The Fast or the Furious?

The members of my editorial team have already calculated how our ‘real' broadband speeds compare to those we pay for, but we're going to keep you in suspense for the time being, while we expand the scope of our survey to include readers from across the Middle East region.

The idea is to find out which ISPs offer the most accurate connection speeds, compared to their claimed performance, and which - if any - ISPs fail to make the grade. And that's where you come in...

All we're asking from you is two minutes of your time to spend checking and sending us some stats. For this, you'll need an internet connected PC and, well, that's it really. Then just send this info to us and for that little task you'll get the chance to bag BenQ's fantastic mobile digital projector, the CP120.

We tested this beauty in the mag a few weeks back and concluded that as light, compact DLP-based light shiners go, it really does take some beating. Oh and it's also worth over US $1600!

Interested then? Great. Here's all you need to do:* Log onto www.internetfrog.com/mypc/speedtest/ from your home PC.

* Wait a minute for the on-screen test results to stabilise, then grab a snapshot image of this screen by pressing the ‘PrtScn' button on your keyboard.

* Then just open Microsoft Paint and use Control/V to paste this screen image into a new image file. Save this image on your PC. (Why? This screen includes juicy info including your connection's download and upload rates and some related file download speeds.)

* Finally, send an e-mail to This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it with the following inside:
- The JPEG screenshot, as an attachment
- Details of the internet package you subscribe to (we need three bits of info: 1 - the name of your internet service provider; 2- the country you live in; and 3 - the speed and type of connection you pay for - 512kbps DSL /1Mbps etc.).

The results of our survey will hit both itp.net and the pages of Windows Middle East in a forthcoming issue, but for now that's your mission. If you accept it, thanks in advance and best of luck!