John Linton
I was prompted by a comment on one of my recent musings about HSPA being a sensible replacement for wire line broadband as the download quotas became more realistically priced (from the user's point of view) and the 3G speeds became more widely avaialble (and HSPA connections didn't return to 56 kbps dial up speeds in so many places) to more thoroughly test 'pings' over the past two days.
As we drove progressively nearer London the HSPA speeds continued to increase even in the very rural locations we have stayed the night for the past three nights. At the moment I am showing I get a 3.6 mbps connection on my TMobile service and when I download from Australian sites I am getting around 1 mbps on downloads and 400 kbps on uploads.
Pings to Exetel's servers are around 400 ms as are pings to other Australian ISPs. Given the traces to all the Australian sites. As these pings are traveling around 20,000 kms (London via Los Angeles to Sydney) the ping results are quite good as can be seen from this trace:
Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.
C:\Documents and Settings\John Linton>tracert exetel.com.au
Tracing route to exetel.com.au [220.233.0.9]
over a maximum of 30 hops:
1 113 ms 100 ms 98 ms 172.18.51.98
2 107 ms 139 ms 119 ms 10.64.74.137
3 97 ms 109 ms 109 ms 10.111.227.217
4 107 ms 110 ms 139 ms 10.111.227.197
5 124 ms 118 ms 119 ms 10.111.227.133
6 103 ms 110 ms 120 ms 10.111.227.82
7 105 ms 130 ms 119 ms 10.111.227.6
8 105 ms 111 ms 149.254.195.194
9 112 ms 119 ms 109 ms 10.126.168.169
10 117 ms 109 ms 119 ms 193.159.226.21
11 233 ms 489 ms 249 ms 217.239.40.62
12 239 ms 249 ms 249 ms 62.156.128.126
13 249 ms 259 ms 239 ms ge-0-0-0-0.plapx-dr2.ix.singtel.com [203.208.149
.2]
14 263 ms 270 ms 259 ms ge-1-0-0-0.laxow-dr2.ix.singtel.com [203.208.149
.254]
15 402 ms 399 ms 399 ms 203.208.148.6
16 Request timed out.
17 * Request timed out.
18 384 ms 379 ms 380 ms EXETELPtyLtd.o2gsc76f03.optus.net.au [203.202.84
.66]
19 389 ms 389 ms 389 ms 33.2.233.220.exetel.com.au [220.233.2.33]
20 388 ms 389 ms 389 ms candlenut-web.exetel.com.au [220.233.0.9]
Trace complete.
As a good ping from a fast broadband service in Sydney to Los Angeles will seldom achieve better than 170 ms tto 200 ms, the additional distance (which is approximately the same) is comparable.
I don't have a WOW or other games set up on my laptop so I couldn't test actual player response times on any game either in the USA or in Australia but when I called TMobile technical support pretending I was having trouble with WOW they immediately tested the server I told them I was playing on and they said they had no reports from WOW users playing on any server having problems and their tests to the server I nominated showed no speed issues at all. So I apologised for wasting their time and hung up.
None of this means anything in terms of an Australian HSPA service that Exetel might provide in Australia (which we will obviously test in Australia over the next 4 - 6 weeks from various cities) but it does seem to indicate that there are no inherent problems in playing interactive games via an HSPA service. At least that's what it seems to me based on my extremely limited engineering abilities and knowledge.
I've now completed testing HSPA as a service in the UK and my conclusions are these:
1) As a traveler it is so much better and cheaper than the alternatives of internet cafes and hotel WIFI or Ethernet I wouldn't use anything else
2) For picking up email and web browsing and intranet access on a train or on a major highway it works fine
3) Once you move outside the 3G coverage areas you can expect dial up speeds or slightly better which is servicable but most internet cafes will provide a much faster service
4) It id almost certainly the 'only' service to use for a traveler.
5) As a wire line broadband replacement it is suitable in any area where you can get a strong 3G signal
For me, on this trip, it has been a life saver (or at least a bet saver) and as Exetel now progresses towards offering HSPA in Australia this has been a very valuable 'end user' look at what such a service may be able to deliver.
I'm looking forward to getting a few of our customers in Australia to test the HSPA service we will be offering in Australia when I get back in mid August.