An empirical comparison of packet loss on end-user perception of performance

In this report we investigate the impact of randomised packet loss on TCP transfers using FreeBSD 8.2. We then evaluate these outcomes with respect to web interactivity and responsiveness. We find that even small rates of packet loss have a significant detrimental impact on perceivable performance of a website, and that avoiding packet loss is likely to be a better strategy than increasing bandwidth. We also investigate the effect of delay, bandwidth bottlenecks and queue size to compare with packet loss.