Plusnet capacity during IOS 7 downloads

Just been having a read of a plusnet blog post about how they handle increased traffic.

http://community.plus.net/blog/2013/09/19/unpreceden...

It seems like they dont have enough back haul to cope with large increases in traffic - which makes me slightly worried as I was looking at signing up to get fibre with them.

Wondered if this sort of information was provided by the likes of BT etc as was expecting them to have more than enough bandwidth?

Week on week peak bandwidth use does not tend to suddenly jump 30% in one night. The trend over time is up, but usually at a rate that is fairly consistent.

Given the lead times and cost of ordering new bandwidth in anticipation would be expensive, maybe bringing forward a purchase that was due in October, but generally PlusNet follows rules on how much capacity is bought.

The interesting part is that with WBC they are billed on the 95% percentile, so get several spikes e.g. ios7, GTA5, CoD, BF4, Xbox One, PS4 in one month could be expensive if you don't allow some contention to kick in.

The difference with PlusNet is they tend to talk about this sort of thing.

Indeed that is true although it would be good to know that the ISP i pick has sufficient bandwidth in place to handle things like this.

Would be good to see some trends with ISPs named from the collective thinkbroadband monitors!

No ISP provisions for huge numbers of customers to download what appears to be 750-1000MB at the same time.

The difference between PlusNet and other ISPs is that Plusnet have a priority system but the others don't. The PlusNet system protects each user in two ways. It is explained a bit in the link you gave, and much more fully here.

You will probably find this page interesting as well, and the "Abnormal load" link near the bottom of it .

I was under the impression that BT pretty much always have enough bandwidth compared to other ISPs?

So a handful of days each year when there is a major event there is a small slowdown in background downloads. Plusnet's prices are competitive, intelligent traffic management is one ace they hold that allows them to do this. The choice you have is to go with an ISP that over provisions capacity to ensure they have sufficient spare to cope with events like that. So if you want to pay the prices of someone like AAISP, that's the choice you make.

In reply to a post by barker04:

Just been having a read of a plusnet blog post about how they handle increased traffic.

http://community.plus.net/blog/2013/09/19/unpreceden...

It seems like they dont have enough back haul to cope with large increases in traffic - which makes me slightly worried as I was looking at signing up to get fibre with them.

Wondered if this sort of information was provided by the likes of BT etc as was expecting them to have more than enough bandwidth?

My broadband isn't issues at all all day yesterday. U shouldn't worry about sign up.

In reply to a post by barker04:

I was under the impression that BT pretty much always have enough bandwidth compared to other ISPs?

BT Wholesale does, as they supply all except Sky, TalkTalk resellers, and a few small LLU's. BT Retail I haven't checked wrt yesterday and today. Maybe you should check their forum here, and also the BT Community ones, to see if anyone has reported issues?

I haven't seen any complaints here about PlusNet speeds in the last couple of days ....

Yes no problem here with plusnet over the last few days with no speed issues at all.

it is good that plusnet are open, BT were not problem free, but I think BT's issues were peering side not WBC side.

That graph I noticed 2 things.

The gold traffic itself almost hit the link capacity.
The silver traffic got squeezed heavily during the gold peak, during that short time period it was squeezed heavily I expect it was more than a "small slowdown". At 7pm silver had what looks like around 200mbit of traffic in use, between 9 and 10pm its squeezed down to barely 10mbit of traffic due to the requirements of gold traffic load.

This is a scenario where plusnet staff not too long ago were stating wouldnt happen.

I would also be concerned that on the point of sale plusnet say a certian thing is normally gold traffic but then it seems on a whim they can reclassify traffic. Not for me thanks.

Edited by Chrysalis (Fri 20-Sep-13 16:01:36)

Thats a very good point, it does look like they are at max capacity - guess its because for fibre they are even cheaper than talktalk!

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

I would also be concerned that on the point of sale plusnet say a certian thing is normally gold traffic but then it seems on a whim they can reclassify traffic. Not for me thanks.

That is gibberish.

If they do say at point of sale that a certain thing is normally Gold, which I doubt, to interpret that as meaning that thing will under all circumstances be Gold displays a lack of English comprehension.

Similarly, to classify this lengthy type of explanation, and all the others about their traffic management options, (previously linked to and including this link), when faced with tens of thousands of simultaneous 1GB downloads as a whim is itself incomprehensible.

The debate the OP started is a valid one.

I don't claim that PlusNet will not slow traffic, or get congested in these extraordinary circumstances. Neither however do I believe that BT Retail, Sky and TalkTalk were unaffected.

Nonsense like your contribution to the debate doesn't show anything except a lack of straight thinking.

Anyway, it's simple. There is no compulsion or even pressure on you to join PlusNet. It would be preferable if you talked sense when arguing the point, rather than launching into emotive rot.

(Reply not specifically aimed at you, Bob)

Perhaps users of other ISPs who frequent this forum could post a link to their respective blogs explaining how they handled the increase in traffic. FWIW I haven't had any noticeable performance problems, but then I haven't been attempting any massive downloads.

Not many will be visiting this forum. We need to visit the others. Where's the huge outcry here anyway? Is there one on this issue in the Community one? Nothing obvious that I can see without reading them all.

When I got home from holiday last night I updated 4 i devices to iOS 7 over a 2 hour period while doing other things on my PlusNet line, all with no problems at all. It does not prove anything but it worked for me.

sorry RobertoS I am talking sense, I looked at the published data by plusnet and gave my view on it, nothing more.

But you seem to have posted a rash reply.

Of course that graph is just one gateway, plusnet have others which may not have hit their limits.

Are you saying I am wrong the silver traffic got squeezed down to a tiny amount between 9 and 10pm?

I'm talking about the quote I gave from your post. Total emotive spin-doctor type spiel. Read my analysis of it calmly .

Something that is normally in a particular state is ipso facto not expected to be always in that state, and the presence of several lengthy detailed explanations of when and why it can be changed from that state is absolutely and completely opposite to "a whim".

Rational argument is fine. You are good at it. That post was not rational.

Edit - all other "unlimited" ISPs say "just trust us". And spend millions of pounds endlessly repeating that message.

Edited by RobertoS (Sat 21-Sep-13 00:51:12)

My broadband worked perfectly all night without a problem. I really rate PN and the service they offer.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Week on week peak bandwidth use does not tend to suddenly jump 30% in one night. The trend over time is up, but usually at a rate that is fairly consistent.

Given the lead times and cost of ordering new bandwidth in anticipation would be expensive, maybe bringing forward a purchase that was due in October, but generally PlusNet follows rules on how much capacity is bought.

The interesting part is that with WBC they are billed on the 95% percentile, so get several spikes e.g. ios7, GTA5, CoD, BF4, Xbox One, PS4 in one month could be expensive if you don't allow some contention to kick in.

The difference with PlusNet is they tend to talk about this sort of thing.

As a new PN customer I've been pretty happy with the service so far.

Agree that it's very good to see them discussing this out in the open. Looks good to me.

cheers, Martin