Masts should have dedicated business grade connectivity that is separate from the cable network, that is assuming the mast in your area is even using the virgin network for its backhaul.

Another reason it won't be DOCSIS is on 4G masts speeds are a lot faster in the upload than the standard cable products.

Basically support are telling porkies

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Masts should have dedicated business grade connectivity that is separate from the cable network, that is assuming the mast in your area is even using the virgin network for its backhaul.

Another reason it won't be DOCSIS is on 4G masts speeds are a lot faster in the upload than the standard cable products.

Basically support are telling porkies

Maybe it's pure coincidence then. Seems strange he mentioned it though and asked to see if it happened at the same time.
It was 4 weeks ago but I'm sure he said 'we' installed a new 4G mast too. The conversation was in that context. He wasn't blaming anyone else. That's what it all sounded like. I'm sure he mentioned possibility of congestion. That's the way I read it. He was talking in context that it could that and there fault. I think he said more than he should of done to honest and was kinda thinking aloud if you know what I mean. He was trying to help, i'll give him his due.
From all that was said, and the way he was talking, none of it would of made any sense if was on dedicated connection. I'm sure I was on the same wavelength as him & that's what he meant. Not unless I totally misread the whole conversation. In which case I dunno what he was trying to say or suggest

Just a quick follow up to say, I have now dumped virgin media.

I ended up having to get a brand new phone line installed & get Fibre-to-the-Cabinet installed, both from another provider, which has fixed every single problem I had.

So I am now a happy chappy

I would like to thank everyone for their input and information given to my post.

In reply to a post by MHC:

In reply to a post by Ignitionnet:

They still shape traffic on downloads and have not made any secret of that.

There is no traffic management on downloads.

Of course if you have proof, rather than libeling...

yeah I think ignition needs to clarify what he means as shaping is a form of traffic management.

Those to statements are incompatible. If they are shaping traffic then that is management.

I'm aware of the issues recently. They lasted for 48 hours about 2 weeks ago. My speeds dropped by about 20%. I found that doing a hard reboot of the modem solved the problem once the network problem resolved. I've been back to normal latency and speeds ever since.
It appears you have switched ISPs. Fair enough. I'm sticking with VM because of their long term reliability and speeds better than the headline figure. I get 160Mb/12Mb 24/7, not to mention superior TV. I have never been traffic shaped or managed.

Traffic shaping is where certain sorts of data get restricted to allow better movement for other types of data. VM is known for restricting peer to peer data because torrents can take up unfair amounts of
bandwidth. The advantage of having 160Mb means I am in and out really quickly even with a 3Gb file. This takes slightly less than 3 minutes. Perhaps that is why my torrents have never suffered from shaping.

Why do VM shape at all? This is because their network architecture is different than Openreach. VM using NTL legacy networks provides for a number of households from a single length of coax. A heavy user on this coax can affect the others. BT uses the existing individual premises copper from the street box so doesn't have to protect other users. Although Openreach and VM both use a fibre hybrid, the BT architecture is less problematic.

VM doesn't traffic manage, by restricting bandwidth on users connections. This is a thing of the past, since Virgin has upgraded much of its network hardware to allow more traffic along the same cable. Their plan is to upgrade technology further to increase potential speeds.

Hi roughbeast, Thank you for your comments.

For 6 years I used to get more than the stated download speeds 24/7 & never once experienced traffic shaping or management. I don't use torrents either.

But in my case it just went faulty over night & even a new superhub 2 didn't fix it. Virgin said nothing was wrong because OOKLA gave 128Mbps, even though I demonstrated to them downloads & updates would not finish. The technician just blamed all my devices at fault and or the sites I went to.

Even itunes updates, a small 39 M/byte file or mobile system updates & apps from sony would not download. Not to mentions dozens of uk websites unavailable. I have a Plusnet 38Mbps fibre package now & it's perfect so far.

So as you can see, that's not traffic shaping, it's just faulty. I would of said congestion to begin with but it seems more like some kind of network error to me.

I just wish virgin could of fixed it and would of stayed with them.