This was how a reader responded when Indian Express online carried a story on the dissemination of the findings of LIRNEasia’s broadband research at the GRT Grand Hotel convention centre in Chennai on November 3.

Another story in ‘The Hindu’ quoted Timothy Gonsalves PhD, Head of Computer Science and Engineering Department, IIT-Madras, our research partner from IIT Madras saying the implication [of the latency introduced by complex routing of network traffic] for consumers is that though a user may get close to the speeds advertised by the operator while accessing servers within India, the download speeds from an international server for even a supposedly fast broadband connection would only be in the 200 kbps range.

The event was attended by broadband operators, users and researchers. Helani Galpaya, Chanuka Wattegama and Timothy Gonsalves, PhD made presentations while Ashok Jhunjhunwala, PhD chaired the panel discussion.

Apart from the reported, the following were stories published by Indian, Sri Lanka and UK media.

“Broadband speed suffers most in accessing international servers” – The Hindu

Sri Lankan broadband users getting less: study – Lanka Business Online

South Asian broadband stuck in international bottleneck: study – Lanka Business Online

Developed countries getting better value from broadband – top 10 broadband

Sri Lanka’s broadband shows over advertising and under delivery – Sunday Times, Sri Lanka

Excerpt below:

“There is disparity in the advertised broadband speed and the actual speed, according to the findings of a research project jointly carried out by Learning Initiative on Reforms for Network Economies Asia (LIRNEasia), TeNeT Group of the IIT Madras.There is disparity in the advertised broadband speed and the actual speed, according to the findings of a research project jointly carried out by Learning Initiative on Reforms for Network Economies Asia (LIRNEasia), TeNeT Group of the IIT Madras.

“Prof Timothy A Gonsalves, professor and head of Computer Science and Engineering, IIT-M said the actual speed, measured using an open source-based software application named AT-Tester, showed that the advertised broadband speeds in the country can rarely help in selecting a broadband package.

“In the south Asian context, it is usual for the operators to advertise higher speed than they could offer. This has been observed in the testing done in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh,” he said.”

Download the presentations made by Helani Galpaya, Chanuka Wattegama and Timothy Gonsalves, PhD.

Then why AT-Tester? Why not LIRNEasia used one of these tools like the Oxford Business School did? Why LIRNEasia had to develop its own tool?

In this paper Timothy Gonsalves, PhD, who leads the development and research team at our partner organization IIT Madras attempts to answer these questions. The paper compares AT-Tester with three popular and eight relatively less known tools.

AT-Tester, originally developed only for Windows XP, the most widely used operating system then, now runs also on Windows Vista and Windows 7 platform

If you believe something, no evidence is necessary, they say, while if you don’t know evidence is adequate. So we are not surprised if users do not agree, but that is what evidence shows. Test results from Feb 2008 and Feb 2009 round shows a clear improvement, when accessing international servers. The broken lines are for 2008, the unbroken for 2009. SLT ADSL and Dialog WiMax were tested both times.

This was one of the ‘stories’ we presented at the Public Seminar ‘Broadband Quality War: Are you a Winner or a Loser?’ – jointly organized by LIRNEasia and IT sectional Committee of the Institution of Engineers. Prof. Timothy Gonsalves of IIT Madras, R. Thirumurthy of Midas Communication Technologies with representatives from Dialog and Mobitel joined me in making presentations.

Presentation by Timothy Gonsalves

Presentation by R. Thirumurthy

Presentation by Chanuka Wattegama

Presentation by Dialog Telekom

Watch this space for the other presentation slides.

(Click on image for a better view)

At a well attended public seminar yesterday (March 18) at Institution of Engineers (Sri Lanka), LIRNEasia released its Broadband QoSE testing methodology (named ‘AshokaTissa’, after the greatest collaboration between India and Sri Lanka, the movement of Buddhism across the Palk Strait) and the preliminary test results of three of the most widely used broadband packages in Sri Lanka, SLT Office (2 Mbps / 512 kbps), SLT Home (512 kbps / 128 kbps) and Dialog (2 Mbps / 512 kbps) This was followed by the responses from SLT and Dialog Broadband. The event was jointly organised by LIRNEasia and Institution of Engineers. (Sri Lanka)

Speeches/Presentations available for downloading:

Comments from the Chair – Rohan Samarajiva

Introduction to broadband and Test Methodology – Timothy Gonsalves

Preliminary QoSE test results – Chanuka Wattegama

Quality of Service Experience (QoSE) of broadband was a topic that has been discussed in LIRNEasia blog for sometime and we find many readers share the view of the Australian cartoonist who portrayed information superhighway to a modern car with cart wheels – the infrastructure.

LIRNEasia’s on-going QoSE benchmarking project aims to find the answer to the question, based on evidence not perceptions, whether the users actually get what has been advertised by the operators.

A seminar presenting preliminary results of Broadband QoSE measures, with the participation of Professor Timothy Gonsalves of IIT Madras (who headed the team that developed the methodology) will be held in Colombo on the 18th of March. This is an open event, but prior registration is recommended. (Tel: 011 267 1160, 077 763 6821; e-mail: kapugama[at]lirne[dot]net)

Here are more information about the event and broadband quality test plan for those who are interested.

Some previous discussions:

http://www.lirneasia.net/2006/05/100000-adsl-connections-how-about-speed

http://www.lirneasia.net/2007/11/unreal-broadband and

http://www.lirneasia.net/2008/01/india-takes-a-tough-call-on-broadband-why-not-others