¶ Burst speed concept
¶ Overview
Burst is part of the Splynx bandwidth manager and works with MikroTik RouterOS devices. In Splynx, you can create speed limits with the burst option via the RADIUS protocol or via API.
Burst lets customers transfer data at a higher speed than their tariff plan specifies, but only for a certain period of time. Burst applies when the average-rate of a queue for the last burst-time (seconds) is lower than the burst-threshold value. Once the average-rate of a queue reaches or exceeds the burst-threshold within the burst-time, burst stops and the customer's speed returns to the plan speed.
When burst is applied, the burst-limit value replaces the max-limit value inside the queue.
¶ Terminology
burst-limit (set in %): the maximum upload and download speed customers can get when burst is enabled. It is set as a percentage (%) of the plan speed. For example, if a customer has a 2 Mbps plan and the burst-limit in Splynx is set to 100%, the customer gets a burst speed of 4 Mbps. If the burst-limit is set to 50%, the customer gets a burst speed of 3 Mbps instead of the original 2 Mbps.
burst-time (seconds): the period over which the average data rate is calculated. This is not how long burst stays active.
burst-threshold (set in %): burst always compares the average speed with the threshold. When the average reaches the threshold, burst is disabled. Like burst-limit, the threshold is a percentage. For example, an 80% threshold on a 2 Mbps plan is 1.6 Mbps, so burst is deactivated when the average speed during burst-time reaches 1.6 Mbps.
average-rate (not configured in Splynx, default value): every 1/16 of the burst-time, the MikroTik router calculates the average data rate over the last burst-time seconds.
actual-rate (read-only value): the actual traffic transfer rate of the queue. The images below show an example of a plan with a burst-time of 16 seconds, a plan speed of 2 Mbps, a burst-limit of 4 Mbps, and a threshold of 1.6 Mbps.
¶ Usage in Splynx
To configure burst like in the example above, set the burst parameters in the General settings of the internet plan as follows:
Recommended values: burst time of 30 or 60 seconds, threshold of 70–80% of the plan speed.