Ping Test

[888]

My ping test is -1. What should it be and how can it be improved? Every thing is really slow (broadband -1) Layman’s terms please!.

[Old_Geezer]

Ping usually comes back with a time to reply receipt. Unsure what -1 means, but I'd hazard a guess it's a timeout/no response.

[JimF]

"My ping test is -1"

I'm afraid that is meaningless. How can you have a ping test? What do you actually mean?

[Gizmonster]

I'm also curious as to how you can get a ping of -1. The result is usually in milliseconds.
Are you sure you've read it correctly??

[JimF]

Exactly. E.g.

C:\Users\Jim>ping theanswerbank.co.uk

Pinging theanswerbank.co.uk [64.237.61.68] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 64.237.61.68: bytes=32 time=110ms TTL=49
Reply from 64.237.61.68: bytes=32 time=109ms TTL=51
Reply from 64.237.61.68: bytes=32 time=107ms TTL=51
Reply from 64.237.61.68: bytes=32 time=117ms TTL=50

Ping statistics for 64.237.61.68:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 107ms, Maximum = 117ms, Average = 110ms

C:\Users\Jim>

[Buenchico]

As has been said, a ping response time is measured in milliseconds, so the lower the figure the better but it can't be negative (because that would mean that the remote server had responded to your request before you'd even sent it!)

I've just got a result of 16ms for a ping test, which is reasonable enough, but ping times don't really matter much anyway unless you're into online video games (where a fast response to your commands is important).

A decent download speed is much, much more important. Here's a (very) rough guide to download speeds:

2 Mbps : The absolute minimum required to use video streaming services, such as Youtube and BBC iPlayer.

5 MBps : Probably better (i.e. more reliable) for video streaming. 5 MBps is around the top speed you'll get through copper wires using an 'ADSL Max' service (which is the basic service that BT Openreach wholesales to ISPs).

10 MBps : Around the top speed you can get through copper cables when an 'ADSL 2+' service is used. (ADSL 2+ effectively gives a user two connections at the exchange, thus doubling download speeds, but usually costs more than ADSL Max).

30 MBps: Around the lowest speed offered by budget services using fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) services.

80 MBps : Around the highest speed experienced by users of FTTC services.

500 MBps : A typical speed for users of FTTP (fibre-to-the-premises) services.

Home users who live alone, and who don't need to download big files (such as movies), only need 5 Mbps to 10 Mbps. (They won't notice much improvement through higher speeds). However a big family, with several teenagers all streaming video content at once, while Mum downloads her favourite movie and Dad is playing online video games, will benefit from much higher download speeds.

Test your download speed here:
https://www.speedtest.net/

[Peter Pedant]

hey chris there is someone who needs your help on Law - final accounts

ping is -1 - - this is the value for TRUE innit or FALSE
so it cd make sense

[888]

Thanks for your help. I’ll have to get back with this. EE broadband says all’s ok at their end and last time BT came to check the landline they said it was ok if we unplugged the extra phone, which solved it for a while. The broadband speed is now 0.02 (yes, really!) Any thoughts?