Plusnet capacity to Apple CDN poor ?

Various apple devices had updates released tonight. Upon updating I discovered that via Plusnet over AC wifi the speed was incredibly slow, taking a good 5 minutes to download a 50mb app update. If I VPN to a friend's router who has a BT Infinity connection, the problem goes away, and the download runs as fast as the uplink of the VPN.

What have plusnet broken now?

I've turned my macbook on for the first time in a few days and the update is crawling along and reports about 50% done and 2hours left

Edit: Doesn't appear to be much better if I use my Pulse8 line either so it's possible it's not actually Plusnet that's the problem but rather Apple haven't allocated enough bandwidth to handle the number of users trying to update

Edited by dragon2611 (Thu 13-Aug-15 23:55:18)

I can confirm the OS X update downloaded at 100% full speed on a BT retail connection yesterday evening (2.12 GB under 4 mins)

Mine too (on BT). Came down surprisingly quickly although it was only 800MB. Also installed Office 2016 for Mac last night which downloaded fast as well. But, not sure I like the ribbon bar on the Mac version...

Similarly, I often do the MS Solitaire Daily Challenge. For my sins I also log in to the Solitaire.

That login via Plusnet typically took 10-20 seconds, as did the next step of getting to the Daily Challenge page.

Yesterday was my first on AAISP. Two to three seconds for each step.

all is good on aaisp ?

So far .

which is interesting as you still on BT wholesale, and plusnet say BT wholesale is the cause of issues.

Something not adding up, it seems the best thing for people to do is leave plusnet if they value reliable good performance.

In general terms is the BB connection noticeably any better ..... so far?

Most pages seem to load more snappily. Particularly when loading the MS Solitaire stuff, where I do have it logging in automatically. That took 20+ seconds and now takes under 10, then the next step to the Daily Challenges took possibly 10 seconds and now takes 2-3.

Thinkbroadband and BT Wholesale speedtests effectively the same top speed as before. Not the 2-3Mbps difference claimed by Plusnet detractors. I intend to look further into that. I'm wondering if it is to do with (a) obviously non-IP Profile ISPs and (b) BT Consumer possibly not using WBC at their end. Or in the latter case maybe just a WBC >> WBMC difference at the handover nodes.

Entanet WBC results would be useful info.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Most pages seem to load more snappily. Particularly when loading the MS Solitaire stuff, where I do have it logging in automatically. That took 20+ seconds and now takes under 10, then the next step to the Daily Challenges took possibly 10 seconds and now takes 2-3.

I've noticed since about Dec 2014 (and I migrated in to Plusnet in June 2014) that the "feel latency" of web pages on a Plusnet FTTC connection from an ethernet connected desktop PC is more like a 3G/4G cellular connection. BT FTTC felt more responsive.

I just assumed some caching or some minor router congestion, which I guess is expected at a lower price.

I'm paying £19.99/m for broadband, but would have to pay £30/m for Sky Pro, the only other huge ISP unlimited option with static ip that I can find so far.

I have had the same experience. It took over 3 hours to download a 1.5GB upgrade to my iPod Touch on Friday. The day before the iPhone and iMac upgrades took a similarly long time. Even app upgrades of 50MB via iTunes took about 15 minutes. And this is on an FTTC service where I generally get 60MB download speeds

Other than that, web browsing was fine.

I did think it might be Apple, but as this was happening over a 2 day period I started to suspect PN was throttling the downloads.

PLUSNET SLOW DOWN

I too have been under the same reduction in my overall speeds since i first took out FTTC 24+ mo. ago..

At first it was a gradual degradation in my downstream speeds however over the past 5-6 months the speeds have dropped off substantially as compared to when my line was first enabled.
I was able to actually achieve 69+Mbps and now I am hitting about 43Mbps.

My upstream on the other had has seen a perceived slow down and actual tests carried out over on bt wholesale speed test has almost halved my upstream to 11Mbps from about 18.5Mbps

I have raised this issue several times with Plusnet but only after my more challenging questions asked went unanswered in my support tickets.

In relation to actual CDN from various couriers I have noticed vast differences in speed throughputs Apple CDN being one such network.

It really saddens me to feel like PN have lied to me about what they are able to do to solve this matter and what they are unable to do to solve this matter..

I said if my speeds were to continue to degrade on their current trajectory then it would most definitely trigger a fault at the then current levels of 45Mbps but now they just move the goal posts and dropped my IP profile instead and as such my threshold for triggering a fault has also trailled down too.

It's pathetic and very unacceptable to be sold a service only to end up having a percentage of what was agreed to and paying a premium for this service.. My latency is also very sloppy and does not seem as "snappy" as it once was.

I used to be all for Plusnet but now I do not recommend them to others.
As for the static-IP comment above well thats just not good enough if the ISP reduce the speeds as much as PN have done.

In reply to a post by majika2007:

I said if my speeds were to continue to degrade on their current trajectory then it would most definitely trigger a fault at the then current levels of 45Mbps but now they just move the goal posts and dropped my IP profile instead and as such my threshold for triggering a fault has also trailled down too.

If your IP profile has reduced, it has not been caused by Plusnet.

Edited by kasg (Sat 15-Aug-15 16:38:05)

Post deleted by seb

Edited by majika2007 (Sun 16-Aug-15 10:51:09)

In reply to a post by majika2007:

kasg: who by then I assume your gonna say BTO??

The IP Profile is automatically set based on your sync speed with the cabinet.

See 1.2.1 here http://www.sinet.bt.com/sinet/SINs/pdf/498v6p0_C.pdf

This is an automated process that no one is influencing.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

Various apple devices had updates released tonight. Upon updating I discovered that via Plusnet over AC wifi the speed was incredibly slow, taking a good 5 minutes to download a 50mb app update. If I VPN to a friend's router who has a BT Infinity connection, the problem goes away, and the download runs as fast as the uplink of the VPN.

What have plusnet broken now?

This is more of an apple problem. i have an AAISP account which had the same problem. the virgin account i have was running much faster due to local caches i would of thought?

In reply to a post by clivers:

This is more of an apple problem. i have an AAISP account which had the same problem. the virgin account i have was running much faster due to local caches i would of thought?

I wondered as MacRumors and AppleInsider have reported that Apple are building their own CDN instead of using Akamai etc.

My parents are with BT and I can VPN to their server, and although they only have 10mbps upload, I was getting stunningly faster updates (to ap[ps in iTunes, and the OS X update) than directly through Plusnet.

Caching would explain it - one to watch.

In reply to a post by AndyHCZ:

In reply to a post by majika2007:

kasg: who by then I assume your gonna say BTO??

The IP Profile is automatically set based on your sync speed with the cabinet.

See 1.2.1 here http://www.sinet.bt.com/sinet/SINs/pdf/498v6p0_C.pdf

This is an automated process that no one is influencing.

Nah I reckon there have to be people manually looking at millions of FTTC lines and editing them by hand.

Seems legit.

In reply to a post by Ignitionnet:

Nah I reckon there have to be people manually looking at millions of FTTC lines and editing them by hand.

Is that part of the apprenticeship training offered by BTW for ISP Tier 1 support staff, or is it a promotion/demotion for such staff?

Post deleted by seb

Got to admit that I was having a laugh reading your post despite the fact that by the time I got to Shopping Time I was getting bored and that about 50% of the post is total poop and 90% off-topic. I hope it gets left in place, then we can all learn about what's going on in the world

I got all the way through it after coffee-make at halfway.

He actually makes a few good points amidst the several misconceptions and erroneous "facts". No solutions of course.

It's rather a shame he constantly has to display Tourette's Syndrome in his last two posts. I find it rather distracting and off-putting, rather than adding the emphasis I expect he intends.

I doubt if Corbyn would be wowing the lefties if he spoke like that .

Post deleted by seb

Edited by majika2007 (Tue 18-Aug-15 20:03:37)

If you can't make your point without swearing (masked or otherwise) then don't make it.

We have no issues with people sharing negative views of providers or other matters but these can be made without inappropriate language.

Downloading the El Capitan Beta 5 update (2.45GB) through apps store is taking an age currently, been going for about 10 mins and only reached 298MB.

Yet the other day I downloaded Beta 4 in a couple of mins... who do I blame for this one!

who do I blame for this one!

The deity of your choice? It is the ongoing trouble that unless you have monitoring of the whole network it is very difficult to state exactly where the bottleneck is - people blame their ISP but it could as easily be Apple or it might even be that there is an interconnect down somewhere.

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

Yet the other day I downloaded Beta 4 in a couple of mins... who do I blame for this one!

'Twas ever thus - downloading the same size file from different places at different times can take vastly different lengths of time. Unlikely to be an ISP issue.

In reply to a post by ian72:

who do I blame for this one!

The deity of your choice? It is the ongoing trouble that unless you have monitoring of the whole network it is very difficult to state exactly where the bottleneck is - people blame their ISP but it could as easily be Apple or it might even be that there is an interconnect down somewhere.

In reply to a post by kasg:

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

Yet the other day I downloaded Beta 4 in a couple of mins... who do I blame for this one!

'Twas ever thus - downloading the same size file from different places at different times can take vastly different lengths of time. Unlikely to be an ISP issue.

Well, to put it in perspective, currently I'm downloading an update from a usually very fast servers... my latency on my BQM's has jumped very high though the connection is barely transferring data, yet sped tests are performing fine... even over seas....

Oh and one of my BQM's has started to show some packet loss (which has become a usual thing but not until around 4PM - 9PM) so if its not Plusnet... I'm going to point the finger at BT Wholesale... reason for this pointing is that packet loss issues as I found out yesterday also affect my neighbour BT connection!

and before anyone points the finger at the NGA or Exchange... it don't happen on TBB's BQM only on one at Rapidswitch maidenhead which ping my connection, my neighbours and another 3 connections elsewhere...

I'm not trying to have a pop at Plusnet here... but very annoyed at the ongoing issues and sick of the lack of support that so many ARE NOT getting!

I just downloaded the El Capitan beta (6GB) through app store in about 11 mins. It comes from Apple's CDN server, same as all OS updates.

I regularly use downloads from Apple's CDN server to test broadband quality and have done for quite a while now, there is oodles of capacity and I have never once caught it going at less than line speed on BT connection at any time of day even on big release dates.

You prob need to raise this with Plusnet if you want it fixed.

Well I've had a rant on their forum... but they will just blame Apple... speed tests are OK... modems synced without errors... been through similar [censored] with them already too many times and it just comes to it being there fault and they don't know what to do...

They have admitted its there issue and they can't fix it... they have wiped all early termination charges from my account and CISAS forced them into paying compensation out to me too... I need to move the connection but no idea where to go...

Also supposed to be moving home soon... and maybe city so don't want to be contracted for something good here and then [censored] elsewhere!

I was looking at getting it moved over to Pulse8 for the time being as Plusnet is just getting worse and worse by the week... but Pulse8 have stil not replied to my 3/4 emails requesting information so I'm not going to be placing any orders until I hear further.

This generally happens when you look for problems.

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

Well I've had a rant on their forum... but they will just blame Apple...

They have admitted its there issue and they can't fix it...

Huh?

Sorry.., thats not related to the Apple CDN issue!

In reply to a post by AndyHCZ:

This generally happens when you look for problems.

Looking.... I don't need to look for them pal!... they keep looking for me it seems...

Now unless you are going to be of any help or contribute any useful information I would ask you keep your opinions to yourself

Edited by mlmclaren (Thu 20-Aug-15 14:21:24)

Post deleted by RobertoS

Replied... can confirm I'm not!

Yes, I've just seen your reply .

The download finally finished... clicked restart to install update and then failed to verify the files...

Corrupt download possibly?.... so its crawling along from the start again now.... I'm going to hop gateway and see if this helps!

Traceroutes to the server might be an idea, can compare slow vs fast

just change isps and be done with it. All these issues will go away.

In reply to a post by vimto_girl:

Traceroutes to the server might be an idea, can compare slow vs fast

It's all done now... hopped gateway and then the update was downloaded in 4-5 mins!

I did try a traceroute to a domain I found on a US Comcast tracert and it went through BT Faraday and on to BT Europe servers...

In reply to a post by Chrysalis:

just change isps and be done with it. All these issues will go away.

I want too, I really do... I'm awaiting some information from Pulse8.... I can't get into any contracts at the moment... I'm supposed to be moving at some point in the next 4 - 28 weeks

Silly as that sounds!

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

I did try a traceroute to a domain I found on a US Comcast tracert and it went through BT Faraday and on to BT Europe servers...

You need to traceroute to the actual CDN server you are downloading from, the domain for the IP should be something like uklon***.aaplimg.com. This is going to be very different for someone on an US Comcast connection.

Edited by deleted (Fri 21-Aug-15 07:39:09)

I did the traceroute to aaplimg.com thinking it would pick up the location itself, which it seemed too!

That's not right - aaplimg.com resolves to one of multiple IP's, none of which are a CDN server (they eventually redirect to www.apple.com)

You need to traceroute to the IP you are downloading from, and have a set of good vs bad.

Also seen this issue the past few days with app updates. If I come of WiFi and go onto 4G I get full speeds.

I had terrible speeds just now downloading IOS 8.4.1: estimated 4 hours. I killed the download, connected to a VPN (I have a collocated server in London) and the download completed in <8 minutes.

Connected via ptw-ag03 (I have to use an ag gateway for my IPv6 trial account to get its correct prefix assignment).

Edited by DougM (Fri 28-Aug-15 16:24:19)

In reply to a post by DougM:

I had terrible speeds just now downloading IOS 8.4.1: estimated 4 hours. I killed the download, connected to a VPN (I have a collocated server in London) and the download completed in <8 minutes.

Yes I have a VPN and that did the same. Very annoying.

Has this been raised on the plus net forum?

This issue has been very noticeable this weekend.

Took 5 minutes to install a 17mb app and currently waiting 1 day + to download OSX El Capitan

Worth noting on Virgin Media I'm getting 14.5Mb/s speeds ie near enough the full 150Mbps speed over WiFi (with their provided router) on the OSX upgrade. Is the issue only with Apple downloads and nothing else?

Just Apple downloads.

Plusnet support proving useless.

Seems as soon as I hopped gateway from bng03 to ag04 the speeds maxed out the connection again

In reply to a post by brandscill:

Seems as soon as I hopped gateway from bng03 to ag04 the speeds maxed out the connection again

pcl-bng02 to ptw-ag02 here and I can now preview songs in iTunes again that wasn't working. Cheers.

I've tried discussing it with support but they're not having any of it.

In reply to a post by brandscill:

I've tried discussing it with support but they're not having any of it.

I'm still in contract, but already looking where I might move to.

Hmmm, no changes then, amazing when you see posts from over a month ago resurrected to continue discussing the same issue.

I do say it is another thing I can confirm I have seen a drastic improvement on since leaving them!

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

Hmmm, no changes then, amazing when you see posts from over a month ago resurrected to continue discussing the same issue.
I do say it is another thing I can confirm I have seen a drastic improvement on since leaving them!

It is a shame, I moved from BT Infinity in June 2014 and until about March 2015 had no problems whatsoever with Plusnet. Now 90% of the time things work, and I don't heavily use my connection - but when I can't download reliably from iTunes and its fixed by VPN to a friend on BT Infinity, I get annoyed.

I can't afford AAISP as I use over 100gb a month (video streaming) - and I really prefer static IP for some of the work things I need to do from the line.

Based on getting the best between Price, Performance and Features (Static IP) I would say Sky Pro!

I only really recommend a few providers as it is based on contracts, they are BT, Sky, Zen...

There may be others but prices start shooting up and also some other reasons, like Pulse8 as well as being expensive monthly seem to have an odd way of signing people whether it be migration or new line (ruling out any previous migrations issues) they seem to charge for ADSL circuit to be installed and activated (which is costly anyway as its wholesale price not subsidised) and then charge another fee to upgrade that circuit to FTTC!

I'm currently in a wee pickle myself as I've been tasked by my grandfather in-law to get his monthly outgoings for telecoms reduced to bare minimum due to him recently being forced into retirement, he was pretty into a deal he had seen from TalkTalk but after advising him on a few requirements and prices don't include Line Rental and some other bits, I've now got the job of sorting the best deal without o much fuss as it will be remote now that I live in another city.

Currently he has Sky's BB Unlimited with Anytime Calls, Sky are increasing his Line Rental in December by £1 to £17.40 but then following that in January his phone tariff is going up from £5 to £8!!!

However after looking around, I feel Sky are going to be the best deal and also be the easiest to manage from a distance.

So Monday I will be in negotiations with them over getting a new deal for new contract.

Plusnet is a viable option price wise but is not worth the hassle with the network issues and the fact that currently I see too many complaints about migrations/activations going wrong and then the inability to contact there support.

Can I ask, have you used TalkTalk Fibre yourself? Their DNS sucks so pages "feel" like they load slowly (easy to switch to google dns anyway), however a torrent maxes out the full 80Mbps night or day and speedtests the same.

Their customer service sucks but their connections are just fine.

I personally was a big supporter of Sky, however I was using all my own hardware. When my own hardware broke and I was forced to use the Sky Hub, I realised how poor it was. It would constantly fall over with the demand I placed on it, reboot itself etc. Also weirdly, I started to get evening throughput issues (dropping from 80Mbps to sub 10Mbps) so moved ship. I currently have a VirginMedia line and a talktalk one. Both are superb for me.

Your BQM looks great.

what made you forced to use the sky hub? I am not.

In reply to a post by AndyHCZ:

Your BQM looks great.

Aye, looks very good when you consider the ammount of data being transmitted near constanly over the last week or so...

And then also during the same periods there can be multiple live streams going on too...

These things whern't possible with Plusnet

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

There may be others but prices start shooting up and also some other reasons, like Pulse8 as well as being expensive monthly seem to have an odd way of signing people whether it be migration or new line (ruling out any previous migrations issues) they seem to charge for ADSL circuit to be installed and activated (which is costly anyway as its wholesale price not subsidised) and then charge another fee to upgrade that circuit to FTTC!

I contacted them about the charge for moving my BT phone to their line package - it's a bug on their website. There's no charge for taking over a BTw line from another provider. My usage has never gone above 60GB so no prizes for guessing where I'll be going once I manage to get out of my Plusnet contract.

if migrating a FTTC connection 'now' there should only be a £30 charge which is fine...

unfortunately if its new connection there is a charge for the £90 managed install charge, £50 for DSL circuit activation and then £30 fibre activation...

£50 is not really required but Pulse8 confirmed that they order a new ADSL line and then an upgrade to fibre order is then placed and done following the ADSL lines provision.

I can assure you this is confirmed, 3 times in fact!

Been noticing the issues with Apple's servers for a little while now but since ios9 and lots of new updates I've noticed it's got worse. I realised it must be plusnet at fault when I switched off wifi and downloads were much quicker on 4G. App downloads in iTunes on the mac are also really slow. I've done some checking and found the downloads speeds were much lower than what they use to be and were around the ~1Mbps somethings getting up to 30Mbps if Im lucky but around the 15Mbps Range typically. I use to get 70Mbps when doing speed tests a year ago but now Im lucky if I get 60Mbps. I wish the apple downloads were hitting 60Mbps but 40Mbps is around the max for them now I've unplugged the modem to see if that helps. So far everything is download faster again but for how long I don't know.

Plusnet seems to be getting slower and slower for a lot of things.

In reply to a post by maximono:

Plusnet seems to be getting slower and slower for a lot of things.

My parents on BT Infninity report very slow downloads from Apple app store for iOS and Mac this week too.

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

if migrating a FTTC connection 'now' there should only be a £30 charge which is fine...

unfortunately if its new connection there is a charge for the £90 managed install charge, £50 for DSL circuit activation and then £30 fibre activation...

£50 is not really required but Pulse8 confirmed that they order a new ADSL line and then an upgrade to fibre order is then placed and done following the ADSL lines provision.

I can assure you this is confirmed, 3 times in fact!

Weird, i rang them pulse8 today, i asked for some clarification regarding FTTC migration and associated fees, they informed me of the unusual and somewhat pointless process that tt go through, that is place an order for ADSL (which is apparently needed to get your line connected to their LLU kit in the exchange) then basically simultaneously they upgrade this to a GEA service,

So they don't actually provision a adsl service that you are no longer able to receive,due to it being jumperd and filtered in the fttc cab
But they do ( tt business) apparently, charge them a whopping £75 fee ,for a FTTC migration, which pulse 8 say they are passing on , But considering BT openreach no longer hold SP's to a 12mth min term for FTTC migrations and charge a lot less for migration fees, than they once did,
Maybe it's because they are offsetting their overall costs incurred from adding new FTTC customers , so those who migrate are getting shafted imo

Edited by tommy45 (Fri 23-Oct-15 18:03:28)

So as I understand it, pulse8 charge the following for new FTTC customers in 2 ways... note that both ways required setup on TalkTalks LLU with an immediate regrade to Fibre using GEA...

1. Migrating from another provider (Eg. Sky) requires them to migrate Sky GEA FTTC > TalkTalk LLU (£0) and then immediate regrade to TalkTalk GEA... this costs the same as most providers at £30!

2. New Line Setup - Require new line installation (£92) and activation on TalkTalk LLU (£50) and then immediate regrade to TalkTalk GEA (£30)

I hope the way I set it above helps... it does seem to be related to the awkward way TT Wholesale do the orders but the issue I have with it is that Pulse8 should either be making TalkTalk fix this "odd" ordering process or be making TalkTalk Wholesale cover the cost.

Anyway, I think anybody with any relevance to TalkTalk should be more concerned about their identities for the moment.

I know I've got a busy weekend ahead of me assisting folk with changing passwords and such.

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

So as I understand it, pulse8 charge the following for new FTTC customers in 2 ways... note that both ways required setup on TalkTalks LLU with an immediate regrade to Fibre using GEA...

1. Migrating from another provider (Eg. Sky) requires them to migrate Sky GEA FTTC > TalkTalk LLU (£0) and then immediate regrade to TalkTalk GEA... this costs the same as most providers at £30!

2. New Line Setup - Require new line installation (£92) and activation on TalkTalk LLU (£50) and then immediate regrade to TalkTalk GEA (£30)

I hope the way I set it above helps... it does seem to be related to the awkward way TT Wholesale do the orders but the issue I have with it is that Pulse8 should either be making TalkTalk fix this "odd" ordering process or be making TalkTalk Wholesale cover the cost.

Anyway, I think anybody with any relevance to TalkTalk should be more concerned about their identities for the moment.

I know I've got a busy weekend ahead of me assisting folk with changing passwords and such.

Well i was quoted a £75 fee to migrate a BTW based FTTC service to them, (Rip Off) which according to their price list is called On-Site Fibre Upgrade
(From Existing Broadband) When there is no "on site" work needed nor is it an upgrade for a FTTC migration, so why they are charging for that i don't know, something seems a miss to me

Edited by tommy45 (Fri 23-Oct-15 21:42:11)

OH [censored] yes I forgot they increase the prices, so that mean then that my last post needs correcting too....

1. Migrating from another provider (Eg. Sky) requires them to migrate Sky GEA FTTC > TalkTalk LLU (£0) and then immediate regrade to TalkTalk GEA... this costs the same as most providers at £75!

2. New Line Setup - Require new line installation (£92) and activation on TalkTalk LLU (£50) and then immediate regrade to TalkTalk GEA (£75)

I understand that Pulse8 are contract free, but that doesn't give them the right to make up costs surely... I feel that they will not exist too long with an attitude like that, if it be for lack of custom or a ruling against their sales.

AIUI the problem Pulse8 encountered once we started publicising their excellent products and pricing on here, was that the one-month (i.e. no-minimum term) terms they offer caused several people to migrate to them ADSLx >> FTTC with no upgrade charge, avoiding many competitors' FTTC upgrade charges, then these users migrated out again immediately to their preferred supplier's FTTC.

They had to re-introduce their blanket FTTC setup charge of £75.

Fair enough charge all those who don't already have an active FTTC service the £75, but it isn't on or fair imo them charging that amount for a simple FTTC migration,they could charge the standard fee of £30 and still cover their costs,
Lets put it this way i will not pay £75 to migrate, i think it is extortionate ,as i'm sure quite a few others will think the same,
As for the monthly min term, people i would think would be unlikely to leave if the service provided is good,

Edited by tommy45 (Fri 23-Oct-15 22:19:20)

Not if TalkTalk are charging them £75.

I'm a bit confused now... what is the wholesale costs for a provider to migrate FTTC to FTTC .... and how much is it for a provider to setup an FTTC from new???

AFAIK Pulse8's high monthly cost was to cover profits, the activations and connection charges where just passing on the Wholesale charges and nothing to do with making a profit

In reply to a post by mlmclaren:

I'm a bit confused now... what is the wholesale costs for a provider to migrate FTTC to FTTC .... and how much is it for a provider to setup an FTTC from new???

AFAIK Pulse8's high monthly cost was to cover profits, the activations and connection charges where just passing on the Wholesale charges and nothing to do with making a profit

CP-CP GEA Migration - same product/premises £11.00 + vat

PCP Only Install £49.00
Engineer Installation with Openreach Modem £92.00
Managed Engineer Install with Operneach Modem £92.00

Edited by tommy45 (Fri 23-Oct-15 22:30:07)

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Not if TalkTalk are charging them £75.

Well then they need to bin of TalkTalk or force TalkTalk to fix the stupid costs!

Talk talk if they responsible are being greedy, as they will also make money from calls and a little from line rental, because they don't sell FTTC without line rental

LMAO

Pulse8 - FORCE TalkTalk to do something? Dream on .

So they ditch TalkTalk Business. Who do they use instead at a better price and with a comparably good product?

In reply to a post by tommy45:

Fair enough charge all those who don't already have an active FTTC service the £75, but it isn't on or fair imo them charging that amount for a simple FTTC migration,they could charge the standard fee of £30 and still cover their costs,
Lets put it this way i will not pay £75 to migrate, i think it is extortionate ,as i'm sure quite a few others will think the same,

Nobody is forced to join them, so by definition no extortion. You compare what they offer and their prices to join and ongoing with any other ISP you fancy, and choose.

As for the monthly min term, people i would think would be unlikely to leave if the service provided is good,

I'm telling you what happened. The users involved were not interested in waiting to see. They just wanted to use it as an easy way to avoid ADSLx >> FTTC upgrade charges by whichever ISP they wanted to move to. They joined and left within a month.

They have other choices of Wholesale provider to choose I suppose they will kick up a fuss when they see a lack of new customers...

Not to mentioned it probably won't be much longer before theres another non contract CP.

Seems like things have gone away off topic lol.

I got in touch with Plusnet on the live chat and mentioned that apple downloads were awful, they tried to sneak the blame in on my wifi which I hands down told them it wasn't the case as other services were fine and Im using an Asus Wireless AC router and getting great speeds on network transfers. Anyway they had me run wireshark and analyse the packets being sent during normal and slow downloads from apple and send it to them. Normal is a joke because on my 70Mbps capable connection the fastest I see from apple is about 40Mbps but that quickly drops to about 20Mbps. I managed to get it to go slow after doing a pause and resume in iTunes where my download of an app was then stuck at 1Mbps. Makes no sense. It can't be apple thats the problem as downloads over 4G seem to consistently out perform my fibre and my 4G speed at home isn't even that great, something like 15Mbps tops.

Oh well See what plusnet say once they've had a look at the data. I did mention others seem to have the same problem and they should check there end but I got nothing back from that as always when u say it's not just you with a problem.

I have an adsl connection at the paltry speed of around 0.95. Update to iOS 9.1 took 25 mins!

Plusnet simply don't want to know. Forum team don't care, chat don't care, my ticket hasn't even been looked at.

Installing 10.11.1 update at the moment and it'll take 5 hours! Ridiculous.

In reply to a post by brandscill:

Installing 10.11.1 update at the moment and it'll take 5 hours! Ridiculous.

Friends of mine on Sky ADSL and BT FTTC have reported the same thing. If you pause a download and resume it in the Mac App Store then sometimes it speeds up. This must be Apple's CDN that is acting up.

I got a reply back from plusnet, saying that because I uploaded the wireshark data to Dropbox they are unable open it as they can't download from 3rd party websites! What a joke! they are an ISP Tech support team, they should be able to download stuff! Crazy. So I managed to record a couple of seconds of data to send to them. At one point on a pause and resume of an app download in iTunes I was getting 300Kbps! Thats terrible for a 70Mbps connection, surely something is really wrong. I just can't see how it's apples server at fault here otherwise there would be many more complaints coming in and someone who works at apple and uses apple products ( because they would) would have noticed and got it looked at. Whoever is at fault it's getting extremely annoying and it's just potluck now if you get a fast download or not. though on 4G it's fast.

Have you asked PlusNet where they would like it uploaded to? It is possible they have a company policy not to allow staff access to 3rd party sharing sites.

I would agree but at the same time it's slow on my Plusnet connection it's rapid on another. If the CDN was suffering surely it would be suffering for everyone?

Now into my second year with them and it's clear that Plusnet has increasing problems, aggravated by management's steady hacking back of their once superb support team. However, we have two iPads and one iPhone; our ADSL2+ line downloaded IOS 8, IOS9 and subsequent updates for all three, taking only a few minutes for each.

I didn't experience any problems myself downloading ISO updates and I know the latest download of Mac OS X El Capitan was quick after a slow start. at times I have to pause/resume to get the downloads kicked off at a high speed but come to think about it it's been like that since switching to plusnet fibre or not long afterwards. Problem just seems to be apps, app updates including IOS, through iTunes and mac app store. Starting to think it's maybe apple but Im gonna have to get to a friends house who has BT not plusnet.

I've now been told it's been escalated to the traffic management team for review and I should hear back in 3-5 Working days. I got a very condescending email explaining that downloads are measured in MB/s not Mbps .. eat ect. The reason I was saying Mbps was because my traffic monitor on my mac can be set either way and I have it set to Mbps to see if Im getting anywhere near my actual line speed. Seeing download speeds from apple of 300kbps is really that not KB/s..

I also noticed earlier downloads from dropbox were slow on my iPad. I'll test some other sites and dropbox again.

currently trying to download iOS9 to restore an old iPhone and the current estimate for completion is 19 hours. this is the second time i've tried today - the first having quit after an error while i was out.

i'm on plusnet FTTC with a typical download speed of 3.5MB.

i've also had the problem with single downloads never getting above 1.5MB, while multiple downloads use all bandwidth.

i think i'll be looking for a new ISP soon.

well, i've just switched connection to via VPN and my update download is rattling along now.

clearly something plusnet need to sort out asap.

Just wanted to add my two pennies to this:

I've noticed that Apples OS X update downloads have been pretty slow these days. Today I've refreshed my Macbook Pro from scratch and the OS X updates and app downloads from Apple's OS X App Store are painfully slow. Definitely something amiss here with PlusNet's connection to Apple's CDNs (probably Akamai).

All other major players and bandwidth hogs; Netflix, YouTube, etc. are fine.

I'm on a Business FTTC Unlimited (76mb) package with a good ~50mb speed throughout the day and night.

I may give their business support a call tomorrow and see if its a known issue.

Please do, if anyone is likely to investigate it's business support.

Has anyone noticed there speeds for Apple Downloads are back up to scratch now? I was worried when I purchased the new Apple TV and got it on friday that it would be a pain to use with the slow downloads but my speeds started going back to normal a day or 2 before. Im currently downloading a game on the mac app store at 55Mbps, which is a good speed for me. All other downloads of apps have also been speedy, seems either apple have fixed something or plusnet have.

I find some days it's fine and other days it's not.

Wouldn't say it's consistent yet.

How are people testing their speed to Apple's CDN? Via a URL? Surely there aren't so many updates that it can be tested a few times a day?

I believe by attempting to download an app from the store. There are quite a few apps available

Ah right, yeah, I suppose a big game download would make a good test.

In reply to a post by Oliver341:

Ah right, yeah, I suppose a big game download would make a good test.

HD movie (rental or purchase) is a couple of GB. Mac OS X update was 5 GB for the download. (ie, a DVD install).

Some iOS apps are 50mb or even 500mb (e.g. Word, Excel) and they're backed up and update on your iTunes even if you never sync your iOS device.