Airtel Xstream Fiber Experience (Direct Cities)

Mann said:
So @napstersquest gave me the idea and I tested it my self.

He's from another state so I guess it's verified.
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Yes can vouch. 200mbps plan + static IP, still getting 1gbps.
First was the Sercomm router, then the Nokia router. Got gigabit with both.

My plan is the 1099 rental (plus 199 for static IP) for Airtel Black. DTH + 200mbps fiber.

Mann said:
What is important is that you should have the router which is capable of 1gbps. If you take a plan which is 300mbps or less, you get a router capable of just 300mbps and all fails. So start with a connection which is more than 300mbps and then migrate back to something less. Airtel black gives first month free so don't worry and go for the Rs.3999 plan.
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The thing is they most likely give you a dual band router for speeds like 200mbps and above, and the GPON unit they provide generally has at least one gigabit port.
So you can ask them to set it up in bridge mode (which they do without much hassle when you have static IP - if you have the Sercomm router you can even do it yourself) and use a router of your choice.


I did face some issues, I have shared them here: https://techenclave.com/threads/need-help-in-port-forwarding-airtel-xstream-with-static-ip.206808/
But overall Airtel seems to be the best so far (I have tried Siliconcare (local), jiofiber, Hathway and Gazon).
And for the price, I am definitely getting an insane deal.

Currently, I have the Nokia G2425A router in the hallway of a 3BHK flat, and an Archer C80 connected via CAT5E, located in my bedroom( acting as an access point).

3-6 mobile phones and 1 laptop, 1 desktop connected directly to Nokia's wireless access point,
1 raspberry pi 4 connected via ethernet to Nokia router,
1 server, 1 laptop, Xbox, LG TV connected via ethernet to Archer C80,
and 2 phones and 1 laptop connected to Archer C80's access point.

I have no issues getting near gigabit speeds on torrents on the server or on the PC, and as long as I am in good range, the LAN transfers are almost always gigabit no matter which AP I am connected to.
This test was run on my gaming PC:
1658060645409.png


And this is on my OP Nord 2 connected to Archer C80 (about 8-10 feet away)
3c3efa23-0b67-4663-9dff-7d73f436b1cd.jpg
 
napstersquest said:
First was the Sercomm router, then the Nokia router. Got gigabit with both.

My plan is the 1099 rental (plus 199 for static IP) for Airtel Black. DTH + 200mbps fiber.


The thing is they most likely give you a dual band router for speeds like 200mbps and above, and the GPON unit they provide generally has at least one gigabit port.
So you can ask them to set it up in bridge mode (which they do without much hassle when you have static IP - if you have the Sercomm router you can even do it yourself) and use a router of your choice.
Click to expand...
Originally I got ZTE router as I had chosen the 200mbps plan. But got it upgraded to a Nokia router for which I had to upgrade to a gigabit plan for a day :). Port forwarding is implemented
I am using openwrt (mainly for SQM) as my router on proxmox on a 4th gen xeon. The max it uses is 500mb RAM and never crosses 8% cpu usage during gigabit speed checks.
 
enthusiast29 said:
I think @Mann and @napstersquest are currently using. Only they can confirm how often they get upto 1Gbps and things like if it comes and goes.
Also how long since they've been using it since they changed to static IP.

This I'd like to know as well.
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I think I'm lucky but every time I have checked it, I got 940+-50mbps. I have updated my steam library,epic,origin and gog at those speeds. What I was surprised to see was a 60% cpu utilisation on my 5900x; first time ever.
I am yet to find another use for those speeds. Okhla and Netflix servers agree at 1gbps.
 
enthusiast29 said:
Haha, yep that's not surprising at all. The more network bandwidth you get and utilize the better CPU you need.
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Well it also means one would need a 5800x or better to actually use these speeds practically. I'm guessing steam is compressing the downloads and a faster CPU helps. But a speed test would only be 8% max.
 
Mann said:
Well it also means one would need a 5800x or better to actually use these speeds practically. I'm guessing steam is compressing the downloads and a faster CPU helps. But a speed test would only be 8% max.
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You don't need 5800X or better. My raspberry pi4 also gets gbps for torrents.
 
napstersquest said:
You don't need 5800X or better. My raspberry pi4 also gets gbps for torrents.
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Torrents are different, steam downloads are different.

Steam uses a pretty heavy compression to save on the bandwidth so the CPU needs to work its ass off to decompress the files as they are being downloaded. When we are hitting gigabit download speeds, many otherwise normal factors can become limiting, even slow storage write speeds (although less likely these days when everyone has SSDs).
 
john1911 said:
Torrents are different, steam downloads are different.

Steam uses a pretty heavy compression to save on the bandwidth so the CPU needs to work its ass off to decompress the files as they are being downloaded. When we are hitting gigabit download speeds, many other factors can become limiting, even slow storage write speeds (although less likely these days when everyone has SSDs).
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Hard disks show upwards of 150MB/s write speeds for sequential. CPU usage will increase, but my HTPC with 3600 in steam downloads does not slow down the whole system.
 
napstersquest said:
Hard disks show upwards of 150MB/s write speeds for sequential. CPU usage will increase, but my HTPC with 3600 in steam downloads does not slow down the whole system.
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Was it touching full 1Gbps in steam?

I'm not sure if it is still sequential writes for HDDs while downloading stuff from steam, anyone know or can confirm it?
 
napstersquest said:
Yupp.
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Oh wow, I remember watching some LTT video in which he mentioned that he is actually being limited by the CPU (5950x) because it can't saturate his 10Gbps local steam catch or something. Maybe it varies from game to game. I can't think of any other variable.

@Mann Were you doing anything else when your 5900x hit 60% while downloading?
 
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May I add that it brought a 4th gen WD Black 850 nvme SSD at 100% and a Seagate 530 at 100% at the same time. Whatever it was doing was not not kind to my PC. I was using 2 programs pertaining to these two drives and they were both saturated. I have harddrives that do 250MBps but my game libraries are on SSD 's
john1911 said:
@Mann Were you doing anything else when your 5900x hit 60% while downloading?
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Nothing while doing this.
 
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john1911 said:
Oh wow, I remember watching some LTT video in which he mentioned that he is actually being limited by the CPU (5950x) because it can't saturate his 10Gbps local steam catch or something. Maybe it varies from game to game. I can't think of any other variable.

@Mann Were you doing anything else when your 5900x hit 60% while downloading?
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14.18min in
 
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