The results of the survey Quality of Broadband Services in the EU March 2012, disclosed by the European Commission in July 2013, formalized the difference between the fixed-line ADSL connection speed promised by ISPs and that actually available to European users. It is confirmed that on average xDSL connections offer only 63,3% of the contracted speed, with consequent navigation, upload and download difficulties for about half of the Europeans interviewed.
In Italy, the Communications Authority launched in 2008 a project to monitor Internet access from a fixed location, which resulted in the creation of two free software, MisuraInternet Speed Test and Ne.Me.Sys. (Network Measurement System), to provide the user not only with the possibility of evaluating the quality of his own connection, but also of receiving an official certification in PDF format, valid for any complaints with providers that offer poor performance. Three years after the two systems were made available, the Agcom Speed Test reaches its peak 104.062 download, while they are counted 24.820 PDF certificates required; the test access procedure is being simplified, and this could soon increase the number of interested users.
MeasureInternet Speed Test, suitable for the main operating systems, is available in the Trial option, without registration and for one use only, and Standard, to use it several times by saving the results. If anomalies are found, it is possible to proceed with Ne.Me.Sys. to obtain further checks and certification useful for the complaint. In a total of three days, 24 surveys will be carried out in 24 different time slots, to evaluate ping, download and upload speeds. It is useful to denounce the poor quality of the connection and eventually consider changing ADSL operator only if the problems have been encountered for some time and constantly, i.e. regardless of the time of day and the numerous factors which normally influence the xDSL speed but which are in fact independent of the provider (the network connection technology, cable or wireless modem connection, time of use…).
Telecom Italia, Tiscali, Vodafone and Fastweb also provide free customized speed tests for their customers; those associated with other operators can take advantage of Ookla's free software (at www.speedtest.net), bearing in mind that unlike the speed test Agcom will not offer a legally valid certification to withdraw from an unsatisfactory contract. MeasureInternet Speed test is only available for landline broadband measurements.
As for the mobile connections, the Communications Guarantor recently carried out an assessment of the efficiency of the 2G and 3G networks, based on 4 months of surveys on the territory (Measure Internet Mobile 2013 campaign). The situation is overall positive, the differences in service between the four operators evaluated are not so striking; in the lead we find Vodafone with 7,260 Mbit/s in download and 1,182 Mbps in upload, followed by 3 Italia, TIM (however better than the latter for upload and delay) and finally Wind, which still boasts 4,691 Mbit/s in download.
