The European Commission (EC) has today taken another step forward in its efforts to produce a more accurate map of EU broadband ISP speeds and connectivity. TP-LINK, a global provider of business networking products, has now officially joined forces with SamKnows, the UK based broadband performance testing specialist, to produce the first report.

The move is being seen as a key part of assessing the success or failure of Europe's Digital Agenda project, which aims to ensure that all Europeans have access to superfast speeds of 30Mbps+ by 2020; with 50% or more EU households subscribing to an internet connection of 100Mbps+ by the same date.

SamKnows currently works with Ofcom in the UK to produce a similar report into the country's national average broadband ISP speeds (View Ofcom's July 2011 UK Speeds Report), which is done by asking thousands of consumer volunteers to install specialist Whitebox monitoring kit (i.e. a modified broadband router) alongside their home internet connections. This is often regarded as being more accurate than anecdotal speedtests and can also test other areas of the connection, such as latency and packet loss.



It's understood that SamKnows will make use of a modified TP-LINK TL-WR741ND Wireless N Router (aka - Whitebox) to conduct the study with roughly 10,000 volunteers from across Europe and data will only be gathered when the line is not in active use (idle).

The programme does not retain IP data and will report all results anonymously to SamKnows for analysis. Each volunteer will also benefit from the ability to view their own real-time data report; a showcase of their latest connection speeds and reliability.

European consumers can visit www.samknows.eu to join the scheme and apply for a free TP-LINK TL-WR741ND Wireless N Router. SamKnows is recruiting volunteers in: Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxemburg, Netherlands, Malta, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, UK, with additional volunteers sought in Croatia, Iceland and Norway.