hotels with robust internet connectivity
 

I know this is a tall order, but my friend requires such for his job. If any of you happen to know of hotels (in BJ, SH++) with extremely fast (by China standards) internet, please post here.

Shangri la in Pudong and China World at Guo Mao are the best I've experienced but this is as of last year....things change:)

I'm actually at the Andaz in Xintiandi right now, and the internet here is quite impressive for a Chinese hotel. I'm getting consistent speeds of about 5mbps down and 1.5mbps up throughout the day, and moreover the GFW is conspicuously absent, leaving a VPN unnecessary (!).

The internet service appears (judging from the login page) to be operated by the Japanese telecom giant NTT DoCoMo, and I suspect that all traffic is actually being routed directly through HK or Japan (so, a hotel-wide VPN, in a sense). The manager wasn't sure how this worked when I asked, which was hardly unexpected, but told me that he thought all the Hyatt properties in SH were now using the NTT service.

This is strange since I could swear (I could be wrong) that the Ritz Carlton Chaoyang at Huamao in Beijing's internet is also run through NTT Docomo and it was not great and most certainly had GFW. I think (I could be mistaken) that there was a note either on the first page or on the table warning about access to certain sites...

Isn't this somewhat a function of website you are searching and the great (fire)wall?

In addition to the nice cookies, the Doubletree in Beijing has a hotel wide VPN (they are very proud of this), but its location couldn't be less convenient.