Hi List,
in an adjacent thread, Alex made a statement that low-bandwidth internet connections are a thing of the past, and thus NX is basically obsolete.
I have personal experience to share which proves him wrong.
The following internet speeds were recorded in a suburb of a metropolitan area with more than 185 000 residents. And yes, I have the screenshots to prove it, I just don't want to burden the list with them.
Residential DSL: Downstream: 5.435 MBit/s max, 5.233 MBit/s average Upstream: 0.465 MBit/s max, 0.427 MBit/s average Ping latency: 23.00 ms min, 28.94 ms average
Residential Cable: Downstream: 35.14 MBit/s max, 28.06 MBit/s average Upstream: 2625 MBit/s max, 2.426 MBit/s average Ping latency: 32.00 ms min, 39,38 ms average (iow, higher throughput than DSL, but higher latency) -> This will, however, get worse, as Cable is a shared medium and people in the area are getting fed up with their DSL speeds and are switching over to Cable as their contracts expire.
LTE, 1st of 2 providers: 3 out of 5 bars Downstream: 4.715 MBit/s max, 2.029 MBit/s average Upstream: 3.923 MBit/s max, 3.706 MBit/s average Ping latency: 48.00 ms min, 60.50 ms average
LTE, 2nd of 2 providers: 2 out of 5 bars Downstream: 0.325 MBit/s max, 0.214 MBit/s average Upstream: 0.325 MBit/s max, 0.225 MBit/s average Ping latency: 64.00 ms min, 79.25 ms average
Now step outside and move another 800 meters towards the city limits, and LTE provider 1 drops to UMTS/EDGE (and GSM on a bad day), while LTE provider 2 actually goes up to 3-4 bars and gets 3-7 MBit/s peak rates - but they are short peaks/bursts in an otherwise very mediocre reception. Nothing you want to rely on.
Again, this isn't Mooville, West Virgina, with 100 inhabitants and 75 of them cattle, but a larger city in the self-proclaimed high-tech nation Germany.
Even Finnish rural areas have better UMTS and LTE coverage than we in Germany have, at the outskirts of our cities. And no, I'm not making this up, I've been to such areas in Finland in the last two years, and I know what the reception there was like.
So NX will be here for quite some time, there is a need for it, and for less fancy, but lightweight desktops that work well with it.
-Stefan
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