Disappointing fibre install

Had fibre installed last Wednesday...23 Feb and here is a typical speed test result:

best speed result

typical test result

The engineer was really surprised with the slow speed was and rang through to BT Wholesale. Their response was that my street cabinet was only enabled to 12mb and that was the maximum I would get. BT Infinity checker shows expected speed as 38.5mb.
The cabinet is about 200 metres from my house and is one of the large new ones. BT engineer equipment showed 39.99mb down on his tester

Was BT Wholesale right in saying the cabinet was only enabled to 12mb? The engineer said that they were not supposed to do speed tests but he did and found he got a max of around 11mb.

I am using an ethernet connection to my PC's not that it should make any noticable difference.

Prior to this I was able to get just about 2mb down and .25mb up so a vast improvement on upload speed...but thats not really any bonus is it?

Do I have cause for complaint here....? I understood that each new cabinet would be enabled at 'full' speed ...it seems this is not that case?

Steve
Exchange is Chesterfield and went live from 16 Feb

*POST DELETED* - sorry ignore this post... I had failed to read a critical line of your post

Edited by nmg196 (Tue 01-Mar-11 19:18:33)

Please run the test at;

www.speedtester.bt.com

and post the test results.

The bit about only being enabled for 12 meg is pure BS. How old is the PC, my beast just cannot handle the speed, will always show around 17meg downstream, and I know for sure my line is spot on. The lads laptop shows around 37 via wireless. If the IP profile shown on the test is low, ring the CP, there's a fault.

Hi Steve,

Sounds a little fishy. What does the official BT speedtester report?
http://www.speedtester.bt.com

am using an ethernet connection to my PC's not that it should make any noticable difference.


... err.

Sorry, I did indeed miss that bit...

Fundamentally, if he got 39.9Mb on his tester there's no reason why your own modem shouldn't get within a few percent of that. They're talking rubbish about "up to 12Mb" - that doesn't exist, In fact BT guarantee you will get 15Mb. Have you got another PC or laptop you can plug in to try? Perhaps you have a faulty NIC or cable. You need to try and eliminate any possible problem with your own connection or computer before calling them out or you could be charged.

In fact the testers usually show a lower sync rate than that achieved by the VDSL modem.

In reply to a post by nmg196:

BT guarantee you will get 15Mb.

No problem with most of that post, but you are wrong there.

The minimum sync (barring the 5Mbps product) is 15Mbps. That isn't the issue for the OP.

Similarly the expected minimum throughput is 12Mbps, as you can see from the expected speed range on the BT Performance test.

It could be the ISP help is confused about the significance of the 12Mbps.

I'm not wrong about about the 15Mb minimum speed as it's quoted all over the internet and was repeated by BT to me today when they installed mine. They say: "customers can expect a minimum download speed of 15Mb on its new Infinity packages.". The difference between sync and throughput on the BT speed tester is minimal (a few percent) and would not account for this chap's problem. By "guarantee" I did not mean that they will work to make your line achieve this speed, I just meant that they will not leave you with a BT Infinity connection if they do not get 15Mb minimum sync on their tester. Ie they will downgrade you back to ADSL.

If they sync at 15Megs, how can they download at 15Megs?

How strange .

My sync is 39992kbps. My IP Profile is the maximum possible, 38717kbps.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

How strange .

My sync is 39992kbps. My IP Profile is the maximum possible, 38717kbps.

Why is that strange? Sounds normal to me.

he may well have a sync of 40meg but his throughput is capped due to something at BTs end. 15 meg is guaranteed throughput from openreach over the gea fibre, what the isp set for throughput is another story (12mb does sound rather familiar). Using the BT tester is the best way to find out what is going on.

They can't. You can't download at your sync speed (and I never claimed you could).

oops, missed page 2. Yeah straight on the blower to BT they have f'd something up.

What is strange is that you say it is normal.

using http://www.speedtester.bt.com I get the following:

Max acheivable speed 38717 down and 10000 up.

test shows 32246 down and 7992 up...then I do speedtest.net and get 2300 down and 6009 up

this all sounds OK...BUT why does speedtest.net show poor results and videos are not streaming OK. I have a 'download meter on Firefox and this shows about 800 max ?

In reply to a post by nmg196:

I'm not wrong about about the 15Mb minimum speed as it's quoted all over the internet and was repeated by BT to me today when they installed mine.

You appear to be mixing up min sync speeds, with "Assured Rates", something that i notice a few ISPs reps are doing also

The Assured Rate is 12Mbps

In reply to a post by nmg196:

They can't. You can't download at your sync speed (and I never claimed you could).

You said

They say: "customers can expect a minimum download speed of 15Mb on its new Infinity packages.". The difference between sync and throughput on the BT speed tester is minimal (a few percent) and would not account for this chap's problem. By "guarantee" I did not mean that they will work to make your line achieve this speed, I just meant that they will not leave you with a BT Infinity connection if they do not get 15Mb minimum sync on their tester

OK you've lost me now... My line has the same figures as yours. What's not normal about it? IP profile is always lower than the sync isn't it?

And speed is always lower than the IP Profile. Often considerably so.

Aquiss have clarified your confusion.

I am using BT Broadband as ISP.......

can anyone suggest somewhere to download a file from that might go at a reliable high speed?

I have tried download sites and share sites and they are disappointingly slow.

My real beef on this is that upload is constanly fast now...to bt vault it show upload of 850-900 but same file back down is slower...!

Steve

Edited by pouser (Tue 01-Mar-11 20:07:24)

In reply to a post by aquiss:

You appear to be mixing up min sync speeds, with "Assured Rates", something that i notice a few ISPs reps are doing also

The Assured Rate is 12Mbps

That's the second time you've posted this. Do you have a link or have you made it up?

What I was told today is that BT claim your minimum DOWNLOAD speed is 15Mb (not sync speed!). I might have been told the wrong figure today,but I'm not mixing up sync and throughput as I'm perfectly aware of the difference between download/throughput and sync speed.

"BT has said that customers can expect an average of around 30Mb and a minimum DOWNLOAD speed of 15Mb on its new Infinity packages." - and that's also what I was told today. They never mentioned sync speed. Source: http://www.broadbandchoices.co.uk/bt-infinity-review...

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

In reply to a post by aquiss:

You appear to be mixing up min sync speeds, with "Assured Rates", something that i notice a few ISPs reps are doing also

The Assured Rate is 12Mbps

That's the second time you've posted this. Do you have a link or have you made it up?

I was told by BT Openreach today in person. But a simple google shows it's also here:
http://www.broadbandchoices.co.uk/bt-infinity-review...

I don't know why everyone's getting so worked up and hostile over the difference between download and sync speed. They're almost the same to within 10% (assuming you're using BT's tester). This guy is getting 1.6Mb when he's expecting 40! A difference of that magnitude clearly has NOTHING to do with the IP network overhead, so he clearly has another problem.

Or are you really trying to say that getting 1.6Mb throughput on a line likely to be syncing at 40Mb is normal?!

OK I apologise, I meant "download" in each case (as their tester doesn't (can't?) measure your sync).

In reply to a post by pouser:

can anyone suggest somewhere to download a file from that might go at a reliable high speed?

This site:
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/download.html

How about a download from here ?

In reply to a post by nmg196:

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

In reply to a post by aquiss:

You appear to be mixing up min sync speeds, with "Assured Rates", something that i notice a few ISPs reps are doing also

The Assured Rate is 12Mbps

That's the second time you've posted this. Do you have a link or have you made it up?

I was told by BT Openreach today in person.

Not you, dude. Question to Aquiss "isp"

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

How about a download from here ?

I just tried that myself out of intrerest, and it tops out at 15Mbps, but I can get 36Mbps out of thinkbroadband's test files. Do you see the same? I was using a download manager which opens multiple connections in both cases.

In reply to a post by pouser:

using http://www.speedtester.bt.com I get the following:

Max acheivable speed 38717 down and 10000 up.

test shows 32246 down and 7992 up...then I do speedtest.net and get 2300 down and 6009 up

this all sounds OK...BUT why does speedtest.net show poor results and videos are not streaming OK. I have a 'download meter on Firefox and this shows about 800 max ?

That BT test is fine. Which means it is nothing to do with your end or the exchange. So what you were told about the exchange enablement was rubbish. It is indeed the expected minimum within the BT Wholesale system, not the maximum, and you just hit 32Mbps.

It looks as though BT Broadband have set things up to bypass their normal routers when a BT speed test is done. Everything else you do goes through their normal routers, and to me it looks like simple congestion at the BT end.

Edited by RobertoS (Tue 01-Mar-11 20:28:48)

I can't put my hands on the exact SIN doc right now as I am using my mobile to reply, however the following link should highlight the assured rates:

http://www.btwholesale-inspire.com/products2/broadba...

Nope

# 15 Mb/s minimum line rate
# Offers 2Mb/s upstream as standard with an option of 10Mb/s
# Service speeds of up to 40Mb/s downstream
# 8Mb/s standard throughput for 90 per cent of the time over the busiest three-hour period
# 12Mb/s elevated throughput for 90 per cent of the time over the busiest three-hour period
# Real-time speeds range from 220Kb/s to 4.9Mb/s (in 300Kb/s increments)

its showing 165kps...

100 mb file and will take 10 minutes..........!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What exactly is missing? That all looks fine.

BT Infinity! Nuff said!

The big isps cant cope lol

In reply to a post by aquiss:

What exactly is missing? That all looks fine.

What's missing is any reference to this:

The Assured Rate is 12Mbps

Could just be a problem with that particular server on speedtest.net. Did you try another server?

If I use the same server you used (Manchester), I get less than 1Mbps each way:
http://www.speedtest.net/result/1180094194.png

If I use the London server (or most others) I get around 32Mb down and 8Mb up:
http://www.speedtest.net/result/1180097294.png

This leads me to believe it's simply a problem with the server in Manchester (or perhaps a problem on that part of the network). The others all seem fine. Can you post the results for the London server, or from the thinkbroadband.com speed checker.

No he posted that:
"12Mb/s elevated throughput for 90 per cent of the time over the busiest three-hour period"

Throughput is the same as assured rate so the only difference is, his quote has extra detail over how it's measured.

In reply to a post by nmg196:

No he posted that:
"12Mb/s elevated throughput for 90 per cent of the time over the busiest three-hour period"

Throughput is the same as assured rate so the only difference is, his quote has extra detail over how it's measured.

It also says "8Mb/s standard throughput for 90 per cent of the time over the busiest three-hour period"

What do either of these have to do with 12Mbps assured rate??

Edited by BatBoy (Tue 01-Mar-11 21:29:51)

they use "download" to differentiate it from "upload", not to imply a difference between sync and throughput which is way too complex for them to handle.

The minimum download of 15M is the minimum predicted downstream rate BT Infinity was provided at, 30M average from the 15 - 40M range of user experiences.

Openreach have a CIR of 20M or line rate on the link from can to exchange, line rate is expressed as ethernet data rate on VDSL, it isn't ATM

so the 12M is for the premium "busienss" services paying more, rather than the 8M of the standard "home" services ?

and it's for 90% of the time, ie the same as the 2M on ADSL for 90% of the busiest 3 hour period. As you say, it's not "assured" it's indicative.

Still waiting for Aquiss to clarify....

15 meg is guaranteed throughput from openreach over the gea fibre

wrong, it's lesser of 20M or line rate.

Thanks for all the comments...the topic seems to have gone off track....!

I have waited for the 10 days trial period to be over...just in case and now find the real cause of the 'problem'

It seems that the speedtest servers dont cope well with higher speeds.

I can download files on all my PC's at the same time (from say the BBC or Microsoft) at up to 32mb per second total but none of them will run at any more that 5-6mb per second. It seems that servers cant (or wont) output anything above 5-6mb but will allow several connections at once?

Also I have used Rapidshare and no downlload will go faster than 1000kb per second...BUT I can download about 20 files at the same time all at that speed.

So....Fibre is good in that respect and after having such a slow connection before it seems the future has arrived at last!

Steve

use a download manager to download a file with multiple connections you will see that throughput hit full speed

Good .

The one BT test you did was fine, did you ever try the one on the main site here?

In reply to a post by pouser:

It seems that servers cant (or wont) output anything above 5-6mb but will allow several connections at once?

No this is not the case. I can easily achieve nearly the full 40Mb (I get 39.1 on my line) from the speedtest.net and thinkbroadband.com servers, so there must be another problem or perhaps some contention on your network. But it's definitely not the case that the servers can't cope - I've seen 91Mbs from speedtest.net when testing from our server hosted on a 100Mb ethernet connection at a datacentre.

Are you trying to test over WiFi which could potentially cause a lot of problems when testing connections this fast? You need to be testing on 100Mb ethernet cable connection to your router. Even my 65Mb wireless N connection cannot transfer data much faster than about 20Mbps even though my pc is only about 3 metres away from the BT home hub. Did you also try several different servers in your area and also perhaps, a different testing site?

As others have suggested, downloading a very large test file from thinkbroadband.com using a download manager such as FDM might be the best way for you to test your particular line while minimising the effects of contention.

Nick

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Still waiting for Aquiss to clarify....

You claimed that fast path is fine on a 6km line and that Interleaving was simply a cure for noise???

I think I know who I will believe thanks.

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

You claimed that fast path is fine on a 6km line and that Interleaving was simply a cure for noise???

and you agreed.

Why are you posting about that in this thread

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

You claimed that fast path is fine on a 6km line and that Interleaving was simply a cure for noise???

and you agreed.


I didn't agree with you. I was trying to point out your confusion with cause and effect.

Interleaving is a cure for noise? Congratulations Einstein.

Why are you posting about that in this thread

Because everywhere you pop up, you state the obvious and then break up the thread with your ridiculous semantics.

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

You claimed that fast path is fine on a 6km line and that Interleaving was simply a cure for noise???

and you agreed.


I didn't agree with you. I was trying to point out your confusion with cause and effect.

Interleaving is a cure for noise? Congratulations Einstein.

Why are you posting about that in this thread

Because everywhere you pop up, you state the obvious and then break up the thread with your ridiculous semantics.

I see you're having trouble working with the forum software. Keep practising sonny.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

I see you're having trouble working with the forum software. Keep practising sonny.

You've been warned several times about your attitude to other posters, I would suggest that you don't persist.

You're right. I'm having terrible trouble working this thing, so why don't you help me?

Start a new thread on the benefits of fast path on a 6km line. When the consensus here is that noise isn't a problem on long lines, so Interleaving is a waste of time, then I will point that out to all the high level support staff at BT and Sky who have decided (after trying many different options) that without the Interleaving the line is virtually unusable.

Or perhaps you will find it really isn't that cut and dried?

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

You're right. I'm having terrible trouble working this thing, so why don't you help me?

Start a new thread on the benefits of fast path on a 6km line. When the consensus here is that noise isn't a problem on long lines, so Interleaving is a waste of time, then I will point that out to all the high level support staff at BT and Sky who have decided (after trying many different options) that without the Interleaving the line is virtually unusable.

Or perhaps you will find it really isn't that cut and dried?

Perhaps you have a line fault? Sudden increases in latency can't really be due to noise.

Perhaps you have a line fault? Sudden increases in latency can't really be due to noise.

The simple explanation:

Long lines can mean higher noise levels. Fast path keeps latency down but can cause severe instability.

Interleaving stabilises the connection but increases latency in he process.

I could link you to some perfectly good explanations of that on this forum, but I'm not sure I know how to?

So I'll just quote one instead:

Credit to Rego for the explanation below

Fastpath is not really an accurate discription, I think perhaps direct path is a more realistic term for what is actully happening.

Fastpath is not necessarily about an increase in speed, although under certain conditions it can have this effect.

In fact, fastpath is just a different way in which the data is transmitted over your telephone line, which is most suited to telephone lines with a low attenuation figure, and a low noise factor.

Even if the attenuation is low but there is noise present on the line fastpath will be unstable, and liable to cause diconnections.

Which is why often an increase in SN margin is neccessary for stability, and this can negate any increase in speed initally gained by the switch.

The system used for people with longer lines, noisy lines, and lines with higher attenuation, is called interleaving, this system corrects most of the transmission errors on a telephone line, and so gives more stablity to the connection.

That is why, when you look at the modem stats from an interleaved connection you will see FEC Errors (Up/Down): 0 / 78,380 These are errors that have been corrected by the interleaving process. [although the bebox misreports these errors]

The down side of the interleaving process is the increases latency and the higher ping times, which are not so good for online gamers.

With fastpath this error correction is turned off so when you look at the stats from a fastpath connection you will see no FEC Errors (Up/Down.

Because there is no error correction unless the telephone line connection is very good it will almost certainly be unstable, and cause disconnections and stalling.

The advantages of fastpath, if you have a suitable connection, is it offers lower latency and faster ping times which for online gamers is important.

However this certainly does not mean that you will get an increase in speed in fact on longer or slightly noisy telephone lines, it will cause a drop in speed because of the higher SN Margin required for stability.

So there we have it.

Length increase = noise increase = instability = Interleaving requirement = increased latency.

I am sure you will find an exception to the rule or die trying, but I'm happy with this explanation thank you.

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

So there we have it.

Length increase = noise increase = instability = Interleaving requirement = increased latency.

I am sure you will find an exception to the rule or die trying, but I'm happy with this explanation thank you.

That equation gives a reason for increased latency on interleave versus fastpath, but doesn't explain your massive swings in latency which you are experiencing. These are more likely to be a line fault.

The swings in latency were caused by fast path when it was temporarily enabled.

That's why I said fast path wasn't really an option on my line.

That's the point you dismissed originally.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

That equation gives a reason for increased latency on interleave versus fastpath, but doesn't explain your massive swings in latency which you are experiencing. These are more likely to be a line fault.

Line faults don't cause changes in latency.

Either the packet gets through and you get a latency determined by the route taken and any congestion on it, or it doesn't and you get a lost packet.

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

The swings in latency were caused by fast path when it was temporarily enabled.

So what do you call the "pausing" if not swings in latency?

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

So what do you call the "pausing" if not swings in latency?

If there is a line fault, most likely packet loss requiring a re-send.

Absolutely nothing to do with latency.

Edited by billford (Fri 11-Mar-11 00:05:01)

In reply to a post by billford:

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

So what do you call the "pausing" if not swings in latency?

If there is a line fault, most likely packet loss requiring a re-send.

Absolutely nothing to do with latency.

When you're in a game waiting for the next packet, and it has to be resent, you will experience an increase in latency.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

When you're in a game waiting for the next packet, and it has to be resent, you will experience an increase in latency.

Nope, it's a lost packet, nothing to do with latency.

Latency is defined as the time taken for a packet to make the round trip from the send point to the destination and back again. If it doesn't make it then it doesn't have a latency time- it's a lost packet.

One day you should learn to admit when you're wrong- it would do your soul good, save the rest of us a lot of irritation and, in time, possibly lead to your opinions being treated with some respect.

In reply to a post by billford:

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

When you're in a game waiting for the next packet, and it has to be resent, you will experience an increase in latency.

Nope, it's a lost packet, nothing to do with latency.

Unfortunately, here we are talking about gaming and the fact is, the game pauses.

We are not talking about network latency.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

The swings in latency were caused by fast path when it was temporarily enabled.

So what do you call the "pausing" if not swings in latency?

As I went on to explain in the thread, The pausing was caused when BT swapped to fast path.

I had the line monitored remotely and a graph for upload and download produced. The consensus came down to packet loss and resending of data, understandable on a long line with fast path enabled.

In reply to a post by BatBoy:

Unfortunately, here we are talking about gaming and the fact is, the game pauses.

I'm not denying that, but it's a pause due to packet loss, not latency.

You could briefly lose PPP to your ISP, but it's not latency.

Someone could pull the plug out for a few seconds, but it's not latency.

It's packet loss.

You are demonstrating that mrnelster was perfectly correct- resorting to semantics. As usual when you're wrong.

Edited by billford (Fri 11-Mar-11 00:34:06)

In reply to a post by mrnelster:

As I went on to explain in the thread, The pausing was caused when BT swapped to fast path.

I had the line monitored remotely and a graph for upload and download produced. The consensus came down to packet loss and resending of data, understandable on a long line with fast path enabled.

Except that you said BT blamed it on Sky's poor equipment, so you had the problem on Sky.

In short what I explained was:

I had poor latency on Sky. That was due to high Interleaving settings.

BT blamed Sky, not me. There connection was no better. I wasn't happy paying more for something they said they could improve and didn't. In response they tried fast path. That is when the line became erratic and had to be reverted to interleaved.

My whole point was that BT should have known that they couldn't realitically improve latency on a 6km line and shouldn't have blamed Sky's equipment. That is all there in the thread.

You were being contradictory for some unknown reason. I thought it was obvious that long lines didn't handle fast path very well. I thought that was why Interleaving was adopted.

If it's just down to a noisy line, then you'll be fine with FTTC.
If it's a line fault on the E-side, once again FTTC will fix it.
However, if it's a problem on the D-side, you may suffer lower speeds on FTTC.

Sub thread closed

Please don't derail threads by bringing other discussions into them.

On the technical side, it seems people are nit picking and playing semantic games too.