DSL vs Fiber Speed Difference?

[Code.016]

Hi guys. I got a call from my ISP that our 5 year old DSL connection will be upgraded to fiber plan. Our current connection is 2 mbps (1.8mpbs max), which is servicing our 5 mobile devices plus my PC. the upgrade that was given to us is 5mpbs fiber connection, which can be upgraded if i want to. I choose 5mpbs fiber plan as i'm not sure if will it be enough for our daily use. I'm planning to set-up a QOS if needed, since the games im playing doesn't require that much of internet, and i just want to make sure that my session will be uninterruptible if my little nephew decides to watch a cartoon series in youtube.

 

Now my question is, if there is any difference between 5mpbs using DLS, vs 5mpbs fiber? (i used 5 instead of 2 just for comparison)

 

Thank you in advance!

[Arrexis]

So just to clarify, the 2 and 5 Mbps were just for comparison sake and is not the speeds offered by your provider?

 

Technically there will be no significant difference in the speed they provide you, 5 Megabit is 5 Megabit. But fiber tends to have lower latency (ping/ms) and depending on your provider, better uptime/stability.

Having a fiber line is a good thing, since it can supply vastly better speeds than DSL is capable of, and has better options of increasing your speed.

Another thing to note, DSL is often asyncronous, meaning that your download speed is different than your upload. With fiber these speeds are often the same up and down.

[Spotty]

19 minutes ago, Code.016 said:

Now my question is, if there is any difference between 5mpbs using DLS, vs 5mpbs fiber? (i used 5 instead of 2 just for comparison)

Latency. Even though they might have the same download speed, the fibre connection will typically have a better ping - something that is generally noticeable in gaming.
Also Fibre offers a lot more future upgrade potential, with fibre connections capable of delivering multiple gigabit speeds (if the infrastructure is in place and services offered by your provider).

Is there any difference in monthly cost or download quota (if your provider has limited download quotas)?

[Jarsky]

DSL has an encoding latency of about 10ms....since your DSL is so slow most likely its a fairly long copper run or theres just a lot of noise on it, which means its probably interleaved and so would have an interleaving latency of about 25ms....with Fiber you're essentially eliminating all of that, so your latency could drop as much as 20ms+

 

I'm surprised your ISP is offering you such slow Fiber....I hope its cheap? That speed doesn't even exist in my country because at a point theres just no cost saving in offering such a slow plan. Our lowest plans are 100Mbit, so any fiber connection is 4K streaming video ready. 

[Code.016]

33 minutes ago, Arrexis said:

So just to clarify, the 2 and 5 Mbps were just for comparison sake and is not the speeds offered by your provider?

 

Technically there will be no significant difference in the speed they provide you, 5 Megabit is 5 Megabit. But fiber tends to have lower latency (ping/ms) and depending on your provider, better uptime/stability.

Having a fiber line is a good thing, since it can supply vastly better speeds than DSL is capable of, and has better options of increasing your speed.

Another thing to note, DSL is often asyncronous, meaning that your download speed is different than your upload. With fiber these speeds are often the same up and down.

Thanks for the feedback! I never thought of the latency part. for the asyncronous thing, my current plan has more download than upload, which is succ because i can't upload any videos of my gameplay to my friends. i'll see this weekend when they already installed it. thanks!

[Code.016]

25 minutes ago, Spotty said:

Latency. Even though they might have the same download speed, the fibre connection will typically have a better ping - something that is generally noticeable in gaming.
Also Fibre offers a lot more future upgrade potential, with fibre connections capable of delivering multiple gigabit speeds (if the infrastructure is in place and services offered by your provider).

Is there any difference in monthly cost or download quota (if your provider has limited download quotas)?

my current plan is unlimited DSL, and the upgrade that they offer is also unlimited, which is good to me as i usually download game updates like 5gb. for cost, it's like i'm just adding like 3% on my monthly plan (900 PHP DSL to 1699 PHP Fiber). its not that costy for me as 5mbps might be enough for us.

 

For the upgrade plan, i might ask it if the connection is stable on our location.

 

thank you for your answer!

 

*PHP = Philippine Peso

[Code.016]

12 minutes ago, Jarsky said:

DSL has an encoding latency of about 10ms....since your DSL is so slow most likely its a fairly long copper run or theres just a lot of noise on it, which means its probably interleaved and so would have an interleaving latency of about 25ms....with Fiber you're essentially eliminating all of that, so your latency could drop as much as 20ms+

 

I'm surprised your ISP is offering you such slow Fiber....I hope its cheap? That speed doesn't even exist in my country because at a point theres just no cost saving in offering such a slow plan. Our lowest plans are 100Mbit, so any fiber connection is 4K streaming video ready. 

hek.. 100Mbit is like 200% more costy here in my country. we have this ISP called Converge, that offers 25mbps fiber, at the same cost of the 5mbps that the ISP called me earlier. but the problem is, Converge has limited on servicing locations and they haven't reached on our place. so i have no other option but to grab that 5mbps.

 

For the latency part, i havent tested yet my current plan for it's latency. how do i check that? cause sometimes when i play games like The Division and The Division 2, i usually got unstable connection to server if im with any players outside Asia. its understandable, but i dont have any ways to test why it is happening. Same with Destiny 2, which is the only game that maxes out my 2mbps, with .5mpbs upload speed. lol.

[Jarsky]

4 minutes ago, Code.016 said:

hek.. 100Mbit is like 200% more costy here in my country. we have this ISP called Converge, that offers 25mbps fiber, at the same cost of the 5mbps that the ISP called me earlier. but the problem is, Converge has limited on servicing locations and they haven't reached on our place. so i have no other option but to grab that 5mbps.

Here in NZ our 100Mbit is about $70/month, ranging up to 1Gbit which is about $120/month

 

4 minutes ago, Code.016 said:

 

For the latency part, i havent tested yet my current plan for it's latency. how do i check that? cause sometimes when i play games like The Division and The Division 2, i usually got unstable connection to server if im with any players outside Asia. its understandable, but i dont have any ways to test why it is happening. Same with Destiny 2, which is the only game that maxes out my 2mbps, with .5mpbs upload speed. lol.

 

Best thing is if your ISP has a speedtest server, you can test latency to there. Most ISP's their dns servers respond to ping, so you could try a ping test to their DNS server IP...basically thats a test from your modem to your ISP's core. 

 

 

[Code.016]

14 minutes ago, Jarsky said:

Here in NZ our 100Mbit is about $70/month, ranging up to 1Gbit which is about $120/month

 

 

Best thing is if your ISP has a speedtest server, you can test latency to there. Most ISP's their dns servers respond to ping, so you could try a ping test to their DNS server IP...basically thats a test from your modem to your ISP's core. 

 

 

welp, time to move to NZ. haha.. 

 

thanks for the tip! i'll check if my current ISP is capable on doing that. thank you!

[Arrexis]

Regardless of the ping, I would grab the fiber connection. Not only is it going to offer better speeds and most likely stability, but it will also open you up to speed upgrades in the future (if your provider wants to).
Heres to hoping they stop their bullshit and start offering actual speeds.

Oh you mentioned QOS, contact the fiber ISP and ask them if the SOHO-router they supply will offer QOS. If not, I would reccomend you aquire your own router with QOS if the ISP allows that.
In fact, I recommend using a non-ISP provided router to everyone, since the ISP provided ones are very often underpowered and lacking features. If you must use an ISP provided router/multimodem, see if you can put it in bridge mode and use your own router.

[dalekphalm]

I'm guessing this isn't true FTTH/P (Fibre to the Home/Premises), given the low speeds and existing DSL infrastructure. Of course, I could be wrong, but I suspect it'll be VDSL FTTN/C (Fibre to the Node/Neighbourhood/Cabinet). FTTN means that it's a fibre run from their exchange to the local node (usually a large-ish industrial looking box on the ground outside a neighbourhood, but the specifics can vary). From the node, the "last mile" (the cable between the node and your home) is the same copper DSL cable from before.

 

VDSL is still way better than DSL though, so any improvement is a good improvement.

[Code.016]

20 hours ago, Arrexis said:

Regardless of the ping, I would grab the fiber connection. Not only is it going to offer better speeds and most likely stability, but it will also open you up to speed upgrades in the future (if your provider wants to).
Heres to hoping they stop their bullshit and start offering actual speeds.

Oh you mentioned QOS, contact the fiber ISP and ask them if the SOHO-router they supply will offer QOS. If not, I would reccomend you aquire your own router with QOS if the ISP allows that.
In fact, I recommend using a non-ISP provided router to everyone, since the ISP provided ones are very often underpowered and lacking features. If you must use an ISP provided router/multimodem, see if you can put it in bridge mode and use your own router.

I already have another router with QOS. the one that i got from my provider does have one, but its too much detailed and i'll just waste my time setting it up. I also got that router (with QOS) free, as it was given to my by my neighbor. 

 

thanks for the comment! I REAALY hope that ISP one day will offer what exactly they are advertising, and not with the 80% reliability BS.

[Alex Atkin UK]

15 hours ago, Code.016 said:

I already have another router with QOS. the one that i got from my provider does have one, but its too much detailed and i'll just waste my time setting it up. I also got that router (with QOS) free, as it was given to my by my neighbor. 

 

thanks for the comment! I REAALY hope that ISP one day will offer what exactly they are advertising, and not with the 80% reliability BS.

If you mean a speed guarantee, its not likely to happen.  Home broadband is so much cheaper than leased lines BECAUSE its on shared links back to the ISP.

You'd have to pay a small fortune to get a speed guarantee as the telco needs to ensure they have enough capacity to achieve it.  That means having just one user on the same allocation of bandwidth that they might currently share with 50 customers.  (I don't think any telco/ISP discloses their contention ratios these days so I'm just using the old figure the UK used to use for DSL)

[mynameisjuan]

1 hour ago, Alex Atkin UK said:

If you mean a speed guarantee, its not likely to happen.  Home broadband is so much cheaper than leased lines BECAUSE its on shared links back to the ISP.

You'd have to pay a small fortune to get a speed guarantee as the telco needs to ensure they have enough capacity to achieve it.  That means having just one user on the same allocation of bandwidth that they might currently share with 50 customers.  (I don't think any telco/ISP discloses their contention ratios these days so I'm just using the old figure the UK used to use for DSL)

Most business plans are ran off the same equipment. Oversubscription is larger than it ever has been.

 

50 customers? Nah, I can throw 256 customers on one of my GPON blades with only a 10gig uplink.

[leadeater]

10 hours ago, mynameisjuan said:

Most business plans are ran off the same equipment. Oversubscription is larger than it ever has been.

 

50 customers? Nah, I can throw 256 customers on one of my GPON blades with only a 10gig uplink.

That's one of the great things about NZ, density is so low it's actually difficult to push up that ratio very high without just making it harder on the ISP itself. Both the optical split and node uplinks sit pretty low subscription wise unless it's the more dense areas in Auckland and Wellington. Of all the ISPs I've been on or had to help someone out with service quality and speed just doesn't drop, I'm glad the one and only thing we've (Gov) done right is great internet lol.

 

The old DSL network sucked major, so glad that horror is over.

 

@dalekphalm Yea I agree, must be FTTN VDSL as I can't see any point offering 5Mbps connections on a technology that operates at 2.5Gbps/1.25Gbps WDM.