Ouch so £22 per month for the broadband, which shows it is the Offnet

TalkTalk is known to under invest in offnet capacity, even if its a small exchange and has the more expensive PlusNet pricing their unlimited is cheaper http://www.thinkbroadband.com/isp/plusnet/package/13...

Standard price in the smaller exchanges is £16.99 if you move the phone to them too and a good chance (but no guarantee) that you will see closer to the 1.5 Meg more of the time.

OK, can you recommend some reading for me because the jargon/technology is way over my head. As starters where can I find an easy to follow primer which tells me the basics such as what is OffNet?

Offnet - off network - i.e. TalkTalk have their own data network in 96% of the UK, but outside of that area is known as off net and as they have to pay more due to the low volume they purchase in these areas they tend to under invest.

Some reading material for you:- http://www.robertos.me.uk/ and also http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

TalkTalk have their own data network in 96% of the UK, but outside of that area is known as off net

Isn't it more to the point that TT don't have their own equipment in exchange and so are using BT's? Isn't it still then handed off to TT's own network? So perhaps 'Off-net' is misleading.

The Off-net transits a big chunk of the BT Wholesale network to where its handed over, and it is this chunk of network and the price TalkTalk pays that are the bottle neck, rather than the fact it is a BT Wholesale DSLAM, or BT equipment in the exchange.

I would talk about how Datastream fared badly years ago with Tiscali when it was still a BT Wholesale DSLAM, but too many terms to confuse poster.

In short - leave TalkTalk, don't join Sky as they probably have not unbundled exchange.

It uses WBC just like any other non-LLU service, and is handed over at MSILs at WBC node(s). The MSILs and transit from them to TT routers are the bottleneck.

Thanks for all of the advice, I think its clear what your recommendation is.


Just one follow up, I have been using ping graph to monitor my connection, not speed but drop outs in connectivity. Is it possible to send you one graph of drop outs for your comment? Its a period at about 03.00hrs when I see approx 6 min loss in connectivity and three of these in quick succession? I see quite a lot of these (at all times of day but worse after dusk and before sunrise), sometime single loses and sometimes in runs of 3 losses of connectivity, my router doesn't always show a red light but I loose connectivity (indeed most often it shows 3 green lights).

Hope this makes sense

Thanks

Just use the share option and post the link and am sure one of us will take a look.

You have a very long telephone line, so some drop outs may have to be accepted. One assumes you've done the usual testing from the test socket, unplug all extension wiring etc

An ADSL line can show ping errors without the DSL sync dropping, i.e. you get bursts of errors that create slows downs, but not bad enough to force the modem to resync. Since a resync takes 10 to 30 seconds, for short bursts of noises most routers will accept the errors and hope that things will recover, if errors persist the modem will drop the line and reconnect.

Not sure that I understand the "use the share option and post a link" can't I just e-ail it as an attachment?