UK: Broadband.

[NayNay1991x]

This may not be useful for some but hey i'll post it .

Basically i dont know if you guys knew about it or not but Virgin Media (not sure about other ISP's) they are capping your speeds on how much you download.. Considering Virgin Media have an unlimited download rate allownace, you still get your speed capped if you download to much. I rang them up and said how come im only getting 2MB he said its because you've downloaded to much in the day (probs used 1GB today). I used to download way over 5GB possibly more in a day and never used to get my speed capped. :/

Dont know about you, but i told them that you will loose customers this way and its absolutely pathectic paying for a service your not actually getting.. Sorry to ramble on

 

[Alvin.C]

Hi,

I have Virgin Media back at home. I'm on the 10 Megabit service.

It's just the way it is with most ISPs unfortunately. To be fair, It is outlined in the terms and conditions. Most ISPs will describe it as a 'fair use', 'fair access' or 'acceptable usage' policy, and the policy usually involves the throttling of the customer's bandwidth (aka bandwidth capping or bit capping). With Virgin Media, it's outlined in the footnote of each broadband package page:

Acceptable Use Policy applies. Traffic Management operates from 4pm to 9pm and 10am to 3pm to ensure a consistent user experience.

However, Virgin Media only cap the bandwidth of so called 'heavy users' which they define as:

...the top 5% of users on a daily basis - those whose usage of the service would affect other users if they weren't managed.

When, and how much of the bandwidth Virgin Media throttles depends on the time of day, and how much bandwidth is used at a particular time of the day. You can check out Virgin Media's traffic management policy in the table provided here: Virgin Media Broadband:Traffic management - & Traffic management.

The trouble with these terms is that they don't seem to state what amount of data actually qualifies as unacceptable usage. All they mention is 'to make sure our service is fair for everybody, we sometimes moderate the speeds for the top 5% of customers who are downloading and/or uploading an unusually large amount.'

 

[NayNay1991x]

I Think its useless considering your paying for what you want and dont even get, its kinda gay when your on Xbox live or PSN and downloading demos.. then get capped

 

[Yami]

That's why my mother pays for a (truly) unlimited bandwidth package. We download over 100GB a month, there's no way any cheaper ISP would allow that ^_^

 

[C0RR0SIVE]

I know when I was in PA, and with comcast... They didnt give a freaking crap about it, as long as I didn't max my connection a lot....

 

[Oreo]

That's why my mother pays for a (truly) unlimited bandwidth package. We download over 100GB a month, there's no way any cheaper ISP would allow that ^_^

TalkTalk does.

Well, kind of. I consistently download between 50 and 80gb per month, i got one warning from talktalk telling me to cut back. But then they havn't said anything since.

I don't think they care so much these days, Bandwidth used to be a big thing, but it's not so much as a problem for ISP's these days.

But i have to agree, if you're paying for a service, they have no right to cap it. If they can't meet what they're advertising, they shouldn't be selling it.

 

[gurusan]

I am on BeThere. been with BT and Sky before and they were both DREADFUL.

I get amazing ping times and sync at 17mbit down/1.3mbit down. I download between 275-350GB/month and upload around 140-150gb/month and have never had any issues with Bethere/o2.

It's also only around 11 quid/month...I'm really dreading having to pay for slow internet in the states when I go back. It seems to get any decent speeds you have to pay LOADS of money.

 

[C0RR0SIVE]

Gurusan, where at in the US you headed to? I know that in southeast PA, Comcast usualy gives you a ~15mbps down, 7mbps up for like $60, but, they usualy forget to put the caps on, and you get nearly double that.

 

[gurusan]

I'll be on the West Coast...probably pacific northwest.

60 a month though!!! jesus.

Seriously, America seems like it's around 5-10 years behind Europe in terms of internet service.

 

[Oreo]

I'll be on the West Coast...probably pacific northwest.

60 a month though!!! jesus.

Seriously, America seems like it's around 5-10 years behind Europe in terms of internet service.

The technology is better, hence they have higher average speeds.

But there market isn't as competitive as ours hence the prices are quite higher. The UK is a world leader in broadband pricing, but a world loser in speed..

Is BeThere cable ? if not you must be hella close to an exchange. Out of interest, what speeds did BT and Sky sync you at ?