I have the Comcast "6Mps" service, which actually runs at about 4Mps down, 363k up. I know someone who lives in my metro area with the "8Mps" service who actually runs at 8Mps down, 1.5Mps up. You might want to try both before you sign up.
Gnome: Upload vs download differential like that is common. However, with the advent of home video, digital photography, etc., and people sending such to each other, the ISP's have begun to increase the uplink speeds. Uploading Speeds Slowly Catch Up By DIONNE SEARCEY November 28, 2007; Page D1 Uploading is getting an upgrade. After years of cranking up the speed of downloading material from the Internet, which made it faster to surf the Web and play music and videos, Internet service providers are finally starting to boost the speed of files moving onto the Web from your personal computer. The acceleration is being spurred by the rise of social-networking sites like Facebook and video-sharing sites like YouTube, as a growing number of people are posting their own music and video clips online. Upload speeds have long been a fraction of the speed of downloads, forcing most users to wait several minutes to upload a photo, for example, that they could download in seconds. But in recent months, companies have been ratcheting up their upload speeds -- for consumers willing to pay a bit more. (snip) Jack
My cable is 10,000 Kb/s and my DSL is 2,500 Kb/s. My DSL is the fastest package that my DSL provider offers. They offer slower speeds, I think 1,000-1,500 Kb/s is the lowest. So your speed results might be just what is offered. Cable companies are providing much faster services than DSL in general. I wish Verizon FIOS was here, but it is not. However, depending on what you need your internet connection for, your speed may be fine.
You can always switch and switch and switch. The question is: What do you use it for? What do you need? How much data are you uploading/downloading? It looks like you have a 1.5 mbps down and 512 kbps up. You won't get better numbers than those. Now if you are paying for 6 mbps down, then something is not right with your connection and you need to speak to your provider. As far as your email, I have stopped using ISP provided emails for this reason. I signed up with Gmail when accounts were being released by invitation only. They have POP3 and SMTP support, 5GB of space and everything you could need from an email provider. I never use the ISP-provided email account. You might consider doing the same by creating an address and then notifying people of it before switching. More bandwidth doesn't necessarily mean more consistency or better quality. Cable service is a shared pipe, so it can very from neighborhood to neighborhood. DSL is consistent but it all depends on your distance from the CO. Go to www.dslreports.com to see what you have available. Good luck.
1. Is it the ISP which limits upload speed? 2. By using Gmail, are you speeds different from what the ISP provides? 3. Comcast limits the size of uploads... I don't know exactly what it is... maybe 10-20MB?. Does Gmail have such limits?
I just talked to Comcast tech support... and they said I actually have "4Mps" service... that's quite a surprise as I was "sold" 6Mps, and even later verified it with a service rep. (Must be like the Gummint... "the truth" is ethereal... whatever supports their agenda)