Speeding up File Transfers

[Derek Neighbors]

> I just got signed up to Sprint Broadband internet service here under the
> impression I could get high download speeds near 100KBPS.  Unfortunately,
> I am only getting transfers in the mid twenty's on a good day.  A test at
> their demo FTP site yielded much higher results but I noticed their test
> file was a nulls.  I'll bet the fact the file is all the same character
> might result in "on the fly" data compression.

A few things I have learned about sprint.

a. Depending on where you are at depends on service quality.  Im in
Gilbert for 3 months speeds where horrendous.  They were 'reworking' the
network to accomodate for growth.  Since then I have seen as high as 7 or
8Mbps down and average well over 4Mbps down.

b. They use some sort of 'burstable' technology that allows them to get
greater speeds however I have found some protocols dont do very well with
this, however ftp was not one of them.  They figure most people do http
which is stateless so bursting will be transparent.

c. Their uplink speed is worse than a 33k modem.  My average uplink speed
is around 29k.  I called to complain and was told this was 'better than
average'.  So uploading things or sending out large email attachments will
kill you. :(

> Does anyone here have any ideas?  It's better than dial-up but still far
> short of expectations.

It is better than dial up and since no ISP charge or phone line needed at
40 a month its same price as phone line plus ISP (roughly).  However the
quality of service leaves a lot to be desired.  If you call them ofr
anything expect a 1 hour MINIMUM wait time.

Derek