Switching ISP

Afteroon folks........ I have been pondering on chaning my ISP whom is currently Virgin Media to DSL connection as I have experienced problems with them and friends have general bad opinion of Virgin Media. Just to let you know a little history..... I have the (up to 20Mb) connection using origionally a Linksys router and then upgraded to a Belkin N series. I purchased a PS3 for online gaming and noticed my game play was lagging etc etc. So the question is am I doing the correct thing by leaving and secondly what shall i look for to to prevent this lag again !!!

It would be wise to actually check what ADSL services you can get first before parting with any cash.

LLU providers such as Sky and Be will give you the best speeds, biggest caps or no caps at all - no throttling - and at the lowest cost.

Use the link I have put below and it will tell you exactly what ADSL services you can get by just putting in your post code or phone number (i.e. it may say "Sky LLU" or "Be LLU" - that means you can use Sky or Be and they are an LLU service).

Link to ADSL services checker.

I have looked into 02 but until my line is operational I cannot do any checks just yet. What is an LLU and should I be just looking for this?

LLU = Local Loop Unbundling, which means the ISP has there own ADSL equipment in your exchange.

Some are good, others are bad.

Bed/O2 are good at the moment. O2 got into broadband by buying Be and using their stuff. Be had very few customers for the kit so performance was brilliant. As O2 marketing gets in the customers, who knows what will happen? It may get over-loaded, or O2 may provision extra kit to cope.

Sky/UKOnline seem quite good, specially as Sky is very cheap if you have Sky TV. But Sky Connect, which is not LLU is very poor.

TalkTalk opinions vary a lot. For low usage probably OK.

Tiscali/Pipex is a disaster area.

All other "up to 8Mb" services are supplied through BT Wholesale, so when you check your exchange don't think that means you can only have BT or the LLUs, you can have pretty well any ISP.

Edit:- If you use the checker TK linked you to, there is also a mapping system to check your area.

Edited by RobertoS (Mon 03-Mar-08 15:05:55)

As RobertoS says - LLU is where an ISP has it's own kit in BT exchanges.

It is the big players who can only afford to do this.

With a good LLU provider (such as Sky/UKOnline and Be) - you will probably get much faster speeds than with any non LLU ISP - no throttling of your connection - plus it will cost you a lot less cash every month as well.

As an example - if you have/or want Sky TV and can also get Sky LLU for broadband - you can get a connection via Sky LLU from �0 a month to �10 a month depending on which of Sky's LLU options suits you.

Edited by deleted (Mon 03-Mar-08 15:28:31)

Oh right thanks for that mate. My area has a local exchance anyway and i am only 706 m from it so i should get good speeds. O2 seemed a good call as they said upload speed is up to 1.5Mb which they also say is good for online gaming. Not sure if this is the case what do i actually need for gaming

On LLU you can get speeds up to 24Mbps - IPStream will only give speeds up to 8Mbps.

As far as what speeds you could get - either on LLU or IPStream - if you put yout stats here (i.e. attenuation, sync, snr) - we can estimate what your possible speeds might be.

Gaming requires good pings.

Edited by deleted (Mon 03-Mar-08 15:36:00)

How can i identify my stats then, Bt said a connection of 6.5 was what i would receive but there not LLU

it looks like your priority (gaming) is latency (pings) not speed. i've heard reports that some llu isps (sky) have very high pings by default, and need calling to sort it out, someone using sky should be able to confirm/deny.

You can't tell your stats until you have an ADSL connection (the stats are determined by the quality of your BT phone line).