Fast Connections from China

The latest reports indicate the cables severed by the December 26 earthquake will take even longer to be repaired. Some say 15 days, others say well into February. CCTV aired a story about its effect on users, with some drastic numbers:

According to a survey by Internet portal Sina.com, 97 percent of Internet users on the Chinese mainland have difficulty accessing overseas websites including Yahoo.com and CNN. At least 5 million MSN subscribers can’t get access to the internet. And about 60 percent say their lives and work have been seriously affected.

That “60 percent” figure is surprising. For foreigners who hit overseas all the time, one would expect an impact but it’s interesting to see this response among locals (most Sina.com users).

But to give some hope, I’ve found it is indeed possible to get speedy overseas Internet access with the right ISP. I’m sitting in Beijing, at a local Paris Baguette cafe along Chaoyangmenwai with free Wifi, and the international access is fast. Not just good and usable, but really fast. Flickr uploading, podcast downloading, email and all.

The ISP here is ASN: 4847 [CNIX-AP (China Networks Inter-Exchange)] which is peered with many other networks, and seems to be part of China Telecom/Beijing Telecom.

So for folks whose business depends on good overseas access, try your luck at Paris Baguette, and if it works well, sign up with Beijing Telecom, because they’re certainly better than what China Netcom DSL provides right now. You can double check the IP address and ISP you are using by visiting DNSstuff.com and seeing the report at the top of the page.
For the technical folks out there, here are two different traceroute results from an ISP in California to China. CNIX-AP is routing through NTT, with low roundtrip times (around 200 ms). China Netcom seems to takes you through Sprintlink, and you’ll see very long roundtrip times (upwards of 600 ms), and lost packets.

From Los Angeles ISP to CNIX-AP, traceroute:

3 core4.t2-1-bbnet1.lax.pnap.net (216.52.255.6) 1.228 ms 105.634 ms 25.687 ms
4 te-1-3.a00.lsanca17.us.ra.verio.net (206.183.201.161) 4.801 ms 2.146 ms 1.359 ms
5 xe-4-3.r00.lsanca03.us.bb.gin.ntt.net (129.250.2.6) 0.915 ms 1.560 ms 6.083 ms
6 xe-0-3-0.r21.lsanca03.us.bb.gin.ntt.net (129.250.4.237) 5.864 ms 0.812 ms 0.690 ms
7 218.30.54.53 (218.30.54.53) 0.832 ms 4.755 ms 1.049 ms
8 202.97.51.225 (202.97.51.225) 176.584 ms 174.498 ms *
9 * 202.97.53.9 (202.97.53.9) 182.331 ms 177.292 ms
10 202.97.57.214 (202.97.57.214) 179.260 ms 190.607 ms 177.025 ms
11 bj141-130-106.bjtelecom.net (219.141.130.106) 202.215 ms 204.203 ms 204.371 ms
12 bj141-146-46.bjtelecom.net (219.141.146.46) 210.946 ms * *

From Los Angeles ISP to China Netcom DSL, traceroute:

3 core2.t2-2-bbnet2.lax.pnap.net (216.52.255.66) 2.370 ms 3.078 ms 9.266 ms
4 sl-st20-la-10-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.154.205) 5.576 ms 1.152 ms 4.712 ms
5 sl-bb21-ana-4-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.8.95) 2.773 ms 1.456 ms 3.219 ms
6 sl-bb20-ana-14-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.1.169) 2.367 ms 2.060 ms 2.669 ms
7 sl-gw29-ana-0-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.1.146) 1.359 ms 3.049 ms *
8 sl-china6-4-0.sprintlink.net (144.232.54.74) 536.913 ms 538.822 ms 539.498 ms
9 219.158.3.113 (219.158.3.113) 436.631 ms 437.854 ms 432.014 ms
10 219.158.4.106 (219.158.4.106) 444.368 ms * 439.637 ms
11 * 219.158.5.162 (219.158.5.162) 526.954 ms *
12 219.158.4.73 (219.158.4.73) 487.188 ms 508.287 ms *
13 www.confucius.cn.net (202.96.12.166) 630.851 ms 617.273 ms 624.489 ms
14 * * *
15 * 61.148.6.194 (61.148.6.194) 585.824 ms 584.845 ms
16 * 61.148.50.14 (61.148.50.14) 637.268 ms *

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This entry was posted on Monday, January 15th, 2007 at 10:38 pm and is filed under Asia, China, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.