Codetel throttling

Adrian Bye

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Jul 7, 2002
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Having dinner with Robert last week he mentioned a fascinating thing: he has noticed that Codetel is throttling its internet connectivity for sites like youtube, facebook, gmail, wikipedia, etc. He realised since he is comparing it directly beside Tricom's internet which has no throttling.

I initially thought this was crazy, but as I've been looking at the download speeds since I see many things don't make sense. I have a 5mb/s codetel internet connection - among the fastest DSL connections you can possibly get in this country. My internet is faster than a lot of people's internet connections in the USA.

And yet I can't play a full youtube video without pausing it to allow it to buffer, wikipedia is slow to download big pictures and facebook has to keep buffering its photos.

I don't really know what to say about this other than I will most likely downgrade my codetel connection and am probably going to test out tricom as well in case it is worth dropping codetel.

Any thoughts or comments?
 

jrhartley

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Sep 10, 2008
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no problem with u tube here unless Im doing three other things at once ,such as downloading stuff and typing stuff on here
 

Chirimoya

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Dec 9, 2002
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Please stick to the topic - the abusive post was deleted and there is no point in referring to it.
 

Robert

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Jan 2, 1999
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Update on our Codetel issue.

Had a techie on our office on Tuesday that appeared to know what's what.

Spent 30 mins in our office on the phone, logged into or modem via his laptop, talking to the office etc. We now have Gmail, YouTube etc without problems and see a much faster connection.

He changed our Cisco 800 MTU (Maximum Transmission Unit ) settings, plus a bunch of other stuff. Also changed the switch we was on at Codetel.

My guess is they are throttling accounts and unless they scream and shout, leave them throttled.
 

Tor

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Jan 1, 2002
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Can anybody explain a bit about this throttle thing.
I have internet through Delancer cable in Sosua, and recently upgraded the speed to 1mb. The speedtest the want me to use
Comcast-SA Internet & VoIP over CATV - Home
shows me that I get that, but still have some problems watching television and videos without buffering. In fact I haven't noticed any improvement at all from when I paid for 512 KB.
 

Adrian Bye

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Jul 7, 2002
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i'm still seeing these disconnects, although they are a lot less frequent now. i will try out tricom and see if it is more reliable.
 

Robert

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Jan 2, 1999
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i'm still seeing these disconnects, although they are a lot less frequent now. i will try out tricom and see if it is more reliable.

When Codetel works, they are the best. It's the support that's lacking.

By all means try Tricom, but I would thoroughly test it before cutting Codetel.
 
Mar 2, 2008
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"Can anybody explain a bit about this throttle thing."

If I'm not mistaken it has to do with (in non techie terms) the IP decreasing the speed or volume of data for selected sites that require the transfer large amounts of data in order to decrease the overall demand for band-width.

This, in theory, allows the sites requiring lesser amounts of band-width to have equal potential. Of course, it really just allows an inadaquete infrastruture to remain up and running when otherwise it might be over-loaded.

I think that is what Robert is referring to, but I could be wrong.
 

Chirimoya

Well-known member
Dec 9, 2002
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And what is the equivalent term in Spanish, or do they say "throttling"? Doesn't exactly roll smoothly off the tongue in Spanish.
 

ExtremeR

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Mar 22, 2006
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In Spanish we call it, Calidad de Servicio or Control de Ancho de Banda, it is QoS (Quality of Service) equipments that they use to control the bandwidth of certain applications and protocols, for example Codetel has 2 kinds of equipments, Packeteer and Allot Communications for the QoS, Tricom does throttle but only P2P applications (Limeware, Utorrent) in a base of 25Kbps per download and a max of 50Kbps total, I know that information by first hand, that way they can offer real bandwidth for browsing activity, remember when Tricom started the campaign of "Banda Ancha Real"? That's was when they started to applicate QoS to certain kind of data. And they only applicate QoS to Home users, business users are untouched.

Now with Codetel the thing is really serious because they seem to throttle every aspect of the connection, including browsing, Live Messenger files transfer, Youtube, and P2P is almost nonexistent when using Codetel. And the worst thing it seems that they control bandwidth in business users who have special needs in their connections (may set up a local Web page, or a SMTP Server) and that is a real offense in their part assuming the huge rates that they charge for that service. I think Indotel will have to take a look into those irregularities that Codetel is applying since they changed owners.
 

Adrian Bye

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Jul 7, 2002
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Yeah, sorry for not explaining throttling. Basically it means you might have a connection of 1.5mb/s, and for most sites that is the speed you get. But Codetel has had a problem with some very high bandwidth sites like youtube and facebook. So for those sites they intentionally reduce your velocity from 1.5mb/s down to 0.3mb/s. Very annoying.

I've got a tricom signup person here right now. We are signing a 6 month contract (the minimum) for cable internet to my apartment. If its good enough I'll drop codetel because I'm sick of all their games and poor service. Codetel has really gone downhill since Carlos Slim took over.
 

Adrian Bye

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Jul 7, 2002
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When Codetel works, they are the best. It's the support that's lacking.

By all means try Tricom, but I would thoroughly test it before cutting Codetel.

I am still getting occaisional codetel disconnects (1 per day or so), and after talking with about 20 techs at codetel we still can't get it solved. I was disconnected from an important VOIP call this morning. As some of you know, I do a lot of interviews, and I can't have internet connectivity which disconnects randomly. This also happened to my codetel dsl line in Santiago (although less) so if Tricom solves it, I'll cancel codetel in a heartbeat.

I will thoroughly test both side by side and report back.
 

Adrian Bye

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Jul 7, 2002
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Adrian, I heard that Wind Telecom was available to consumers in Santo Domingo at lower prices, not sure cause I dont live there but you should look into it.

in wimax only though, right? or is that in some kind of DSL/cable version?
 

track

New member
Sep 6, 2008
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About controlling speed for any sites.

Yes, it's possible, is very easy to do, and sometimes very expensive.

Is Codetel doing it? I'm not sure but very unlikely.

Please check what Robert is telling you
"He changed our Cisco 800 MTU (Maximum Transmission Unit ) settings, plus a bunch of other stuff. Also changed the switch we was on at Codetel."

Wind Telecom??? What will happen to them?
FYI, The Wimax installation in Santo Domingo is based on Nortel. Nortel today bailed out of WiMax. They will discontinue its mobile WiMAX business as part of a recovery plan to streamline its operations.

I've tested Codetel internet connection, they will do full speed if you are next or very close to a- Central Station, b- One green or white box on the street. and/or if you have a good setting.

The 3 Mbps is a 3.5Mbs, you can almost do realtime hd video with it, or see realtime regular 720p video.

WiMax is not WiFi!

I would not switch from Codetel to another carrier at this time. Call a good tech, ask Robert if he knows someone.

If you have 5mbps with Codetel, you should have capacity for 27mbps bandwidth for the Claro TV.
 

ExtremeR

Silver
Mar 22, 2006
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About controlling speed for any sites.

Yes, it's possible, is very easy to do, and sometimes very expensive.

Is Codetel doing it? I'm not sure but very unlikely.

Please check what Robert is telling you
"He changed our Cisco 800 MTU (Maximum Transmission Unit ) settings, plus a bunch of other stuff. Also changed the switch we was on at Codetel."

Wind Telecom??? What will happen to them?
FYI, The Wimax installation in Santo Domingo is based on Nortel. Nortel today bailed out of WiMax. They will discontinue its mobile WiMAX business as part of a recovery plan to streamline its operations.

I've tested Codetel internet connection, they will do full speed if you are next or very close to a- Central Station, b- One green or white box on the street. and/or if you have a good setting.

The 3 Mbps is a 3.5Mbs, you can almost do realtime hd video with it, or see realtime regular 720p video.

WiMax is not WiFi!

I would not switch from Codetel to another carrier at this time. Call a good tech, ask Robert if he know someone.

If you have 5mbps with Codetel, you should have capacity for 27mbps bandwidth for the Claro TV.

Hello Codetel representative,

You claim it is possible but unlikely for Codetel to be throttling, I inform you that is not only that is possible, is that it is a fact that they are throttling connections as I personally know and looked that they have Packeteer and Allot equipments set up for QoS. Codetel has not only gone down in customer service, also their service and response times are really lacking right now.

One thing is to control a little P2P and other is to control every aspect of the connection including browsing (Youtube, Myspace, Facebook) and also MSN Messenger file transfer (have any of you had error in transfer when sending multiple photos in MSN?) and then sell a 5Mbps service to you with a straight face.

So please accept the fact that Codetel has really gone downhill since this new administration, Tricom is also throttling but in a very subtle manner so end users won't even feel it or have the need to complain about it.
 

track

New member
Sep 6, 2008
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Hello Codetel representative,

You claim it is possible but unlikely for Codetel to be throttling, I inform you that is not only that is possible, is that it is a fact that they are throttling connections as I personally know and looked that they have Packeteer and Allot equipments set up for QoS. Codetel has not only gone down in customer service, also their service and response times are really lacking right now.

One thing is to control a little P2P and other is to control every aspect of the connection including browsing (Youtube, Myspace, Facebook) and also MSN Messenger file transfer (have any of you had error in transfer when sending multiple photos in MSN?) and then sell a 5Mbps service to you with a straight face.

So please accept the fact that Codetel has really gone downhill since this new administration, Tricom is also throttling but in a very subtle manner so end users won't even feel it or have the need to complain about it.

Me a representative of Codetel? That must be and I will think it's a joke.

Please visit Packeteer-WAN Optimization, optimize bandwidth, network roi, save bandwidth, improve response time, application performance management, network management., Those where very expensive equipment.

Tricom, installed a new 300Mbps link, hope this helps.

Again, I did no say it's impossible, it's very possible but they don't have the need for it in City of Santo Domingo (Piantini, Naco, etc), Santiago (Ceros, Tritaria, etc.) or the city of Puerto Plata.

I don't know about customer support for Claro / Codetel, but the investment they made is very, very high, more than any other carrier in DR.
 

Adrian Bye

Bronze
Jul 7, 2002
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Track, codetel is absolutely throttling, there is zero doubt about it. I can download a 1 hour 720p TV show from the US in 30 minutes, but youtube is continually buffering to play a low quality tiny video?

And, I am in one of the top neighbourhoods in Santo Domingo.