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Safe, Private, Easy Way to Test Connection Speed? - flipperpull - 08-09-2020

Hi, learning user for Linux and Linux Lite here. I am wondering what is the best, most private, and easy way to test Internet connection speed? I have concerns re: speedtest.net as it apparently collects much data. Is there a good way to run a utility, preferably with a GUI, that tells me how fast a connection is?

Thanks!

Editing to add: I am hoping to get the Mbps max download speed of a new connection, like what Speedtest.net does, only more private. I tried CBM (Color Bandwidth Meter), but it seems to be just monitoring the speed of current usage, unless I understand it wrong.

Re: Safe, Private, Easy Way to Test Connection Speed? - Moltke - 08-09-2020

(08-09-2020, 09:17 PM)flipperpull link Wrote: Hi, learning user for Linux and Linux Lite here. I am wondering what is the best, most private, and easy way to test Internet connection speed? I have concerns re: speedtest.net as it apparently collects much data. Is there a good way to run a utility, preferably with a GUI, that tells me how fast a connection is?

Thanks!

Editing to add: I am hoping to get the Mbps max download speed of a new connection, like what Speedtest.net does, only more private. I tried CBM (Color Bandwidth Meter), but it seems to be just monitoring the speed of current usage, unless I understand it wrong.

You have to ask yourself, how does a net speed test work? And it al comes down to this; in order to test the speed of any connection such a tool have to upload and download files to and from your computer, knowing that, I  think whatever tool/gui that may exists out there will do just the same; collect data to test your internet speed.

https://help.speedtest.net/hc/en-us/articles/360038679354-How-does-Speedtest-measure-my-network-speeds-#:~:text=This%20test%20is%20performed%20by,measured%20in%20ms%20(milliseconds).

https://www.howtogeek.com/426757/how-do-internet-speed-tests-work-and-how-accurate-are-they/

https://www.ncta.com/whats-new/how-do-internet-speed-tests-work-2

As alternatives to speedtest.net

https://alternativeto.net/software/speed-test/


Re: Safe, Private, Easy Way to Test Connection Speed? - flipperpull - 08-09-2020

Thanks for your reply. I looked at some of your links. Yes, I believe I understand roughly how they work. My original post was reacting to the Terms of Service warning displayed on speedtest.net's site that states that they collect extra data.

I tried your good suggestion to try Alternative-to (should have thought of that myself). It led me to https://librespeed.org/. Its claims to be an opensource site. Its privacy statement admits it still collects telemetry, but claims it is only for their purposes. On the surface, it functions similarly to speedtest.net. Results are pretty different however, but that is not surprising as it likely does not have the same optimizations. For "real world" testing, I am simply going back and forth between the two and writing down the numbers. Yeah, not very scientific.

Yes, these sites are probably not very accurate, if for no other reason than that they take just a snapshot of a moment (besides the other reasons your sites suggest).

I will continue to try LibreSpeed, but am still open to suggestions.

Thanks again!

Re: Safe, Private, Easy Way to Test Connection Speed? - Moltke - 08-12-2020

(08-09-2020, 10:49 PM)flipperpull link Wrote: Thanks for your reply. I looked at some of your links. Yes, I believe I understand roughly how they work. My original post was reacting to the Terms of Service warning displayed on speedtest.net's site that states that they collect extra data.

I tried your good suggestion to try Alternative-to (should have thought of that myself). It led me to https://librespeed.org/. Its claims to be an opensource site. Its privacy statement admits it still collects telemetry, but claims it is only for their purposes. On the surface, it functions similarly to speedtest.net. Results are pretty different however, but that is not surprising as it likely does not have the same optimizations. For "real world" testing, I am simply going back and forth between the two and writing down the numbers. Yeah, not very scientific.

Yes, these sites are probably not very accurate, if for no other reason than that they take just a snapshot of a moment (besides the other reasons your sites suggest).

I will continue to try LibreSpeed, but am still open to suggestions.

Thanks again!

I never really gave too much thought but you got me curious Smile so I used this site https://tosdr.org/# which you can use to check some of those hidden policies you didn't read/know about, for instance, I checked those of speedtest.net and this is what I got:
Quote:× This service can view your browser history
Generated through the annotate view

+ You can request access and deletion of personal data
Generated through the annotate view

It doesn't look that bad if you ask me, I mean, according to that you can request them to delete whatever personal data they have on you. Unfortunately, it doesn't have anything on https://librespeed.org/ so I couldn't check that one.





Re: Safe, Private, Easy Way to Test Connection Speed? - newtusmaximus - 08-26-2020

Can you not access enough data from logging into the admin on your router also using Ping?