Calling all Shaw & Shaw High Speed Xtreme Subscribers

[supershocka]

Ok, I have a question for all the Xtreme users. What kind of speeds do you get? They advertise on Shaw as 7MB download speeds, but I went to dslreports.com, and I get 1MB/s max. Now obviously I would not get 7MB/s, but I would definitely expect more than 15% of the advertised speeds. So now I'm curious as to what others get. I think I may be paying for the service, but not actually getting the service.

My hypothesis was reinforced when I received an email from them saying I went over the 20GB cap (wtf, thats so low!). But when I read the agreement, I came to find out Xtreme users have a 50GB cap. So why did I even get this email?? (I was said to be at 30GB that month by the rep)

To top this, I've been paying for this service for 1year plus now. And I've been waiting for a reply to my email for 1 week already. A lil frustrated now...I think I will be giving them a call soon. I should be compensated well to avoid me switching.

What speeds do other Shaw users get? And what do you guys think of the situation? Does it sound like I am getting ripped off here?

[Spent]

Is that a third category?
I thought they just had regular and lite.
I guess that's the advantage of living in a big city like Vancouver.

[ynchu]

Hey,

just some ideas. You should try to test the speed by using downloading software such as GetRight or FlashGet to download over 20 files all from different servers, and see how that goes.

On top of that, you should definitely try to do similar testings during different times during the day. I bet at 5 in the morning it would be faster.

For the cap problem, how much did you upload? Did you mean 20GB in total for uploading and downloading? If they just b*tch at you because you'd downloaded and uploaded ONLY 20GB, then send them a copy of your agreement. However, of course, I am pretty sure that somewhere in your agreement says "this agreement may be changed or altered by Shaw without prior notice to the users." They may have changed the policy somewhere after you signed the agreement.

[J1M]

The best policy is to ignore them if they complain about bandwidth usage. They don't do anything until like the 3rd time they bug you about it. To test your bandwidth you should go to shaw's website and do the test there. You don't know if it is the pipe or the server limiting you anywhere else.

I had extreme for about a month. It was worth it for newsgroups, but if you just use bittorrent or emule there is not much point.

[malbadon]

This is the site J1M was referring to.
http://support.shaw.ca/troubleshooting/speedtest2.htm

As pointed out, using the flakey java based dslreports test has way to many variables for me. Use 12 different speedtest sites, get 12 different results.

[supershocka]

Hey,

just some ideas. You should try to test the speed by using downloading software such as GetRight or FlashGet to download over 20 files all from different servers, and see how that goes.

On top of that, you should definitely try to do similar testings during different times during the day. I bet at 5 in the morning it would be faster.

For the cap problem, how much did you upload? Did you mean 20GB in total for uploading and downloading? If they just b*tch at you because you'd downloaded and uploaded ONLY 20GB, then send them a copy of your agreement. However, of course, I am pretty sure that somewhere in your agreement says "this agreement may be changed or altered by Shaw without prior notice to the users." They may have changed the policy somewhere after you signed the agreement.

I have. Fastest I've ever downloaded was at about 800kbps.
While in contact with the rep, I was told current regulations state 20GB total (up+down) for high speed users. In the agreement online, it says 50GB(up+down) total for xtreme users. When I got the email, I was told I was at 30GB total (20down, 10up)...But, as an Xtreme subscriber, I am well within limits..

This is why I don't think I am actually getting the Xtreme service. The e-mail that I received seemed very much like an automated e-mail, which lead me to believe I am still "classed" as a normal high speed user.

[i6s1]

Raise hell. BTW, 3 years ago I was getting 5mbps from Shaw highspeed, now I get 1.

[Kwirky]

I have. Fastest I've ever downloaded was at about 800kbps.

Okay, now I just want to clear something up here... because you're using bytes (capital 'b') in your fist post, and bits (lowercase 'b') in this post. So, are you saying you're downloading at 800 kilobits per second, or 800 kilobytes per second? I ask because 800 Kilobytes works to be 6400kbits/sec, which nicely matches the 7 Mbit Shaw Xtreme service (taking into account TCP overhead) advertised speed.

[temporalillusion]

Almost always get 6Mbps+ on speed testing sites.

Sometimes I've had waaay over 7Mbps when starting a download, almost like it takes a few seconds for the hardware to throttle my connection; sometimes when I start a download it starts at 2000KB/s and doesn't make its way down to 800KB/s for 10 seconds. Sometimes I get 20 meg files in less than 10 seconds.

Anyway I'm very pleased with my connection speed.

[Evil Techie]

Ok, I have a question for all the Xtreme users. What kind of speeds do you get? They advertise on Shaw as 7MB download speeds, but I went to dslreports.com, and I get 1MB/s max. Now obviously I would not get 7MB/s, but I would definitely expect more than 15% of the advertised speeds. So now I'm curious as to what others get. I think I may be paying for the service, but not actually getting the service.

My hypothesis was reinforced when I received an email from them saying I went over the 20GB cap (wtf, thats so low!). But when I read the agreement, I came to find out Xtreme users have a 50GB cap. So why did I even get this email?? (I was said to be at 30GB that month by the rep)

To top this, I've been paying for this service for 1year plus now. And I've been waiting for a reply to my email for 1 week already. A lil frustrated now...I think I will be giving them a call soon. I should be compensated well to avoid me switching.

What speeds do other Shaw users get? And what do you guys think of the situation? Does it sound like I am getting ripped off here?

doesnt shaw guarantee you 7Mbps
that is 7 megabits per second

so it would translate to 0.8750 megabytes per second
the fact that you are getting about 1MB/s (1 megabyte per second) is quite good so i dont know what you can possibly complain to them about except for the email


you can go check your bandwidth usage on http://secure.shaw.ca

create an online customer service account and view the stats in your browser

[supershocka]

Okay, now I just want to clear something up here... because you're using bytes (capital 'b') in your fist post, and bits (lowercase 'b') in this post. So, are you saying you're downloading at 800 kilobits per second, or 800 kilobytes per second? I ask because 800 Kilobytes works to be 6400kbits/sec, which nicely matches the 7 Mbit Shaw Xtreme service (taking into account TCP overhead) advertised speed.

Well, from the speedlink given above, i got speeds of ~250KB/sec (thats what it says in IE)...

And from dslreports, the following:

2005-07-24 02:42:21 EST: 937 / 798
Your download speed : 960225 bps, or 937 kbps.
A 117.2 KB/sec transfer rate.
Your upload speed : 817564 bps, or 798 kbps.

I've reached 800KB only once or twice (late at night)...
Am I wrong about the whole not getting the advertised speeds here????

[supershocka]

doesnt shaw guarantee you 7Mbps
that is 7 megabits per second

so it would translate to 0.8750 megabytes per second
the fact that you are getting about 1MB/s (1 megabyte per second) is quite good so i dont know what you can possibly complain to them about except for the email


you can go check your bandwidth usage on http://secure.shaw.ca

create an online customer service account and view the stats in your browser

Yeah, I just realized that myself..I most likely am wrong on the speeds issue. But the email thing seems off...
crap.

[Kwirky]

Yeah, I just realized that myself..I most likely am wrong on the speeds issue. But the email thing seems off...
crap.

No, you're right - based on the speedtest posted above, you're only getting a fraction of what you should be getting...

Shaw's own test site is http://speedtest.shaw.ca - go try that one, and if you get the same poor result, you can definately complain to Shaw; there's no way that you should be getting such poor speeds on Xtreme - the DOCSIS 2.0 network is still relatively new shouldn't already be saturated.

Just so you know, Shaw will likely get you to test the speeds wired directly into the modem (ie no router), so you might want to check said speed before calling them, just in case.

They should then be able to check signal strength, throttling, etc for you.

Good luck!

-EDIT- re getting 250KB at above speedlink, a rough bytes-to-bits translation is to multiply by 10. If you're getting 250KBytes/sec, that's about a 2.5Mbit connection - still ony half the speed of a 'regular' Shaw HS connection is advertised at.

[hagbard]

Good luck. I went the first three years with Shaw (when they introduced Cable internet service) with slightly better than 56k modem speeds. They sent out techs, checked and replaced the cable coming into the house twice, and were not able to correct it. It did improve in the last two years we lived in that house, I suspect they overfilled the nods in our neigbourhood.

[zerocool24]

Well, from the speedlink given above, i got speeds of ~250KB/sec (thats what it says in IE)...

And from dslreports, the following:

2005-07-24 02:42:21 EST: 937 / 798
Your download speed : 960225 bps, or 937 kbps.
A 117.2 KB/sec transfer rate.
Your upload speed : 817564 bps, or 798 kbps.

I've reached 800KB only once or twice (late at night)...
Am I wrong about the whole not getting the advertised speeds here????

What time was this speed test taken? That is definitely nowhere near 7mbps. You are around 1mbps. They probably have you on the service you had before upgrading and have been collecting your money without upgrading your speeds. I would complain big time, and make sure they give you back the difference. I am not familiar with their plans in bc so i couldn't tell you what service you are paying for.