80/20 or stick with 40/10?

I have been on a 40/10 connection with an independent ISP for over a month. My connection is rock solid 39976/9992 and my downstream speed is consistently above 38Mbps throughout the day. My Fritz!Box shows an error rate which is negligible and I have had no disconnections. My ISP has offered a free upgrade to 80/20 but I am not convinced that it is worth it. My FTTC cabinet is about 250 yards away and my router shows that my line would sustain102.3Mbps down and 31.7Mbps up. As we are not a multi-user family, I am concerned that if I accept 80/20 I might be trading line stability for speed when the speed benefits are arguably negligible. Any thoughts?

stick with the 40/10 connection

There are quite a few reports of problems on 80/20 from people who had stable 40/10 before. It looks to be in the WBC or Openreach systems.

Most people I think are fine, but I would leave it until the reports stop coming.

I went to 80/20 as soon as it became available (on the trial) and it's been just as stable as the 40/10 was, I get a profile around 70Mbps at ~400 metres from the cabinet.

But now it's widely available I've quite a lot of sympathy with Bob's comment- if you're risk-averse then wait until BT get their act together.

Edited by billford (Tue 15-May-12 09:29:44)

I was on a good steady 38/9Mb for just over a year and then had the uplift back in April and to date my connection has been the same as before with a steady 77/18Mb and no problems at all. With the uplift my start off speeds was around 70/15Mb and over the week they increased up to my current speed. As have been said some have been lucky others have not and have big problems, at the end of the day it's up to you really, you can go for it and if your not happy drop back.
iechyd da

I say go for it. I only got FTTC last month but my totally stable 40/10 turned into a totally stable 55/15 two weeks ago. Didn't cost me anything - didn't even need to extend my contract.

My line was tested as capable of 81Mbit by Openreach when it was installed although the availability checker says 55Mbit for my line.

I upgraded to 80/20 a couple of weeks ago and it's been absolutely 100% solid, just as before, and I've got a full 80/20 sync with IP Profile and throughput to match.

Given your max attainable rate is higher than mine, you're even less likely to have problems.

I say go for it.

Thanks one and all. A lot to think about here.

I'm using a F!B 7390 on 80/20, my maximum attainable speed is quite a bit lower than yours (I'm actually running at my line's maximum of 62Mb) and it's as stable as it ever was on the 40Mb service (In bad weather I get a few CRCs, over the last 24 hours I have logged 6 CRCs), current DSL connection time is about 12 days and that was caused by a resync to a slightly higher speed.
IF you get some instability you can always adjust the F!B line settings towards 'maximum stability'. Please check you're running the latest firmware (05.22 for the 7390), my VDSL sync improved from 05.21.
Which ISP? Most will regrade back to 40/10 if there's a problem with 80/20.
If, (when) you go for it, please let us know how it performs.

Also, take a look at http://www.fritzforum.com/ , need more members!

Edited by Al1264 (Tue 15-May-12 14:56:19)

If BT offered the unlimited package on 40/10 I'd probably go with that if it was cheaper than the 80/20. But they don't so for me the 80/20 package would be the option. I'm not really sure why BT are limiting it to 80/20 as the 17a profile works upto 128Mb ish down 30Mb up before overheads are taken into account.