware. I know I can do some things with ping, but how do I interpret and compare those results in an intelligent way?

[ghporter]

Measuring the effectiveness of one build of a browser over another would require timing page loading and such, which may be doable but not terribly simply. The two metrics for browsers that come to mind immediately would be page load time and cache loading/usage, neither of which lends itself to ease of measurement.

But there are other, general network metrics that are easy to interpret, and even very easy to measure. Using Speedtest.net's speed measurement tool gets you raw upload and download rates along with ping times. Those two speeds tell you how well your connection between your router and the rest of the world is working. Using "before/after" measurements at about the same time of day to the same distant end will show you whether your firmware update and all the tweaks you did to the router's settings were helpful. Ping time reflects latency, which simply says how long it takes between your computer sending out a request for something to come back. You have no control over this because it's a function of your physical connection and how the ISP is working, but it's useful to know your typical ping time to a particular locale because that helps you judge if something is behaving oddly or not.

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[selowitch]

Originally Posted by ghporter 

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Very. I figured it would be you who would have something to say on this topic. Thanks!

[selowitch]

Here are my results (using conventional DSL):

[Cold Warrior]

That's an expected result with DSL. 3Mb down, <1Mb up, low latency. Not bad, and it's what I get at home.

[ghporter]

Your contract is proably for "up to 3,000kbps downloads" and "up to 600kbps uploads." Your ping is pretty good for a 50 mile hop-unless your target was actually on your ISP. I get around that for a similar distance.