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More Broadband for Your Buck

Are you getting all the ISP you pay for? Here's how to make the most of your connection, and what to do if it's time to switch providers.

By Scott Spanbauer, PCW Print   

Test Your Broadband Speed

How fast is your connection, really? That depends. Your PC and the ISP that connects it to the Internet are only part of the route that data travels between here and there. Broadband analyst John Navas says that hand-timed tests provide the best measure of your broadband performance, but you can still get a good thumbnail sketch of your connection speed by collecting the results of automatic tests from different sources. Always run a test from the location closest to your home.

Broadband provider Speakeasy.net can test your download speed from any of the company's locations in major cities nationwide. DSLReports tests both downstream and upstream speeds between your PC and one of two sites in California. And PCWorld.com's own Tools page offers partner PC Pitstop's Internet speed test from servers in California. Run each of the tests multiple times at different times of day, and average the results. For more links to sites where you can run speed tests and make speed tweaks to your PC, peruse Eric Arnold's great big list of bandwidth testing sites.

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