Inconsistent broadband speeds

Hi,

I have been having trouble with my broadband connection for months and have been dealing with Virgin Media support escalations.

During the day I have a very reliable 2 meg connection and can stream from Sky Player, BBCi player, etc., but in the evening it drops to between 400 & 800 kbps. This speed drop will not be investigated by BT (thru Virgin) as it is within their acceptable range. I can stream BBC iplayer, but not Sky and the iplayer will frequently drop in bit rate and even pause at the lowest rate.

I accept that I will never get super fast speeds as I live too far from the exchange, but I currently have 2816 kbps connection and a 2000 kbps ip profile. My connection has been as high as 3500 kbps with a 3000 kbps ip profile.

I have used tb meter during streaming and speedtests, which shows an even level during the day and erratic levels at night. I have also been running routerstats, which shows the noise margins to be consistent through the day and erratic at night.

I have a Netgear DG834G v2 with latest updates and have used a Belkin as well, but that kept disconnecting every evening even after being swapped for a replacement.

My computer has been changed and I have plugged direct into test socket - pretty much all the standard checks have been done. BT have done line tests during the day, which pass, but they will not do the tests at night which is when the fluctuations occur.

Even browsing is affected as web pages frequently hang when loading and I have an internet radio which also loses the stream in the evenings.

BT have apparently told Virgin that 'natural wastage' is needed for my speeds to increase and that the 'VP' is not running hot.

I guess my main question is - is it acceptable to have a speed reduction of more than 60% at night and should the noise margins and speeds fluctuate so much?

I truly hope someone can shed some light on this as I have been back and forth with Virgin support for 3 months now.

Thanks in advance,

Daren

Which exchange are you on? The link to what samknows about it would be ideal.

If there is no VP congestion then it is simple congestion or traffic management on Virgin. A migration to a better ISP would solve it.

How much do you pay, and are you still in a minimum term?

Steady noise margin in the day and going down by three or four dB evening and night is normal. It also fluctuates rapidly by 1dB or so at that time of day.

Sorry, Daren, I'm unable to help with your prob, but there will certainly be some clued up guys here who will be able to.

If it's any slight consolation (which I doubt) I too am suffering inconsistent results (from btinternet), with dl ranging from 3660kbps down to 1383kbps in the past month, measuring with both btspeedtester and tbb. All the other readings are also up and down like the proverbial w*.'s d*s.

Unfortunately the bt guys have been unable to explain the wide variations so far.

Good luck!

Hi,

This is the exchange: Warmwell exchange

The noise margin fluctuates by more than 1 dB and has frequent spikes greater than this. This is captured by routerstats.

I do wonder if the Virgin Media Servers are the cause and use this analogy: 50 meg connection droppping to 20 meg at night would not have any real impact, but 1.9 meg dropping to 0.6 meg or less would be very noticeable.

I am not in a minimum term, but I have been with VM since dial-up days and have my virgin email tied to many online accounts. I am in the process of converting these accounts to a new gmail address. I am wary about changing as the problem has at least been escalated within VM and I would have to start again if the problem followed me.

I pay £17 per month and have no ther services with them. My migration choices are limited as the exchange is not unbundled.

Thanks,

Daren

Any RouterStats down-spikes that are in red are just the router too busy to reply to the request for the info. Only the normal colour spikes are actual falls.

How much do you download? That's quite a low price.

Hi RobertoS,

The graph is all one colour. I have seen the red spikes which drop to zero, but apart from that they are all black.

I don't download much, but my son plays xbox online and my daughter just chats online all night (eyes roll). I use the bbc iplayer to catch up and would use sky player, but it just will not run in the evening. The kids are always complaining about slow speeds, but generally it is worse mid week and less so at weekends.

I use an internet radio during the day.

I ma not listed as a heavy user by VM as it has been checked. I would guess between 20 and 30 gig a month max.

if you are maintaining a 2000 IP profile then it isn't a line issue it is ISP or exchange congestion. Virgin and other ISPs using NTL infrastructure have never been brilliant in terms of peak time capacity, in the pub on Saturday lunchtime (Tesco) it was speed testing at under 1M with a 6M sync. A test at 6am should validate this.

"MAC please"

You could consider IDNet Home Max at a few pounds more. Home Lite probably wouldn't be enough.

See here.

Might be worth if to stop the moaning.

Edited by RobertoS (Wed 01-Sep-10 14:21:11)

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Might be worth if to stop the moaning.

I'm sorry, but I thought it was a perfectly reasonable question that I had originally asked - what a fool I must be to hope to get a reasonable speed at the times that matter.

I guess you feel it acceptable to pay for a service and get a 60% or more reduction at the times you actually want to use it !!!!!

I will not be 'moaning' on this site if that is the kind of feedback you deem useful.

Heh heh!

I was referring to this moaning:- "The kids are always complaining about slow speeds".

A few pounds a month to avoid that could be a good investment.