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In a previously related post. I detailed my "journey" into the getting no broadband anymore. iBurst's service is still degraded.
Due to all the download issues and retries I eventually exhausted my 5GB-bundle and my 3.5GB top-up and was forced to topup by another 3.5GB last week to just make it through the month and be able to work. The 5GB are generally sufficient, but the last 30 days I spent downloading the same 120MB (non-resumeable) file 13(!!!) times as iBurst disconnected the network and download-speeds had been below 200kbps (this is KiloBits, which is 25KB/sec --- compare that to 400KB/sec on ADSL or 250KB/sec on 3G).
The call-centre will find any excuse (check your MTU settings, have you rebooted your computer, did you install the latest Windows service-pack) for not helping you. They will then also send you to their own speedtest site, which shows a sugary-picture:
It's just a pity, that I never download anything from iBurst's website and a real-life scenario shows a picture like this:
Yes, most downloads, news etc originate from US and Europe, and this is where iBurst does not deliver broadband. Before we blame it on international traffic being congested, how come that ADSL- or 3G-users don't have this problem. Clearly points out that iBurst is in trouble.
The recent site visit from the iBurst engineer, also did not prove an issue on my end of the wireless internetlessness. My signal quality is 100%, no frame-errors, perfect throughput on modem and router, but still speed issues.
During a further Speedtest this morning I noticed a brief improvement of speed (lasted between 6:00-6:30 and fluctuated between 300-500kbps) - after 6:30am however it was back to the previous state. Also still experiencing the same disconnects and fluctuation in speed.
iBurst speedtest: Upload 464kpbs / Download 138kpbs
Speedtest – Johannesburg: Upload 509kpbs / Download 253kpbs
Speedtest – Capetown: Upload 362kpbs / Download 123kpbs
Speedtest – NY: Upload 272kpbs / Download 92kpbs
You will notice, that the further you get away from your connected location the more speed drops. In contrast, this is not the case with other connection types. Hell, even pairing my Nokia N95 via Bluetooth on 3G is faster than iBurst. Still waiting for a resolution, as the problem is currently looked at by the network team. It has been confirmed during the site-survey, that the issue is not on my end though!
Update 2009-01-01: I had cancelled iBurst with 1st December 2008 and have been on ADSL (4mb) since November. iBurst did not really care addressing the problem and customer service is just horrible. Moving over to ADSL (via Webafrica) is the best thing I could have done. Downloads are coming in at 400KB/sec - not comparable to the 40KB/sec on iBurst.
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on my Sharp WX-T92 (which is a premium
Japanese based SoftBank phone, just released for the TW
market) I get very lousy transfer rates, much slower than iBurst. I get 114KB/sec on iBurst when running 2-3 concurrent connections (multithreaded downloads) from US, Japanese and European servers.