Big differences in various speed test results

[Chrisk-K]

I have a 50/25 connection service.  Here's a list of my speed test result given by several tests.  I ran each test twice on a PC wired to the router and the reported speed is the average.

Verizon speed test --> 17/20. 

Verizon network diagnostic tool --> 52/25. 

Speedtest.net --> 16/20
Myspeed.visualware.com --> 50/24.

One thing that's clear is my upload speed seems consistant. For download speed, which one should I believe?

[viafax999]

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@Chrisk-K wrote:

I have a 50/25 connection service.  Here's a list of my speed test result given by several tests.  I ran each test twice on a PC wired to the router and the reported speed is the average.

Verizon speed test --> 17/20. 

Verizon network diagnostic tool --> 52/25. 

Speedtest.net --> 16/20
Myspeed.visualware.com --> 50/24.

One thing that's clear is my upload speed seems consistant. For download speed, which one should I believe?

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time the download a file of a known size from somewhere and believe that one.

[CaptainSTX]

If you are using WiFi large variation in speeds can result from WiFi interference.

Speed also varies during day parts as more people tend to havily use the Internet during the evening to stream video.

To determine if the variations you are seeing on the WAN (Internet)  or LAN  test your LAN using a utility such as LAN Speed test.

FYI information  a single speed test from any site is probably is not statisically valid.   Run  100+ tests over a week at various times of day.   Speedtest's site lets you accumulate the data and download it.   Load the data into Excel and calculate the averages and then the standard deviation.  At two standard deviations you can determine what your average speed is with a confidence level of 95%.

[eljefe2]

The OP said in his original post that he was using a PC hard wired to his router.  No wifi involved.

FWIW, I don't know why the OP is seeing the variation he's seeing I've always found speedtest.net to be reliable.  I can run a test dozens of times over a period of a week or a month and the results are always within 10% of each other, upload and download.  In addition, I find very little different between the speedtest.net results and the FiOS speedtest results.

Along the lines of viafax999's recommendation....I have DU Meter installed and rely on it to give me real world results when I'm uploading or downloading anything.  The problem, of course, is that servers vary tremendously on what they can deliver to you and other simultaneous users.   I've found a few links, though, that will saturate my 75 mb/s download service and if I have any question about speedtest results, I download a file from one of those servers and simply watch the results on DU Meter.

edit:  Here's a screenshot of DU Meter during a recent download of the 3+ GB Windows 7 .iso file from a Microsoft server:

 

[talason]

Im having the same problems....im suppose to be getting 50mbs download speed and i get 10mbs on speedtest now. I use to get high download speeds and now all my streams lag. It was after the rain storm in so cal last week. On verizon speed test it says i get 50mbs so the verizon agent cant help me.

[kh-gary]

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