Sorry no old stats the only difference that has been mentioned by Sky and Plusnet is that O2 had their LLU gear in the exchange where Sky and Plusnet use BT gear. I am pretty sure it was ADSL2+ with O2 and I was using my Netgear DGND3300 V2 modem.Below is a small sample of speeds with O2..

Thu 09/05/13 10:38 7.55 Mbps 7.36 Mbps 1.17 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Wed 08/05/13 22:13 7.51 Mbps 7.50 Mbps 1.16 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Wed 08/05/13 22:12 7.56 Mbps 7.39 Mbps 1.16 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Wed 08/05/13 09:27 7.41 Mbps 7.43 Mbps 1.16 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Tue 07/05/13 16:31 7.50 Mbps 7.41 Mbps 1.17 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Mon 06/05/13 23:35 7.55 Mbps 7.50 Mbps 1.17 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Sun 05/05/13 09:18 7.56 Mbps 7.41 Mbps 1.17 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Sat 04/05/13 09:48 7.53 Mbps 7.44 Mbps 1.17 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Thu 02/05/13 20:16 7.52 Mbps 7.43 Mbps 1.16 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Wed 01/05/13 19:12 7.51 Mbps 7.43 Mbps 1.16 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Wed 01/05/13 00:36 7.52 Mbps 7.43 Mbps 1.10 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Tue 30/04/13 17:05 7.52 Mbps 7.42 Mbps 1.17 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Mon 29/04/13 18:58 7.50 Mbps 7.40 Mbps 1.16 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2
Sun 28/04/13 10:38 7.51 Mbps 7.42 Mbps 1.16 Mbps 78.86.216.229 O2

Edited by deleted (Mon 07-Oct-13 20:05:00)

Sorry - I assumed you knew what an ISP tag was. So my calling you rude was inappropriate.

It is odd Adam hasn't replied. He may not have seen your PM on Friday, as they work Monday-Friday office hours, but I would have thought he would have done today. I'm not an expert on searching the Community forums so can't see if he has been there today.

It might be an idea to start a thread there, just with a couple of speeds from O2 and PlusNet, with those line stats as well. I find it a bit worrying however that you also had a similar issue on Sky. That strongly suggests it isn't an exchange issue, but something between there and you or at your end that happened coincidentally. A new or replacement Sky box perhaps?

Re the technical side of it, PlusNet is ADSL2+ just like O2 LLU, and the difference in connection speed should have been minimal. The phone support person was simply wrong, as is any reply here that supports it. There is the possibility you had asked O2 to reduce your noise margin to 3dB, where their and PlusNet's default is 6dB, but I have a gut feel you didn't. I wouldn't expect such a huge difference in speed from that anyway. I think it much more likely there is a problem somewhere.

Edit - And yes, those O2 figures are ADSL2+.

Edited by RobertoS (Mon 07-Oct-13 21:29:17)

Thanks, I did have my SNR at 3db with O2 for all the time I was with them, on the odd occasion if they reset it to 6db I lost about 1.3meg d/load speed but they always put it back to 3db and speed went back up. When I joined Sky my land line would drop the dialing tone after pressing 3 or 4 digits and Sky sent out an engineer from Openreach who carried all the tests he could and found no fault. It was only when another engineer decided to swap things around at the exchange that all was well, but did not make any difference to my download speed.
I am using the Plusnet modem now but did try my Netgear DGND3300 without any noticeable change in stats so I am not sure what else I can do and I am not happy just getting 4meg download speed and I might have another word with Tech support and see if they can drop the snr to 3db's.

Not good . To me it sounds as if something was messed up on the move to Sky.

Apparently it is possible to get the margin lowered to 3dB, but the people you phone won't have the authority. You could re-open this thread perhaps. How much it will improve things I don't know. The forum reps can do much more, as I said before .

You are connected to different equipment at the exchange end from your former LLU service using different jumper wires to before. Sometimes you get a particularly good combination of equipment and line conditions, which performs better than expected, sometimes the opposite happens and you get an underperforming combination.

As you've gone to PlusNet via Sky, and had a fault repaired whilst on Sky that might have led to part of your line being swapped for a different pair of wires, there's really no way to know precisely what the root cause of the slower speed is, especially without detailed diagnostic information from the O2 setup to compare to what you have now (attenuation figures at a minimum, detailed information on bin SNR and bit loading would be of interest). Any PlusNet / BT Wholesale speed estimates might have been based on a line with better parameters than the one you have now - but there's no way to go on a 'shopping expedition' for a better pair or return to your original pair if part of your line was swapped for a different pair.


If your PlusNet connection is sufficiently stable, it may eventually find its way to a 3dB noise margin by itself, which should improve the connection speed. Beyond that, I'm afraid an estimate is an educated guess and no more. A speed lower than the estimate is not grounds for escaping from your contractual obligations, though PlusNet have the discretion to release you should they wish to.


As the Be/O2 residential network is closing, you've just left Sky and seemingly don't want to go back and any BT Wholesale based ISP is likely to perform similarly if not identically to PlusNet (they use the same equipment, and you will remain connected to the same DSLAM port if you migrate from one BT Wholesale based ISP directly to another), that doesn't leave many options.

SamKnows gives the remaining options as AOL, C&W, TalkTalk and Tiscali, but quite apart from this data not necessarily being up to date, it's also misleading. Both AOL UK and Tiscali UK's operations have long since been taken over by TalkTalk, so those three are only actually one option for new customers (and I very much doubt there are still three separate networks after all this time). What's listed as C&W is the old Bulldog network, which still used as a wholesale provider for certain connections (ADSL24 still lists a C&W based product, I'm not sure if any other ISPs still sell a C&W based product).

Rather than looking to escape from your PlusNet contract and move to one of the two remaining ADSL options, which could turn out to be even worse, what does the BT Wholesale checker list against your phone number for FTTC? It seems that at least some parts of your exchange area may have FTTC deployment to come in the next few months, which could offer you significantly faster speeds with, as I understand it, no need to buy yourself out of your PlusNet ADSL contract if you upgrade to PlusNet Fibre.


Meanwhile, it would seem a good idea to follow the suggestions you're being given by RobertoS about bringing your case to PlusNet's attention.

Thanks again for all the help, I have an option to go to Virgin Media as I was with Telewest many years ago and the cable duct is outside my house. It might be reasonable to assume Sky messed things up but the land line fault occurred a couple of weeks into joining Sky and prior to that my download speeds were about 2 megs slower than O2. I was advised again by Plusnet to send a complaint about my speed which I did and at present I am waiting for a reply.

It must be old age or something, I have registered for the forum and followed your link but could not find how to send a new post in that thread. I can quote and reply to the message that's there but how do I post my own message ?

You can either post a reply on an existing thread (which is, in effect, posting your own message), as you have already found, or create a new topic in the forum by clicking on the forum name "Broadband and Routers" in the "breadcrumb trail" near the top left then clicking "New Topic"

Edited by kasg (Tue 08-Oct-13 10:50:27)

In reply to a post by David_W:

Both AOL UK ... operations have long since been taken over by TalkTalk

While AOL BB (not AOL UK which is part of AOL Inc) may now be owned by TT, they do still offer separate LLU BB products over a separate network (according to SamKnows). Admittedly not brilliant.

Indeed they are one of the few (only) retail ISPs to still offer a Partial LLU product, but only "Up to 8 Meg" [ugh].

Edited by XRaySpeX (Tue 08-Oct-13 13:03:17)

Not sure if someone has been tweaking but my speed has improved over the last 24 hours..Stats below
Link Information

Uptime: 0 days, 23:33:08
DSL Type: ITU-T G.992.5
Bandwidth (Up/Down) [kbps/kbps]: 448 / 6.103
Data Transferred (Sent/Received) [MB/MB]: 57,52 / 274,79
Output Power (Up/Down) [dBm]: 11,8 / 19,5
Line Attenuation (Up/Down) [dB]: 22,6 / 42,5
SN Margin (Up/Down) [dB]: 20,6 / 2,6
System Vendor ID (Local/Remote): TMMB / ----
Chipset Vendor ID (Local/Remote): BDCM / TSTC
Loss of Framing (Local/Remote): 9 / 0
Loss of Signal (Local/Remote): 1 / 0
Loss of Power (Local/Remote): 0 / 0
Loss of Link (Remote): -
Error Seconds (Local/Remote): 9.566 / 0
FEC Errors (Up/Down): 0 / 0
CRC Errors (Up/Down): 13 / 12.358
HEC Errors (Up/Down): 7 / 12.273

SNR shown as 2.6db !