lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA
3 edits | Comcast is throttling FTP uploads
Split from this topic --> »Comcast Bandwidth Abuse/Limits - Discuss here only
~sorto'
I have no Torrent clients or other file-sharing software.
I do have a consulting business that require me to create reports that are often very large (15 to 40 MB) .PDFs.
Because the size is too large for email attachments, I upload the reports to one of my web servers via FTP or SSH depending upon the file, the server and the confidentiality required.
Both with my Business Comcast account and my home account, I have seen Comcast throttle uploads (and sometimes downloads).
With my FTP client, I can see the upload begin where it should: at 1 to 1.3Mbps ... a few seconds, it will gradually begin to drop ... to 800K, then 500K and after 30 seconds to a minute, it will stabilize somewhere between 150K and 300K.
A few minutes ago, it took me 25 minutes to upload a 23MB file ... Hmmm, 1Mbits/MINUTE!
So, they're actually giving me 1/60 of the bandwidth that they are charging me for. I smell lawsuit.
In general, the larger the file, the slower the upload. Files less than 10MB tend to have less throttling, and those below 5MB usually have none.
The throttling does not seem to discriminate among different file types. (.exe, .avi, .jpg, .pdf etc)
Traceroutes to my servers (one hosted less than 5 miles away and other in Ohio) show the first hop beyond the router is asterisked out and times out. I assume the throttling begins at that node.
These are hosted servers, with no throttling, giant bandwidth and I'm paying for massive gigabytes of throughputs.
I've prepared a video of the throttling using Camtasia and will be producing a YouTube video of the sordid mess. |
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hobgoblin
Sortof Agoblin
Premium
join:2001-11-25
Orchard Park, NY
clubs: | Re: Comcast Bandwidth Abuse/Limits - Discuss here only
The CMTS is the first hop. In almost all cases it does not respond to a ping.
I dont believe you have any grounds for a lawsuit, but good luck. |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA
| well, it's a contractual sort of thing. They promise one thing and they deliver another. The data is very clear that the bandwidth is there and they're throttling it ... They've also made representations that prompted me to rely on those representations ... to the detriment of my business.
Those both fall into tort category which does offer me grounds.
I will probably bring this in Small Claims court which evens the playing field. Sure it limits me to $7,500 PER INFRACTION but that's better than allowing them to escape entirely.
Plus there are class action lawsuits already filed.
And I don't think they -- or the FCC and the FTC -- will be happy with the suit or the YouTube video. |
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hobgoblin
Sortof Agoblin
Premium
join:2001-11-25
Orchard Park, NY
clubs:
| I think your wrong. I believe their TOS say "Up To" ands make all sorts of disclaimers.
and you have offered no proof of anything actually.
But good luck anyway
--
"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
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funchords
Hello
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
 ·Verizon Online DSL
 ·Skype
1 edit | reply to lperdue
lperdue,
On the Comcast Business 8Mbps/1Mbps plan, your subscribed upload speeds should result in throughput of about 125 KB/s (minus some protocol overhead). Please remember that 125 KB/s = 1 Mbps. Having been with Comcast for a long time, I know that they do overprovision their modems, so I'm not surprised that you settle out at over 150 KB/s.
The reason that you get a boost up to 1 MB/s upload (8 Mbps upload) for a while is a feature called PowerBoost.
HTH
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
"We don't throttle any traffic," -Charlie Douglas, Comcast spokesman, on this report. |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA | I'm sorry. I made a decimal error.
Upload speeds are settling out between 15 and 30Kbps.
I'd be happy to share the logs and video of this. |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA
| Here's a little screen capture (78K) that shows the upload thruput from a session about an hour ago:
»www.ideaworx.com/comcast-benchma···1108.jpg |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA
| reply to hobgoblin
Hobgoblin: I'll be posting the video of a dozen sessions showing the throttling in action. Just got to find time to edit down for YouTube length.
And "Up to" legally must approximate the touted speeds, otherwise it becomes false and deceptive advertising.
15 or 2OK is a loooooong way from 150K.
And I've never even seen CLOSE to the "up to" except for the first few seconds of a transfer before the throttling chokes it back by 90% |
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hobgoblin
Sortof Agoblin
Premium
join:2001-11-25
Orchard Park, NY
clubs: | So what actual PROOF do you have?
Hob |
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funchords
Hello
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
·Verizon Online DSL
·Skype
| reply to lperdue
Okay - I looked at the JPG. Let's see if we can strengthen it. This won't get you to "proof," but it does make for better evidence.
1. Can you demonstrate that the destination server can accept uploads at that speed?
2. You said before that you have both home and business accounts. Which account involves this JPG -- more importantly, what are its purchased speeds? Does it include PowerBoost uploads? (note. If it does include Powerboost uploads, this would explain why the speed falls off from the starting higher speed. Now the concern becomes why are both speeds so low?)
3. On that computer, have you performed the "tweaks" test here at DSLReports with a clean result?
4. Is it possible to take the same computer, files, etc.. to a non-Comcast connection and repeat the test in order to compare the results?
5. Have you exhausted the Tech Support resource such that they're sure there isn't a technical problem?
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
"We don't throttle any traffic," -Charlie Douglas, Comcast spokesman, on this report. |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA
| Sorry to be gone so long ... had to make dinner ... Fettucini with linguica, sun dried tomatoes and a lot of garlic..
Anyway, while I was cooking, I uploaded the following which shows the raw video of the throttling process:
»ideaworx.com/home-comcast-030508···pets.avi
It needs editing (as I said previously) and has about a dozen sessions. The first is like 3 minutes ... the rest are closer to 30 sec.
What they show (look in the lower, right hand corner under "speed") is the transfer starting at the higher speed and then dropping shortly afterwards.
I have another .avi on my office computer that shows the same pattern.
I've had Comcast to both locations three times. The last time I called they said they would charge me $19.95 to have someone come out.
I have performed the tweaks test. I'm good on that.
Both my hosting services are pissed and will give me an affidavit on the minimum 12 Mbits/sec I can have if I can get that connection.
I do not have a way to test on a non-comcast connection. Wish I did. |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA
| The following will answer questions about the company that hosts my main web servers:
»www.completeweb.net/article.php?9.0
»www.completeweb.net/article.php?8.0
Note that the minimum is 5 Mbps ... I pay for more than the minimum. |
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hobgoblin
Sortof Agoblin
Premium
join:2001-11-25
Orchard Park, NY
clubs: | "Note that the minimum is 5 Mbps ... I pay for more than the minimum."
I am assuming that is download. |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA | both ways. and that's bare minimum. That's to and from my server. |
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hobgoblin
Sortof Agoblin
Premium
join:2001-11-25
Orchard Park, NY
clubs: | So for proof....
We need to see something uploading at that speed. |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA
| Yeah, which means I need a connection other than comcast.
If you or anyone else has a suggestion on how I might get that, then I am all ears.
I don't need an upload at my paid-for server speed. I just need something better than 17 Kbps from Comcast.
The .avi clearly shows the throttling, the higher speed connection and the down grading over time.
The hosting service will be providing the affidavit regarding the bandwidth for the law suit. |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA | I'm offline for tonight. My day begins at 4:30 am. |
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funchords
Hello
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-11
Washington, DC
·Verizon Online DSL
·Skype
| reply to lperdue
said by lperdue  :Yeah, which means I need a connection other than comcast. If you or anyone else has a suggestion on how I might get that, then I am all ears. There are several companies that sell VPN services. Most are marketed to travelers who frequently use hotspots in public places. One is called www.hotspotvpn.com -- which I only mention because it comes up first in Google when I search on those two terms. You might also search the terms anonymous VPN -- since Comcast et. al. has declared war on some of its users, such services have become popular.
If Comcast is having undue influence on FTP uploads, a VPN will keep them from being able to detect the protocol you are using.
I would also like to suggest that you hit the "hey mods" button and perhaps get this Topic broken out for some additional opinions. I looked at your recording and I can't explain what I'm seeing. It's not PowerBoost (that would stay high for a while, then drop abruptly -- your speed slows very gradually by comparison. It isn't related to abuse/limits/caps. By sticking it in here, I'm afraid that you're limiting its exposure and people who could help are not seeing it.
--
Robb Topolski -= funchords.com =- Hillsboro, Oregon
"We don't throttle any traffic," -Charlie Douglas, Comcast spokesman, on this report. |
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kelso
join:2007-04-06
Ashburn, VA
2 edits | reply to lperdue
Re: Comcast is throttling FTP uploads
said by lperdue :I upload the reports to one of my web servers via FTP or SSH depending upon the file, the server and the confidentiality required. --clip-- With my FTP client, I can see the upload begin where it should: at 1 to 1.3Mbps ... a few seconds, it will gradually begin to drop ... to 800K, then 500K and after 30 seconds to a minute, it will stabilize somewhere between 150K and 300K. From reading your first post, it appears that you can upload your files using SFTP (SSH file transfer).
Does both the SFTP and FTP get throttled or only FTP ?
SSH or SFTP is known as the poor man's VPN. Comcast will not know what you are doing with the SSH connection.
You could, for example, try downloading a file before uploading using the same session and see if that makes a difference with the throttling.
edit: Security statement: I would use SFTP over FTP when given a choice because your account login information (and password) is sent in the clear when using FTP. Not so with SFTP.
edit2: As a point of reference, I went to a local Panera (free WiFi) and used SFTP (on port 443) to transfer a large file to my laptop from my home Comcast machine. It uploaded the file at a fairly constant 175k Byte/second (I have blast 16/2 service. The port 443 is how I have my home sshd daemon set up. So, client sftp is "sftp -o port=443 name@xx.xx.xx.xx". |
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lperdue
join:2008-03-11
Sonoma, CA
| After raising hell on this DSLReports forum yesterday, a near-miracle happened sometime while I was sleeping.
This morning, I'm getting uploads at about 300 Kbps (.3 Mbps) at both home and office. FTP and SSH are the same.
The bandwidth is also no longer showing the gradual throttling back of the bandwidth shown in the video.
While this upload speed is less than half the bandwidth I'm paying for at home and 1/5 of what I'm supposed to get at the office, it is a surprising improvement.
I must assume that someone from Comcast monitors this.
Yes, I do understand that Comcast hides behind a speed limit technicality that amounts to "up to what we tout so loudly in our advertising."
However, "up to" should not mean, "never will get there."
Approaching the touted bandwidth does not mean _never_ getting past 20 to 50% of what the customer has been led to expect and what the customer is paying for.
That, folks, is false and deceptive advertising.
So, as of this morning, I _still_ have a crappy connection. But,nevertheless, it's better than the sluggish, near-dial-up speeds that crippled me for the past weeks.
It still fails to deliver anything close to promised and that's a contractual violation.
Stay tuned.
I'm still headed for court so a judge can decide what "up to" reasonably means in a court of law. |
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