How many megabytes are in megabytes? Internet speed in Mbps and Mbps: what's the difference and where is the catch?

User question

Hello.

Please tell me, I have an Internet channel of 15/30 Megabits / s, files in uTorrent are downloaded at a speed of (approximately) 2-3 MB / s. How can I compare the speed, is the ISP cheating on me? How many megabytes should be at a speed of 30 megabits / s? Confused about the values ...

Good day!

This question is very popular, people ask it in different interpretations (sometimes, very menacingly, as if someone had deceived someone). The bottom line is that most users confuse different units : both grams and pounds (also Megabits and Megabytes).

In general, in order to solve this problem, you will have to resort to a small excursion to the computer science course, but I will try not to be boring 👌. Also, in the article, along the way, I will analyze all the questions regarding this topic (about speed in torrent clients, about MB / s and Mbps).

So...

👉 Note

I also recommend looking at another article on how to find out your real Internet speed (there I also partially touched on this issue).

Educational program on internet speed

And so, for ANY Internet provider (at least I personally have not seen others), the speed of the Internet connection is indicated in Megabits / s (moreover, pay attention to the prefix "BEFORE" - no one gives a guarantee that your speed will always be constant, because it's impossible) .

In any torrent program (in the same uTorrent), by default, the download speed is displayed in MB / s (Megabyte per second). That is, I am leading to the fact that Megabytes and Megabits are different values.

👉 Usually, it is enough to divide the declared speed in the tariff of your Internet provider in Mbit / s by 8 to get the speed that uTorrent (or its analogs) will show you in Mbyte / s (but see more about this below, there are nuances).

For example, the rate at which the Internet provider was asked is 15 Mbps. Let's try to translate it into a normal way ...

👉 Important!(from the computer science course)

The computer does not understand numbers, for it only two values are important: there is a signal or no signal (i.e. "0" or "1These are either yes or no - that is, "0" or "1" is called "Bit"(the minimum unit of information).

In order to be able to write some letter or number, one unit or zero will obviously not be enough (it will definitely not be enough for the entire alphabet). It was calculated to encode all the necessary letters, numbers, etc. - a sequence of 8 Bit.

For example, this is the code for the English capital "A" - 01000001.

And so the code for the number "1" is 00110001.

These ones 8 Bits = 1 Byte (i.e. 1 Byte is the smallest data item).

About prefixes (and derivatives):

1 Kilobyte = 1024 Bytes (well, or 8 * 1024 Bits)
1 Megabyte = 1024 Kilobytes (or KB / KB)
1 Gigabyte = 1024 Megabytes (or MB / MB)
1 Terabyte = 1024 Gigabytes (or GB / GB)

Mathematics:

One Megabit is equal to 0.125 Megabytes.
To achieve a transfer rate of 1 Megabytes per second, you will need to connect to the network at a speed of 8 Megabits per second.

In practice, as a rule, they do not resort to such calculations, everything is made easier. The declared speed of 15 Mbit / s is simply divided by 8 (and ~ 5-7% is taken from this number for the transfer of service information, network load, etc.). The resulting number will be considered normal speed (an approximate calculation is shown below).

15 Mbps / 8 = 1.875 MB / s

1.875 MB / s * 0.95 = 1.78 MB / s

In addition, I would not discount the load on the ISP's network during peak hours: in the evenings or on weekends (when a large number of people use the network). It can also seriously affect access speed.

Thus, if you are connected to the Internet at a rate 15 Mbps, and your download speed in the torrent program shows about 2 MB / s - everything is very good with your channel and Internet provider 👌. Usually, the speed is less than the declared one (about this my next question, a couple of lines below).

👉 Sample question.

Why is the connection speed 50-100 Mbps, and the download speed is very slow: 1-2 Mbps? Is the ISP to blame? Indeed, even according to rough estimates, it should be at least 5-6 MB / s ...

I'll try to make it out point by point:

firstly, if you carefully look at the agreement with the Internet provider, you will notice that you were promised access speed "UP TO 100 Mbps" ;
secondly, in addition to your access speed, where you download the file (s) from is very important. For example, if the computer (from which you are downloading the file) is connected via low-speed access, say 8 Mbps, then your download speed of 1 Mb / s from it is, in fact, the maximum! Those. try downloading the file from other servers (torrent trackers) first;
thirdly, it is possible that some program is already downloading something else on your PC. Yes, the same Windows can download updates (if, in addition to a PC, you have a laptop, smartphone, etc. devices connected to the same network channel - look what they are doing ...). In general, check what your Internet channel is loaded with;
it is possible that in the evening (when the load on the Internet provider increases) there are "drawdowns" (you are not the only one who decided to download something interesting at this time ✌);
if you are connected via a router, check it too. It often happens that inexpensive models cut the speed (sometimes they just reboot), in general, they simply cannot cope with the load ...
check the driver for your network card (for example, for the same Wi-Fi adapter). Several times I came across a situation: after updating the drivers for the network card (the drivers for the network adapter are installed in 90% by Windows itself during its installation), the access speed increased significantly! The default drivers that come with Windows are not a panacea ...

Nevertheless, I do not exclude the possibility that your Internet provider (with old equipment, clearly inflated tariffs, which are only theoretically available on paper) may be the culprit for the low speed of access. Just, for starters, I wanted to pay attention to the above points ...

👉 Another sample question

Why then indicate the connection speed in Mbps, when all users are guided by MB / s (and in programs it is indicated in MB / s)?

There are two points:

when transferring information, not only the file itself is transmitted, but also other service information (some of which is less than a byte). Therefore, it is logical (and in general, historically it happened so) that the connection speed is measured and indicated in Mbit / s.
the higher the number, the stronger the advertising! Marketing has not been canceled either. Many people, they are far enough from network technologies, and seeing that somewhere the figure is higher, they will go there and connect to the network.

My personal opinion: for example, it would be nice if providers indicated next to Mbps the real download speed that the user will see in the same uTorrent. Thus, the wolves are fed and the sheep are safe 👌.

👉 To help!