🚀 go-pugleaf

Thanks to the folks who responded to my query. After I posted, I began
to feel a bit guilty about having taken the lazy approach and not looked
for the answer myself. So I did. I searched (mostly with AltaVista) for
"factors affecting Internet speed" and got some illuminating results.
Everything I discovered corroborates what the posters here have said.
Some interesting stuff turned up, so I thought I should share the links.
To wit:

http://www.earthlink.com/internet/speed/connections.html

http://www.rahul.net/howto/connectivity.html

http://www.toast.net/performance/index.html

http://www.cnet.bigpond.com/Briefs/Guidebook/Netspeed/ss06.html

http://home.glasscity.net/support/online/pages/advancedspeed.htm

http://home.glasscity.net/support/online/pages/speed.htm

J...