Financial Trader Considering AAISP...please assist

Currently with Plusnet but seriously considering a move to A&A
I am a financial trader and need....Constant speed 4mb down / 800k up... plus high reliability and a true tech/backup service.
I was considering UKonline which has LLU at my local exchange (just 600 meters away) and offering 16Mbs, till I saw the reviews on their Tech/backup service and reliability.... don't sound good, and then I read some good things about A&A, so here I am.
My trading day is 2pm - 9pm Mon to Fri.
Speed of trade execution is essential... a 10 second execution time can cost 20 points on the Dow. I currently start my day at 4Mb but by 5pm this has started to dwindle to 1.5Mb which needs a router reboot to get back to maybe 2.5Mb.
I am using a Voyager 2110 router.... but Kitz DMT test is showing Downstream Attenuation at 15.5dB and SNRM at 6.1dB.
Any feedback on A&A and the above would be much appreciated before I dive in.
Thanks Guys and Gals

I've no idea about the AAISP service but those prices are eye-watering! They had better be good at those prices.

Regards,
Steve

Only 6dB snr at 600m from exchange doesn't seem too good.

Rather than change isp I'd first make certain you have best connection
possible to your phone line.

Master socket with integral filter.
Router sited near master socket and connected by a short cable.

On 8Mb/s over 600m I'd expect snr a lot better than 20dB.

Although I'm only around 800m los distance from exchange, line comes from a
junction box 400m further away and that's mostly overhead. So my 800m
from exchange is really 1600m of line distance. On 8Mb/s I had mostly around
18dB but with severe dropouts and modem disconnections.

A&A put me back on 2Mb/s and snr is mostly around 30dB and reasonably steady.
Ftp speed tests on 2Mb/s vary around 210-230kB/s (vs 0.3-730kB/s over period
on 8Mb/s).

A&A don't have official support out of office hours but there is usually a
presence on <irc://irc.uk.nixhelp.org/A&A>.

DL

Depends on how much you download during their peak hours.

I moved from Nildram to A&A and I have carry-over each month. So my total bill is �18.99p inc VAT.

Technical is fantastic.

Speed is up too.

Assuming your modem is connecting at 4Mbps - then something is wrong with the figures you've shown us you should be connecting at 8Mbps.

The fact a router reboot gets you some more speed lends weight to the issue being a telephone wiring issue, most likely in your property

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/faq/sections/radsl.html#235
and
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/faq/sections/install.html#226

Are worth a look.

I assume 'SNRM' was the margin, in which case you would expect it to be low... Max ADSL will always try and reduce the SNR margin to the minimum possible.

A&A are good, but if you're trading lots of money you ought to have some sort of backup in place. Neighbour's wifi? 2x DSL lines? 1x DSL + 1x cable? Mobile data package? something like that, or any downtime could get expensive.

Is off-peak unmetered?

Have to say I'd expect A&A to rank as the number one ISP in every category in this country at the prices they charge for the quotas given.

And I thought Zen were expensive.

Currently they only charge for DOWNLOADS between the hours of 9:00am and 6:00pm Monday through Friday. Outside those hours and H24 Sat & Sun, NO charge for DOWNLOADS. UPLOADS are NOT charged at all.

It has been the practise not to charge UP/DOWN for Christmas/New Year week.

If I go outside my 1GB quota, which I only did during my first part-month; you are charged for what extra you have used. ie go over by 78MB and you pay for 78MB.

Unused quota in a month is carried over to the next month. This is not cumulative. Therefore, due my usage of less than 1GB per month, I now start each month with a 2GB allowance.

Their fault monitoring, fault resolution appears to be 100% the best (I have not needed it yet) and they have recently introduced user accessible fault testing. So I can trigger off a BT test on my circuit and get the results in seconds.

I am reluctant to praise A&A any further in case 100% of every other ISP's customers read this and transfer in and strain the resources, so lets just say that changing to A&A was the best thing I ever did!

In reply to:

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I am reluctant to praise A&A any further in case 100% of every other ISP's customers read this and transfer in and strain the resources, so lets just say that changing to A&A was the best thing I ever did!

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At their prices I don't think there's much chance of 0.01% of the UK's users moving to A&A. Not only are they expensive but their website is a confusing mess of information that will turn most people away. I gave up trying to figure out what the service plans might provide me after 15 minutes trying to navigate around the site.

Edited by deleted (Fri 01-Aug-08 18:41:34)

Depends how much and when you download.

I'm retired, well sort of - I'm a County Councillor and use my broadband for remote access etc as well as my own usage. I do not receive any payment from the County Council for remote access or for broadband or telephone etc.

My monthly bill has been �18.99p ever since the first full month. So for me not many cheaper options with A&A service and reliability, if any.