Are Coms now throttling?

Are coms now throttling?

Tonight since about 10 or 11pm I've noticed both usenet and torrents being throttled to about 350kB/sec. I thought it was originally something amiss at my end so I've tried other servers etc but all remain capped at approx 350kB/sec. I checked the settings and its nothing wrong at my end.
Normal http downloads seem unaffected and so does video streaming. They come in at around 730kB/sec which for me is my max speed.

I've been a long long time customer of ADSL24 and very happy overall with their level of service and support. I was weary of this coms migration as when companies get taken over, the service can sometimes suffer but I'll give coms a chance. The actual changeover went okay, no loss of service that was noticeable. The only couple of noticeable things are that the 'my account' page on the coms site where I could previously change my line options is greyed out and that my usage data was blank for 1 -15th Feb and only came back from 15th Feb onwards. I opened a ticket and eventually got told it was due to the changeover (well d'uh) and just to wait and it will get sorted. Not impressed.

If it is throttling then will actively look to leave.

Edited by deleted (Mon 17-Mar-14 02:46:47)

Same problem here. Normally I can get 3.5mbps using usenet but tonight I am down to just 10% of that at 350kbps. Really does annoy me I have been with ADSL24 for years and then coms comes along and I am now faced with having to find a new decent ISP again.

I am not really a heavy user either. In the years I have been with ADSL24 I never came close to using my 30gbs per month allowance. The comical thing about this is I am getting 350kbps speeds at 4am in the morning. I mean seriously how can there be congestion at 4am in the morning ?

Edited by deleted (Mon 17-Mar-14 04:46:08)

I would have thought that 4-5am on a Monday morning would be one of the quietest times.
Why they need to throttle now is beyond me. 4-5pm on a Saturday afternoon I could see a reason for but not right now.

Cheeses me off that Coms are now apparently throttling in the first place after saying that nothing would change from ADSL24. "would not be adversely affected" or some such I think they said in that letter.
The lack of throttling was one of the main reasons I chose ADSL24 when I first got ADSL.. Previously living in a cable served area kinda spoiled me!
Oh well, MAC requested.

I guess I'll have to spend some time researching my alternatives. Pain in the butt! I've been on ADSL24 since about 2008 so I guess the marketplace has changed since then.

Yeah I noticed throttling at around 10:49pm.. tested it out on steam and was getting speeds of around 950kbps but on my torrent it wouldn't go higher than 130kbps. Now I've woke up this morning and even my general download speed is lower too plus streaming speed reported is like 3% of my connection speed.

Edited by deleted (Mon 17-Mar-14 07:58:33)

Tested it with the Ubuntu live CD and I'm hitting about 250KB/s at the most. That's something that should be well seeded and to prove that, I ran the it on my VPS too and it ate it for breakfast at 8MB/s.

Normal HTTP traffic seems fine. I don't use usenet.

Edited by deleted (Mon 17-Mar-14 09:55:48)

Try Xilo. I was also with ADSL24 and jumped ship months ago. I can unreservedly recommend them. The have my web hosting too.

DrT

Usenet slow too, getting 150kbps should be 800+

Dunno if its intentional or some problem, never had issues before

Whelp I pulled the trigger and have requested my MAC code. I was with ADSL24 for 7 long years and for the most part I was happy with them. I would have stayed with Coms.com (stupid name) if they had kept the same level of service as ADSL24 but with the recent DNS screwups and now this usenet throttling I just don't see why I should pay £30 a month for a service that is approaching Talk Talk levels of quality.

Cheers for the suggestion Dr Teeth. I have been looking at Xilo and so far they seem perfect and tick pretty much all the boxes. The only black mark I can think of so far is that they require a 12 month contract period which is always something I have tried to avoid. So I am going to have a look around a bit more (very rusty at this since it has been 7 years since I last had to shop for an ISP). However right now Xilo is my preferred choice.

Throttling seems strange. Sunday night seems a odd time to implement it (it was fine Sunday afternoon) and as we're still in peak usage it shouldnt matter how much we download as we're in a download limit anyway. Never been throttled before

Could something break at coms hq to cause this? I dunno how it all works

Edited by bobble_bob (Mon 17-Mar-14 18:39:07)

My speeds just shot back up to normal? Anyone else try it now

Edit: And now slow again although faster than earlier

Edited by bobble_bob (Mon 17-Mar-14 19:01:53)

I was just about to post that I am still limited to 350k. I have put things in motion to get my MAC code. I specifically stated I was leaving because I believed they are throttling usenet. The reply I got was basically "sorry you are leaving, we will get your MAC code shortly". Pretty amazed they didn't even make an attempt to keep a customer that has been using the same service for 7 years.

maybe someone's working late at coms hq?

In reply to a post by charmingcharlie:

I have been looking at Xilo and so far they seem perfect and tick pretty much all the boxes. The only black mark I can think of so far is that they require a 12 month contract period which is always something I have tried to avoid.

That's true for FTTC.
However their website says all their ADSL services are on a 1 month contract. Mine certainly was.

In reply to a post by charmingcharlie:

The only black mark I can think of so far is that they require a 12 month contract period which is always something I have tried to avoid.

If FTTC yes, but that's due to the wholesale terms..

All other broadband services are month by month.

Matt

Just noticed the throttling myself now, wondered why an 11GB download was not complete in the usual time. I get 9mb/sec usually so it's pretty quick - yep throttled to 450k/sec.
Going to give it a week then i'm requesting a MAC if it continues.

Where are people moving to at the moment?

Edited by Lucifa42 (Mon 17-Mar-14 20:19:43)

Ive sent a PM to PaulComs see what he says about it

Doesnt bother me too much as i only download a few things a week via usenet, but its principle really. Whether they have done this to try and tackle the packetloss issue i dunno

Edited by bobble_bob (Mon 17-Mar-14 23:03:56)

This is happening to me too. Really annoys me considering ADSL24 was as close to perfect as I'd seen from an ISP and now Coms have ballsed it all up. Xilo is the one people recommend then for unshaped, unthrottled fibre?

After a very long time with ADSL24 and Enta before that I'm getting traffic shaping on usenet so looks like I will be moving on, its such a shame, thinking of xilo now. Been with ADSL24 and great support for more years than I can remember, now its come to an end, Coms its on a route to ruin, sad really :/

Let us know what PaulComs says.

How do you request a MAC code? Just submit a ticket in control panel or do you have to ring them up? I could have swore ADSL24 had an option in the control panel to request one.

The throttling of torrent speeds doesn't bother me at peak times but tonight it effected my online gaming..fifa clubs on X1 was almost unplayable until literally bang on 10pm when it mysteriously became stable again. If this continues, I too will probably move to Xilo.

The throttling is now gone up (!) to 450k/sec for me tonight. Still unacceptable. If they'd announced that they were going to do this it wouldn't be as bad, slightly, but nothing but a wall of silence from coms...

I had a look at Xilo's page and according to their broadband checker, I'll only get an estimated 1Mb down and 1.4Mb up speeds. I currently get about 6 or 7Mb down and 800k up.. Plus I see its BT IPstream... when I last had to look at broadband providers, I'm sure they were pretty [censored]. Mind you, things have moved on somewhat I guess. The last I heard ADSL24 had moved from Entanet to Murphx although that was a while ago too. Unless there's something wrong with my broadband, I don't pay much attention to whats going on!

I've also been looking at Vivaciti as they seem to be offering roughly what ADSL24 used to, although I can find no mention of throttling...

I think you may find the online gaming issue was due to some packet loss (well according to my BQM logs anyway which ended around 10pm). Again this has been reported and looked into

I did a few races on Forza 5 without issues around 9pm

Edited by bobble_bob (Mon 17-Mar-14 23:37:46)

Something very weird is going on with coms.com and usenet. I was a bit bored and thought I would test my usenet access again and now it is back up to full speed. Right now I am getting 3.7MB/s which is more or less what I should be getting.

It is possible we may have jumped to conclusions regarding them implementing throttling. I now have my MAC code which was issued efficiently and without any hassle. It is my understanding I have a month to use it, if I don't use the MAC code it just expires.

I think I will see how things go over the next 2 weeks. I really cannot be bothered to start chopping and changing ISP's and which ever ISP I choose will lock me into another 12 month contract (because I want fibre). It would be nice though if we could get some "official" word from someone at coms.com with regards to whether they have started using any sort of throttling.

Yep, I can confirm things are back to full speed, for the moment at least.
I don't see what else it could be other than throttling. It was clear that usenet and torrent speeds were being capped at 350k/sec and 450k/sec, last night and earlier on, whereas streaming and http downloads were at full speed. For me anyway.

In reply to a post by charmingcharlie:

I just don't see why I should pay £30 a month for a service that is approaching Talk Talk levels of quality.

Absolutely! Why pay £30 a month with coms when you can go direct with the devil's spawn for £5.75 a month (+line rental) for an unthrottled connection, line speeds 24/7, very reliable, static ip address and comes with good UK based phone forum support? Paying more doesn't always give you a better product as you've just found out.

Edited by deleted (Tue 18-Mar-14 07:10:58)

Hi,
I can confirm we do not throttle connections.

In reply to a post by vivaciti:

Hi,
I can confirm we do not throttle connections.

Who do you use for your LLU Unlimited Office package?

Either TTB or C&W

Good Morning Everyone

In response to concerns raised on this forum relating to stability, we can confirm that our team are testing some traffic management tools between the hours of 16:00 and 01:00.
In effect, this slows down data which isn�t speed-critical, such as P2P and NNTP, to make sure that time-dependent services such as streaming run more smoothly. Please be clear that this has been done in order to improve the interactive user experience for all of our customers.

Probably not the news that some of you want to hear but we have a duty to thousands of customers and need to balance this with the reality that some people will want to download the entire internet whilst others just want to game, watch iPlayer and have a service that is stable.

The intention is to get a balance for Coms xDSL users and we will continue to work hard on getting that right. If you can bear with us whilst we continue to work on the right profiles then you will reap the benefit so thanks in advance for those prepared to work with us.

Thanks,
Paul

Personally dont have too many issues with it providing you never throttle streaming/gaming/browsing etc. Easier just to have usenet running in the background overnight when not using my connection anyway rather than kill my connection downloading at full speed

Yeah I sort of agree, it won't make things too difficult for me but at the same time it stings a little to be paying the same amount for an inferior service. Credit where it's due though, thank you Paul for coming on here and being honest.

Edited by deleted (Tue 18-Mar-14 12:28:21)

Thing is peak usage on ads24 ended at midnight. On coms its 8pm. So when before everyone waited until midnight to download the internet you didnt notice as most were in bed. Now its 8pm its a peak time so congestion is more noticable

Hi Paul, here are my thoughts.

It seems that increasing off-peak times and allowance for us has worked against you and you can't provide the capacity to match ADSL24's level of service. That might explain the varying degrees of packet loss caused by your gateways. Assuming that's the cause and the fact that there's smidgens of packet loss during the day does suggest capacity really is a problem for you.

I can understand some throttling but to less than 500KB/s? Is the situation desperate? I'd like to think it's a temporary step while you're busy increasing capacity. I never really expected throttling to visible at all on my 7-8mbit connection in 2014, even if I do like to P2P all 50GB of the internet per month.

I understand that you're a business that wants to make a profit and I have no idea what financial state ADSL24 were in but you're taking away one of the main selling points and there's little to make Coms broadband stand out from the crowd, IMO.

The only good things I can say is that your communication is above average due to your posts on here although that doesn't mean that there isn't room for improvement. I've not really had to make use of your support very much but with my easy queries, they've been pretty quick and efficient.

Obligatory moan about throttling complete!

That's strange that you said you do throttle connections as just today I received this from Coms in response to a question about my connection being throttled:

Good afternoon,
Please be advised that Coms do not enforce any kind of traffic shaping or throttling. I have reassigned your ticket to the relevant department to run some tests on your line.
They shall update you here once this has been done.
Kind regards,

In reply to a post by Pindi:

That's strange that you said you do throttle connections as just today I received this from Coms in response to a question about my connection being throttled:

Good afternoon,
Please be advised that Coms do not enforce any kind of traffic shaping or throttling. I have reassigned your ticket to the relevant department to run some tests on your line.
They shall update you here once this has been done.
Kind regards,

Lol, consider yourself lucky you're on stage one, they're wanting to send out an engineer for me.

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/6360-no-sign-yet-...

May not be just a coms capacity issue

Two things that I'm not totally clear in that respect:
-Aren't we all via TBB rather than BTw?
-The packetloss is introduced at the gateways, isn't that part between us and the gateway?

Where does capacity issues come from? Is it home to exchange or exchange to isp? We are on TT at the exchange but who knows where it goes after that

And again where does the gateway sit in all of this. Not too clued up on this area

Problem these days is ISPs cant have a one size fits all package. If people want to download the internet via p2p/usenet then it costs ISPs money, but then they cant pass on that cost onto low bandwidth users as they wont pay it

Im sure James (ex adsl24) once said that high bandwidth users actually cost an ISP money, but they make that back on everyone else who doesnt download that much. So as for a business viewpoint im guessing ISPs dont want heavy users on their network as those people arent profitable, and if those users are effecting streaming/gaming/browsing they risk losing the other end of their customers that make them money

I can understand some throttling but to less than 500KB/s? Is the situation desperate? I'd like to think it's a temporary step while you're busy increasing capacity. I never really expected throttling to visible at all on my 7-8mbit connection in 2014, even if I do like to P2P all 50GB of the internet per month.

Dont think the problem is the amount, its the time people are doing it. The fact they only trottle from 4-1 suggests everyone is download then, so even if its only a small amount it will effect the network

Edited by bobble_bob (Tue 18-Mar-14 14:46:03)

I don't get the throttling during peak times though, isn't that the point of the caps? You can't download the internet during peak time otherwise you'll hit your cap.
Is the problem now you've given everyone much larger caps than they had previously so now they don't bother downloading at off peak times.
For example, I had a 30-50GB cap with ADSL24 (which I would use about 50% of in any given month) and now have 500GB that I don't need.

I do schedule my downloads for early mornings but sometimes, like yesterday, I want a file now - an ability my connection gives me. If I have to use some of my cap to get that, that's fine as it doesn't happen often.
You may not consider it speed critical, but I do.

Edited by Lucifa42 (Tue 18-Mar-14 15:55:57)

You may not consider it speed critical, but I do.

its always nice to have things fast but p2p/usenet isnt speed critical. It wont break if you dont have full speed, where as browsing, streaming, gaming will if those are slowed down

In reply to a post by bobble_bob:

its always nice to have things fast but p2p/usenet isnt speed critical. It wont break if you dont have full speed, where as browsing, streaming, gaming will if those are slowed down

I get your point.
It just frustrated me last night, I'm not a high bandwidth user, I don't download much either peak or off peak but when I do want something, I don't want to wait.

I've looked at Vivaciti but there is a stunning lack of information on their website.

having chatted with Customer Service - they state no shaping or throttling, but thanks to this thread it seems there is.
Just this second tested my usenet speed...running roughly 10-15 %

I might switch to [censored] plusnet. Cheaper and supposedly unlimited with no shaping.
who else is similar ADSL24 prices, unlimited off peak, no throttling ??

Edited by deleted (Tue 18-Mar-14 16:26:46)

Plusnet traffic manage usenet dont they?

CS probably havent been told as this is a trial according to PaulComs

Yeah tempted by plusnet too, but they do traffic manage to an extent.
More details here:

http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/do...

Drop down the package you are interested in.

Also: http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/tr...

So p2p/usenet is "bronze" whatever that means in reality

I think you can buy an extra package called Plusnet Pro for 5 a month that removes all the management.

http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/products/pro-A...

The best starting point for Plusnet Traffic Management is this explanation. It is exactly what Paul has just mentioned, except Plusnet have it working fine.

You will find many gripes about it, nearly all of those being from (less than?) half a dozen non-customers of Plusnet who just want to object in principle and keep making a noise about it.

I only know of one customer who has some sort of issue, but all the rest are happy. Else they would have left years ago. Even the one with the issue has said that on balance he is happy with the (FTTC) service.

On the Plusnet unlimited products the Pro option is redundant, as if you read the doc I just linked to you will see it can only degrade time-critical applications such as gaming and VOIP. On the allowance products it is possibly worth having, but not in my opinion.

Once Coms get their equivalent working it should be OK for them as well, but I fear it could be a long time before they get it to an accepable state. Particularly for gaming, where recognising the game's signature to give it priority seems not to be fully automated at Plusnet. If at all.

In reply to a post by Lucifa42:

So p2p/usenet is "bronze" whatever that means in reality

Network capacity is upgraded frequently to keep up with the current growth in customer numbers, with the aim being that even bronze traffic through the Plusnet routers goes at full speed for everyone.

As per the article I just linked to, where the PN system matters is within the customer's own connection, if several activities are using it at the same time. P2P from other un-managed ISPs could make YouTube and other streaming service buffer if the particular line is being used to capacity. The system prevents that, but not by fixed throttling. Just prioritisation of time-critical apps.

Ironically if all heavy downloaders now jump ship, it will make the need for a throttle redundant

Think people are quick to want to leave any isp that throttle in some way, without working out if it will actually be an issue to them. This throttle is also something that will benefit them in regards to better streaming/browsing if the 'trial' works.

Like you say, some dont like the idea in principle, but i dont think you can have it both ways. People want a cheaper and cheaper package but want to download the world for it

Edited by bobble_bob (Tue 18-Mar-14 17:50:35)

In reply to a post by Benjanyan:

The only good things I can say is that your communication is above average due to your posts on here although that doesn't mean that there isn't room for improvement. I've not really had to make use of your support very much but with my easy queries, they've been pretty quick and efficient.

I'd say communication is barely above average - as there seems to be total silence unless pressed about things - and in this case as they're trialling something, which would have been planned in advance (one would hope), there could have been an announcement about it. And if the support desk don't know about it either, then that says quite a lot to me about internal communication too.

Most customer service works like that unfortunately. Ive had issues with o2 where they CS have said there is no issues, even though their own network status reports there is

I would have to agree with Tony I am afraid as I do think their customer service is indeed o more than about average. Whilst they sorted out my problems after three days of no connection it has cost me a new router ( which was claimed to be the problem) when it was a faulty stack of IP addresses, I was also overcharged on my account since the move over. I did PM the two representatives about my issues as I felt that some "credit" for my issues should be applied to the account but have not heard since. To me that is not above average customer service and I was always under the impression that companies had a duty to respond to complaints. Maybe I am just impatient but an answer to my email would be nice.

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

The best starting point for Plusnet Traffic Management is this explanation. It is exactly what Paul has just mentioned, except Plusnet have it working fine.

Is this traffic management on a per connection basis, as it implies in the document, or across the whole plusnet network.
I'm the only user of my internet connection so I don't need something else to prioritise my connection for me
But it does look good though, though I do fear going to a big ISP and the associated customer service problems.
I see on twitter there is a lot of mention of 30-60 mins waits in the phone queue!

It is across the network as well as within the connection, but as I said - the network is scaled to make it irrelevant to the P2P, whilst still prioritising VOIP/gaming. That's in the detailed links someone else gave.

I would expect bronze to slow down over the network when Apple release another iOS and lots download it, or Andy Murray is in a Wimbledon Final. I doubt if it is scaled to cater for 5 days a year out of the 365 .

From what I've seen over the years, no ISP does that. There were even reports of Zen delivering 500kbps on speed tests not long ago. I don't remember exactly when, it was the Olympics or the Commonwealth Games in the UK. That sort of thing.

The beauty of it is, (and don't forget that Paul says Come are working on the same - my link was to explain what he was on about and why it isn't all bad), that even at times like that gaming and VOIP will still work, and hopefully the streaming that is causing the pressure. For that benefit, I think most customers will say "stuff the internet downloaders on P2P" .

In reply to a post by PaulComs:

In response to concerns raised on this forum relating to stability, we can confirm that our team are testing some traffic management tools between the hours of 16:00 and 01:00.

An email or message on your website beforehand would have been nice.
It still doesn't explain why we were being throttled still at 4am on Monday morning. I would have thought that at that time in the morning, there was no need for throttling, trial or otherwise.

So much for that statement in the letter we were all sent saying our broadband would not be adversely affected with the Coms takeover...
I don't download that much but when I do, I don't want to wait all night on it coming in. (heck, 'broadband' is slow enough as it is, being in the sticks, without a piddling 350/450k/sec throttle.)

Before ADSL24 was taken over and the off peak times were 12midnight - 8am, things generally worked well. Speeds were fine during the day and only ever dipped slightly between midnight and 1am or so. Maybe Coms shouldn't have been so quick to put everyone onto the 'office' times of offpeak being from 8pm - 8am.

Hi Vivaciti.

From what I can make of it, filing of your annual return and accounts are somewhat overdue. Am I looking at the right company and if I am, when do you expect to get your filings up to date?

In reply to a post by ross1701:

In reply to a post by PaulComs:

In response to concerns raised on this forum relating to stability, we can confirm that our team are testing some traffic management tools between the hours of 16:00 and 01:00.

An email or message on your website beforehand would have been nice.
It still doesn't explain why we were being throttled still at 4am on Monday morning. I would have thought that at that time in the morning, there was no need for throttling, trial or otherwise.

So much for that statement in the letter we were all sent saying our broadband would not be adversely affected with the Coms takeover...

This is what's really [censored] me off. Bull in the letter about not being adversely affected and no mention anywhere of this traffic shaping. Hell, it still advertises as being completely throttling free on the website.

A quick way for a company to lose me as a customer is just to flat out lie to me. If Coms had said something about this beforehand, I wouldn't have liked it but I could certainly understand and accept it but to just implement it and only fess up when people complain is just low

I dont think it was planned from the start, it was put in after many of us on here complained about packetloss. They could add capacity, and maybe they will, but this is an immediate solution

Had hoped, that my recent low speeds were not related to the coms migration, but seems I'll have to migrate. Recently disappointing that coms couldn't keep the adsl24 model.

Your target snr may have been reset, seems some were to 12db

Unless you mean usenet only

Edited by bobble_bob (Tue 18-Mar-14 22:26:13)

I was wondering why gaming online on the xbox has been so bad these past few days. At first I thought it was just the bad connections of those I was playing against however improbable considering how many games on FIFA I tried playing; they couldn't all have had poor connections? I guess it was my connection that made FIFA completely unplayable. Just now, attempted three games online, all three were a stuttering mess that disconnected halfway in. Usenet is slow, xbox live is ruined. Not good

As bobble_bob said, if you're referring to consistently low speeds since the migration, it's most likely because of the snr. I had this problem myself and a quick ticket through the control panel and a few hours later, was enjoying much better speeds. In fact, this is the one area where I can praise Coms, since the migration my speeds have increased a fair bit.

In reply to a post by Pindi:

I was wondering why gaming online on the xbox has been so bad these past few days. At first I thought it was just the bad connections of those I was playing against however improbable considering how many games on FIFA I tried playing; they couldn't all have had poor connections? I guess it was my connection that made FIFA completely unplayable. Just now, attempted three games online, all three were a stuttering mess that disconnected halfway in. Usenet is slow, xbox live is ruined. Not good

Noticed this last night on Fifa and was stuttering from when I came on at 8 until around 10pm at which point everything was fine. Tried doing some seasons games tonight and it's unplayable. It's worth noting that I was able to play Titanfall fine before hopping onto Fifa and I was also able to play Fifa fine this morning.

Ive had no issues with Forza online and streaming video through xbox (plus the speedtest on the machine says im getting full speeds)

That's why I'm thinking it's a Fifa only issue as I was able to play Titanfall just fine too. EA runs their own servers after all while Forza and TF are on the Azure ones.

More than likely. Back when i used to play Fifa on the 360 used to get poor connections. Dont think its a coms issues just EA being EA

In reply to a post by partial:

Hi Vivaciti.

From what I can make of it, filing of your annual return and accounts are somewhat overdue. Am I looking at the right company and if I am, when do you expect to get your filings up to date?

New company name

J AND V DATA SERVICES LTD
358 LONDON ROAD
HADLEIGH
ESSEX
ENGLAND
SS7 2DD
Company No. 08555127

Accounts not required til 2015.

In reply to a post by theADDict:

having chatted with Customer Service
who else is similar ADSL24 prices, unlimited off peak, no throttling ??

Why not try contacting some of the established enta resellers who sell more than enta connections ? aquiss, vivaciti and xilo/uno
Vivaciti was my choice almost a year ago with no regrets.

In reply to a post by PaulComs:

Good Morning Everyone

In response to concerns raised on this forum relating to stability, we can confirm that our team are testing some traffic management tools between the hours of 16:00 and 01:00.
In effect, this slows down data which isn�t speed-critical, such as P2P and NNTP, to make sure that time-dependent services such as streaming run more smoothly. Please be clear that this has been done in order to improve the interactive user experience for all of our customers.

Probably not the news that some of you want to hear but we have a duty to thousands of customers and need to balance this with the reality that some people will want to download the entire internet whilst others just want to game, watch iPlayer and have a service that is stable.

The intention is to get a balance for Coms xDSL users and we will continue to work hard on getting that right. If you can bear with us whilst we continue to work on the right profiles then you will reap the benefit so thanks in advance for those prepared to work with us.

Thanks,
Paul

So a decision was effectively taken NOT to inform customers that service on certain platforms would be extremely handicapped for several days (they are still testing) ?

[censored] me. That's all I need to know really.

Edited by deleted (Wed 19-Mar-14 16:51:31)

I'm on fibre so snr shouldn't be a problem for me right? I'd be inclined to believe it's just a FIFA EA problem but since the shaping came into play, I've not managed to finish a single game online. Of probably 15-20+ matches, every single one has stuttered horribly before completely disconnecting and kicking me out of the game.

So people recommend Xilo as a good alternative to ADSL24?

Is your fifa problems consistent throughout the day? I'm able to play it just fine in the mornings and at lunch time.. in fact I had a few games at about 1pm today without any problems. Last two nights trying to play games at 8pm though was stuttering so bad it disconnected me either at the start of a game or right at the beginning. Never had problems with the EA servers before and was fine playing it a few weeks back in the evening.

Yeah, I've tried morning, afternoon and evening and it's all been the same. I've contacted ADSL24 support about this and I'll see what they say.

On another note, I've been looking at Plusnet unlimited fibre and it looks to be a great alternative to ADSL24 and at a much lower price than what I'm paying now. I've spoken to Plusnet and checked their site and it seems you get line speed on all traffic on unlimited tariffs:

http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/do...

Anyone know of any reason not to go with Plusnet? I've always been concerned about going with a 'big', well known ISP but on the face of it, I can't see any downsides.

Hi Shroompicker

Having seen your comment I'd like to have the right of reply if I may.

Communicating that a trial period to diagnose problems is also a dilemma. Perhaps we got this wrong but we haven't committed a serious crime or acted in a way to try and annoy customers.

Just to repeat my earlier message, in response to complaints about packet loss we had to do something in order to find a fix. Rather than panicking, we have been able to collect real data from users and combine with DPI data to eventually draw some conclusions and corrective action.
For what its worth we have seen improvements (FIFA users apart) so a judgement on whether we were right or wrong may continue. The easy answer is to chuck more bandwidth at the problem, we tried that and it didn't address the root cause.

It was, and is, my responsibility ultimately to decide on communicating what we are doing on the network. I'll accept any criticism and take it on the chin. It is also my responsibility to ensure that we have a network that supports the many not the few.
I'm delighted that a really interesting debate has opened up especially with the news from TT about their usage hitting 1Tbps. Usage of bandwidth will continue to rise as more applications and services become available.The challenge for ISP's is to continue providing a service that consumers are willing to pay for and as with any commercial enterprise it also cannot be a loss making service or you cease to exist.

I've also seen other comments that service from ADSL24 from say 3 years ago isnt the same as it is today but neither is the volume of data that users are consuming. I would like to think that we have got priorities right in terms of making sure that wherever possible real time applications such as Voice and streaming services such as Netflix are given priority in the network.

Thanks
Paul

Hi Pindi

Can you PM me with your details and we'll take a look at your service. Are you having issues with any other programs or is it just FIFA?

Thanks,
Paul

In reply to a post by PaulComs:

Hi Shroompicker

Having seen your comment I'd like to have the right of reply if I may.

Communicating that a trial period to diagnose problems is also a dilemma. Perhaps we got this wrong but we haven't committed a serious crime or acted in a way to try and annoy customers.

Just to repeat my earlier message, in response to complaints about packet loss we had to do something in order to find a fix. Rather than panicking, we have been able to collect real data from users and combine with DPI data to eventually draw some conclusions and corrective action.
For what its worth we have seen improvements (FIFA users apart) so a judgement on whether we were right or wrong may continue. The easy answer is to chuck more bandwidth at the problem, we tried that and it didn't address the root cause.

It was, and is, my responsibility ultimately to decide on communicating what we are doing on the network. I'll accept any criticism and take it on the chin. It is also my responsibility to ensure that we have a network that supports the many not the few.
I'm delighted that a really interesting debate has opened up especially with the news from TT about their usage hitting 1Tbps. Usage of bandwidth will continue to rise as more applications and services become available.The challenge for ISP's is to continue providing a service that consumers are willing to pay for and as with any commercial enterprise it also cannot be a loss making service or you cease to exist.

I've also seen other comments that service from ADSL24 from say 3 years ago isnt the same as it is today but neither is the volume of data that users are consuming. I would like to think that we have got priorities right in terms of making sure that wherever possible real time applications such as Voice and streaming services such as Netflix are given priority in the network.

Thanks
Paul

No you haven't committed a serious crime, but please don't try to mitigate by telling us to have some perspective - don't appreciate that from you.

I have exchanged several emails with your CS and performed multiple line tests since Sunday and generally faffed about trying to get to the bottom of it, and not even your CS seemingly were aware of the testing. I and many others could have been saved a lot of bother.

Why on earth did COMS increase monthly peak allowance from 100 to 500GB on my tariff and extend the off peak times to more accounts if your networks are so squeezed? Defies all logic.

"As promised there are no changes to your price or contract and your service won�t be downgraded in any way."

It's pretty apparent quite the opposite can be expected.

It isn't necessary to quote complete posts when Replying. In Flat mode which a large proportion of posters use it is quite irritating, and even in Threaded mode the link in the header takes you to the relevant post, if needed.

oopsies, sorry about that.

No problem .

If you just want a bit of quote, you can of course remove some of what's inside the quote after pressing the button. Or add q and /q tags within it to answer point by point, which sometimes is actually a good idea when replying to a long complex post.

Have you tried other multi player games to see if those have issues?

Also if xbox one run the speed test in settings see what you get

Edited by bobble_bob (Wed 19-Mar-14 20:01:18)

In reply to a post by Shroompicker:

No you haven't committed a serious crime, but please don't try to mitigate by telling us to have some perspective - don't appreciate that from you.
... and not even your CS seemingly were aware of the testing. I and many others could have been saved a lot of bother.

Why on earth did COMS increase monthly peak allowance from 100 to 500GB on my tariff and extend the off peak times to more accounts if your networks are so squeezed? Defies all logic.

"As promised there are no changes to your price or contract and your service won�t be downgraded in any way."

It's pretty apparent quite the opposite can be expected.

Generally +1 this.
Are there details somewhere as to which tariffs had their monthly peak allowance raised?
I was not aware of this. I was on 30Gb peak monthly and still am as far as I am aware... I knew about them extending off peak starting from 8pm... no wonder Coms are having problems if they gave the higher peak caps a free upgrade! Without serious infrastructure upgrades, thats almost asking for trouble.

Both Titanfall and Fifa are unplayable tonight due to the lag spikes I'm getting. Was playing TF fine at 5pm however trying at 8pm and the lag is unbearable. Doing the Xbox One connection tests multiple times and the problem seems to be the upload with 22% packet loss on one test and speed showing at less than half of what it is. The download speed is also showing at less than half of my synch rate.

Edited by deleted (Wed 19-Mar-14 20:35:24)

I get 5% packet loss and full speeds, just testing Forza now but suspect it will be ok. The server used to test is in America so slow pings/packetloss probably expected, but not 22%.

What do your BQM logs show?

Seems they adjusted the throttle aswell as getting 100kbps on usenet

Edited by bobble_bob (Wed 19-Mar-14 20:37:23)

Didn't even know what BQM stood for a minute ago lol, any recommendations on what software to get to log?

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping

Looking at my log got quite alot of packet loss since 8pm so that will be effecting it. I managed to do a race on Forza tho although it was effected nothing too bad

Got that setup,will keep an eye on it.

Edited by deleted (Wed 19-Mar-14 20:50:53)

Nope you have the wrong company there RandomJointer, but I guess that's what happens when you are just out to try to stir the pot, you end up looking silly

In reply to a post by PaulComs:

Hi Shroompicker

Having seen your comment I'd like to have the right of reply if I may.

Communicating that a trial period to diagnose problems is also a dilemma. Perhaps we got this wrong but we haven't committed a serious crime or acted in a way to try and annoy customers.

Just to repeat my earlier message, in response to complaints about packet loss we had to do something in order to find a fix. Rather than panicking, we have been able to collect real data from users and combine with DPI data to eventually draw some conclusions and corrective action.
For what its worth we have seen improvements (FIFA users apart) so a judgement on whether we were right or wrong may continue. The easy answer is to chuck more bandwidth at the problem, we tried that and it didn't address the root cause.

It was, and is, my responsibility ultimately to decide on communicating what we are doing on the network. I'll accept any criticism and take it on the chin. It is also my responsibility to ensure that we have a network that supports the many not the few.
I'm delighted that a really interesting debate has opened up especially with the news from TT about their usage hitting 1Tbps. Usage of bandwidth will continue to rise as more applications and services become available.The challenge for ISP's is to continue providing a service that consumers are willing to pay for and as with any commercial enterprise it also cannot be a loss making service or you cease to exist.

I've also seen other comments that service from ADSL24 from say 3 years ago isnt the same as it is today but neither is the volume of data that users are consuming. I would like to think that we have got priorities right in terms of making sure that wherever possible real time applications such as Voice and streaming services such as Netflix are given priority in the network.

Thanks
Paul

Hold on, I got told (and you have it recorded) that NOTHING would change [and you stated as such as others have mentioned] when I swapped over to coms (I asked about throttling etc) on a new contract to get the limitless cap, mainly as we both work at home and I need the B/W sometimes as our work install sets are >1G and the kids now love netflix :-/

But something has changed, it seems as you purchased a company without realising the ramifications, or just did it anyway knowing you could not handle the thruput of adsl24 added to yours. You must have known the b/w that adsl used on a daily and nightly bases.

You must in all your time as an isp seen what happens + all the complaints when these sort of things are not communicated clearly, you must have known people would notice when you 'appear' to stealth throttling in.

So now am i locked into a 12 month contract with worse service that I had before?

Edited by deleted (Wed 19-Mar-14 21:41:38)

Coms are a new ISP. There network started the minute we got moved over

I wish these companies would just be honest, it just happens time and time again.. Attempting to sneak in throttling..

Regardless of being new or not they would have crawled over the thruput that adsl24 used and decided they could change it, and this would have been done at purchase time.

Edited by deleted (Wed 19-Mar-14 21:49:15)

I agree this could have been handled better. If they had put their side across first, i dont think the anger would be there as much. Way its turned out is people have experienced the throttle first without an explanation, so it looks sneaky

Doing tests:

Speed Test - full speed, about 1600
torrents/usenet = 100
normal downloads = 250
Netflix streams superHd with zero issues.
Steam downloads at 1600 (so full speed)

Edited by deleted (Wed 19-Mar-14 22:08:42)

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/d5913bcd129...

Off to a good start!

In reply to a post by aibreeze:

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/d5913bcd129...

Off to a good start!

I changed to opendns on my router a few weeks ago after arguing with the customer support reps (moaning it was not at there end) - I then connected thru my work vpn and it all worked.. funny that.

Yeah I rang them up with my problems and they are trying to get me to agree to a time slot for them to send an engineer over.. pretty poor tbh.

Your IP isnt pingable, thats why. Change it in the router

Paul,
you know what ADSL24 worked just fine with out traffic management, so why you feel the need now to have it baffles me.

I am not alone in being pretty disgusted in the sneaky way this has been put through even though we were assured that nothing would change when you took over ADSL24.

I guess many people won't be waiting to see if you get the right profile for you shaping but will simply walk with their mac's.

I for one am pretty sad and disgusted that

A. You broke you promise about no changes.
B. You did not have the courtesy to inform us of this Pilot
C. Let us feel like idiots checking all our connections and testing everything when you could have given us a simple head up.

Sneaky back door policy like this hardly make you endearing to your paying customers who always had excellent service from ADSL24

I for one am really not happy about this!!

Steve

I've been with adsl24 for over four years and have had an exceptional service. There are better value packages out there but I didn't mind paying the extra for bandwidth when I needed. Now today I see a rare occasion where I try to torrent something and I'm getting throttled to the hilt. What's the point me paying a premium for this?
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/7430695/ISP.jpg

adsl24 sort of had traffic management by having peak ending at midnight on Home packages, that kept people from downloading the internet during a busy time for the network. Coms may have shot themselves in the foot by ending peak usage at 8pm as it seems thats when the problems start

Edited by bobble_bob (Wed 19-Mar-14 22:32:57)

The main problems are with FIFA although I've had issues with Titanfall too. Dunno about any others, those are the only two I play online. Usenet is down to 115kbps. Ridiculous. I've requested my MAC code and I'll be looking elsewhere.

I'm down to Plusnet or Xilo. Which would you guys recommend? Plusnet state they do not shape traffic on their unlimited packages and that I will get full line speed on all traffic at all times (barring the usual slowdown that may come with congestion/regular issues etc). So yeah, Plusnet or Xilo?

In reply to a post by aibreeze:

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/d5913bcd129...

Off to a good start!

That link doesn't work.

In reply to a post by stevepressman:

Paul,
you know what ADSL24 worked just fine with out traffic management, so why you feel the need now to have it baffles me.

I am not alone in being pretty disgusted in the sneaky way this has been put through even though we were assured that nothing would change when you took over ADSL24.

+1

In reply to a post by joper_90:

So now am i locked into a 12 month contract with worse service that I had before?

I would seriously hope not!
When I signed up for ADSL24 it was a monthly contract. Nowhere in that letter that was sent did it say that as soon as Coms takeover, you're locked into a 12 month contract. Then again, it did say the broadband wouldn't be adversely affected yet they've just introduced throttling and only admitted so(in a public forum. no official annouincement) when people were reporting problems. Myself included.

When I requested my MAC, the customer support rep said nothing about 12 month contracts.
I see from the shambles that is the Coms website, the broadband contracts are 12 month, so hopefully the 12 month contract only applies to new Coms signups. It'd better or trading standards will be getting a call...

Edited by deleted (Wed 19-Mar-14 22:56:54)

Bob, my off peak was always 20:00-08:00 , I was quite happy to pay nearly £30 a month for my Fibre because of the quality I got from ADSL24 and the option if I wanted to to be able to download what ever I wanted at off peak times as I work night time and I am not even at home but thundering around the country in my truck. Of my 30GB allowance I was lucky some months to use a max of 10-12 gb and pretty much in the daytime would only use it to surf the www or read and send email.

Like I said this has been done really sneaky and I find it a little condescending of Paul to say that the customer does not have to be informed of everything they are planning, Duh we pay their wages and for their service and yes I DO expect to be informed of any such critical change of usage that may or not affect me!!

regards

Steve

Edited by stevepressman (Wed 19-Mar-14 23:08:59)

My peak with ADSL24 was 8am - 8pm, Mon - Fri (fibre 30 ultra) never got near my allowance, In fact i don't actually download that much, so to find I'm getting [censored] because someone want's to download all the 4k pron they can find is kind of annoying to say the least....

Edited by Cruncher (Wed 19-Mar-14 23:07:45)

I agree with communication. Its amazing how a little bit of info from a company can calm people down and helps keep everyone in the loop (not just talking an ISP either)

Thanks, got it working properly now!

Gaming just fine again. Not sure exactly when it starts but it clearly doesn't last as long as the quoted times for traffic management. Paul if you're reading this, please do look into this problem with Xbox Live assuming it is your side because while I can sympathize with what you're saying about the need for traffic management, having it stop me online gaming at such a critical time frame (8pm-10pm from what I have noticed so far) is simply unacceptable.

Send him a PM, he will see it then

Cruncher, I agree with you, however when we were with ADSL24 was your service the same as it is now or better than now? Because back then the same people as now were downloading the www off peak too and the odd occasion when I was at home during the evening when I had a night off I can honestly say hand on heart from 8pm until I would fall into bed about 2am time I never ever noticed any degrading of speed at all, so their argument doesn't really stack up does it, unless by some magic they suddenly found an extra few thousand extreme customers overnight when they took over ADSL24.

Regards

Steve

Edited by stevepressman (Wed 19-Mar-14 23:18:35)

All of ADSL24 customers peak usage was split (some had 8-8 others 8-12), now everyone of those are on 8-8 peak usage, so everyone has offpeak at the same time. And guess what, the packloss starts at 8.

So more are downloading during the busy time for the network than on adsl24

Oh thx for the heads up Bob I wan't aware of that difference in off peak times, I stand corrected then even so after midnight if and when these other off peakers came on line I never noticed any difference then though!

Steve

Think home users peak was 8- midnight and office was 8-8. I was on 8-midnight anway

Thing is at midnight its a quiet time for the network. Alot will be in bed, or wont be streaming much tv so the network has more capacity for the heavy downloaders. Trouble we see with coms is they allow heavy downloading off peak just as everyone has got home from work, had something to eat and is browsing/gaming/streaming. So something has to give

Edited by bobble_bob (Wed 19-Mar-14 23:38:10)

Thats a good website in that link, not heard of them before but seems good to know if you want to see if your isp traffic shapes

Or is it some software?

Edited by bobble_bob (Wed 19-Mar-14 23:44:52)

In reply to a post by bobble_bob:

Thats a good website in that link, not heard of them before but seems good to know if you want to see if your isp traffic shapes

Or is it some software?

Website that uses Java, so bit of both.
Glasnost

I too have noticed the throttling which is unacceptable.

Going to move provider but unsure who can provide a similar service to the old ADSL24 days?

Shortlist is either Zen or Plusnet; comments please?

In reply to a post by culmor:

Shortlist is either Zen or Plusnet; comments please?

When I left O2 LLU to get FTTC, I went to IDNet, who have a similarly high reputation to Zen, because I had got so used to the excellent O2 service.

After a year I felt more confident about FTTC and my line, (which had been troublesome on ADSL2+ but was fine on FTTC), and purely on cost grounds moved to Plusnet in February 2012. I haven't regretted it in any way. I felt I was paying a lot for CS that I rarely need, and now I know more about PN I don't think theirs is an issue - despite some scary posts over the last few months.

So Zen if you feel nervous, (incidentally so far as I can see their cheap line rental doesn't apply if you take their broadband), but Plusnet if you feel you can risk the 18-month minimum term.

Hi Steve

PM sent with a reply to your post.

Thanks,
Paul

Care to share?

Haven't had a chance to game tonight but was wondering if there has been any improvements?

No there is no improvement I am at a standstill with everything except WWW surfing and Email, torrent is a joke I just tried a small one to see what was happening getting max 10KB download speed, thought I would catch up on some TV from yesterday on the BBC Iplayer and that will neither download a program or run a program to watch, this is really frustrating me now!!

Steve

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/ping/share/18adedc2ab6...

Virtually zero packet loss so yea seems so

I feel your pain, was the same for me the whole of last week. I just tried a torrent and seem to be restricted to 100kbps.. a little better than yours but still ridiculously low.

If Paul doesn't mind I will share it with you all.

Steve

Just done a test with Glasnost and this is what I got back, I wasn't surprised either!!!


Is your upload traffic rate limited?

Your ISP appears to rate limit your uploads.

Details:
* Your ISP appears to rate limit your BitTorrent uploads. In our tests, uploads using control flows achieved up to 14403 Kbps while uploads using BitTorrent achieved up to 856 Kbps.

* There is no indication that your ISP rate limits uploads on port 6881 or 46233. In our tests, uploads on port 6881 achieved up to 14403 Kbps while uploads on port 46233 achieved up to 14419 Kbps.

Is your download traffic rate limited?

Your ISP appears to rate limit your downloads.

Details:
* Your ISP appears to rate limit your BitTorrent downloads. In our tests, downloads using control flows achieved up to 30545 Kbps while downloads using BitTorrent achieved up to 894 Kbps.

* There is no indication that your ISP rate limits downloads on port 6881 or 46233. In our tests, downloads on port 6881 achieved up to 30545 Kbps while downloads on port 46233 achieved up to 28671 Kbps.


Steve

iplayer is broke, and also broke at the same time yesterday weirdly. BBC know about it though and seems to effect all their streaming services.

Usenet getting 100kbps and gaming seems fine. Also Paul said they're looking into the Fifa issue to see what they can do about it. I suspect the dedicated servers are causing the issue with coms as normal xbox servers seems fine

Im intrigued now

Thanks for the heads up Bob about the Iplayer, bit of a bummer when I have a week off and everything goes down the pan.Further to my testing though just done an HTTP Glasnost test and there is no traffic management on that.

Steve

Edited by stevepressman (Thu 20-Mar-14 22:23:01)

Do it, its not just you having this issue, we all have a right to know what he said, would be nice if he had the balls to post it on the forums tbh...

Ive tried to test my connection twice this week for various reasons, tonight with iplayer and the other day with xbox live. Both services died but obviously i assumed it was my connection. Talk about sods law when trying to do testing

Cruncher,

while I am inclined to agree with you I do respect his and my right to privacy, I will pm him and ask if I have his permission to make it public or not and see what he says.

Steve

ADSL24 never throttled or shaped the ADSL or FTTC connections I had with them and neither does my current ISP, Xilo.
Just get a MAC and move. There are enough ISPs that do not cripple your connection. Just find them and use them.

I agree with you about the other ISP's sadly I am totally locked into a 12 month contract because of my being so stubborn with refusing to pay BT £100 for an engineer visit they deemed was not required. Long story that has cost me more than if I had paid the £100 in the first place.


Steve

Throttled again this morning.. already

Seems they have changed the times. Although getting 400kbps. Was ok around 8

End of the day we either accept the throttling or move on. Nothing is going to change i suspect as the throttling is working regards to less packet loss. For people that dont use usenet/p2p that much then it wont be too much of an issue. If you use it alot then probably only 1 option for you

Edited by bobble_bob (Sat 22-Mar-14 10:52:57)

I guess for people who don't use p2p probably won't have even noticed a difference but I think the issues run a little deeper than that imho. We were assured prior to the move that there wouldn't be traffic management and it didn't take them long to change that. Worse still, their communication has been dreadful. I had issues over a week ago and for five nights in a row, was unable to do anything other than web browsing at peak times and after speaking to their support was left with the genuine impression that they didn't have a clue what was wrong. Sure enough, a few days later and we find out they are testing traffic management. Now that means either A: They didn't even let their support know or B: They are very good at faking sincerity.. either way it completely undermines their job and my trust in them seeing how they have bugged me twice this week to book an engineer visit.

I guess there is light at the end of the tunnel for those who don't mind traffic management but these last two weeks have left a bitter taste in my mouth and I won't pay the same amount of money for an inferior service.

In reply to a post by bobble_bob:

Seems they have changed the times. Although getting 400kbps. Was ok around 8

End of the day we either accept the throttling or move on. Nothing is going to change i suspect as the throttling is working regards to less packet loss. For people that dont use usenet/p2p that much then it wont be too much of an issue. If you use it alot then probably only 1 option for you

But I am now screwed, I moved to the unlimited 100 (mainly for work reasons) so agreed after asking repeatedly 'nothing is in the pipeline to change the service?' that nothing was going to change.... I stupidly agreed to the 12 contact after attempting to stay on the 1 month one.

VPN is the answer now.

I dont think coms wanted to throttled usenet, it was after a few of us complained of packetloss and this was the solution they had. Now you could argue that they should have known this would happen after increasing peak usage and reducing peak hours, but thats another issue

Regarding the Customer Service, its typical in the tech industry. Our works CS dont even know what the name of the software we use is called! Many times ive phoned CS (not coms, just in general) and know more than them, as 1st line often are useless and are there for basic queries. Thats why people like DanComs and PaulComs are handy, as they bypass that and get 2nd line to deal with your query, who are the people that know what they're doing

I think more of a concern is it seems coms dont monitor their network 24/7. The packetloss other day was caused by some "tweaks" a tech guy did, and only noticed issues after seeing posts on the forum. The major packetloss issue was only noticed after me and others PMd Paul to tell him. If they monitored their network wouldnt they have noticed this themselves?

Either way we are screwed with this traffic shaping! As soon as I can I am off from this lot, broken promises,CS way below par and just too many things going wrong with them

Steve

I realise that 7pm Saturday evening might be quite a busy time for the network but throttling torrents to 100k/sec ??? [censored]. I just want to grab one small file and thanks to Coms, I'm going to have to wait 30-40 mins on what should download in 3 or 4 normally. Pathetic.

For a communications company, Coms sure are lacking in their communications to their customers with this whole stealth throttling thing.

It wouldn't surprise me if its all a strategy by Coms to pee off the moderate to heavy users and get them to leave so that they can sit back and milk all the light users. Saves them investing money in upgrading the network.[/tinfoil hat]

Edited by deleted (Sat 22-Mar-14 19:22:41)

+1

I am of the thinking if I can get what I want quicker then I can get off the network quicker too, freeing up the network for everybody else, I too am trying a couple of small torrents and am being throttled to hell

Steve

I think its obvious what they were planning now.

1. Buy ADSL24
2. Put everyone on generous higher usage plans and say nothing will change to make everyone happy, knowing full well they will throttle the [censored] out of our connections a month later.
3. ?
4. Profit.

/TFH.

Edited by Cruncher (Sat 22-Mar-14 21:07:47)

From my Glasnost test


Is your upload traffic rate limited?

Your ISP appears to rate limit your uploads.

Details:
* Your ISP appears to rate limit your BitTorrent uploads. In our tests, uploads using control flows achieved up to 14252 Kbps while uploads using BitTorrent achieved up to 841 Kbps.

* Your ISP appears to rate limit uploads on port 6881. In our tests, uploads on port 6881 achieved up to 14252 Kbps while uploads on port 36835 achieved up to 835 Kbps.

Is your download traffic rate limited?

Your ISP appears to rate limit your downloads.

Details:
* Your ISP appears to rate limit your BitTorrent downloads. In our tests, downloads using control flows achieved up to 16253 Kbps while downloads using BitTorrent achieved up to 802 Kbps.

* Your ISP appears to rate limit downloads on port 6881. In our tests, downloads on port 6881 achieved up to 16253 Kbps while downloads on port 36835 achieved up to 824 Kbps.


Steve

So whats gaming been like the last few days?

Sunday 11am... Torrents seemingly being throttled down to 450k/sec.

I guess they extended the times of the throttling, probably to the whole of off peak now... again without informing the customer base. A little communication can go a long way to appease users.

That was one good thing about ADSL24 in the early days, they used to be so open about what they were doing and any problems that were occurring. The old forum was one of the things that made me choose ADSL24 in the first place. Sure, it may have looked on the surface like a lot of users complaining and whining about things but there was often valuable info and tips on setting your router to maximise speeds etc etc.
Now it seems, like most companies nowadays, that all Coms want is your money and treat the customers like "useless eaters" who know nothing about anything.

I had no problems last night at least on Titanfall, haven't tried Fifa since Wednesday.

An open letter to Paul Richens Operation Director of Coms.plc
Having been a very happy customer of ADSL since virtually the very beginning and now having been bought by Coms.plc who promised us the following
1. The same if not better service than ADSL24 (WRONG) Speeds dropped immediately!
2. The same price per month as ADSL24 (WRONG) Cost per month went up!
3. The same terms and conditions as ADSL24 (WRONG) I am now capped between 16.00 to 01.00 daily and deep joy the WHOLE of the weekend! (wow impressive for nearly 40 quid a month!)
Now in the English dictionary the word �unlimited� is very well documented (except if you are an accountant or solicitor doing the small print for rogue internet companies, then it means whatever they choose it to).
Why am I being capped? I have no idea? Have I received any communications from your company informing me that I may have been a �naughty boy� and exceeded your designated amount which in fact can�t exist if I am on the same contract as promised on your web site to all ADSL24 customers? In fact how much in the way of communications have I received? One rather vague flyer over the Christmas period and an email sometime in November/December that I would slowly turn green?
So here I am paying an your Internet Company £40 pound a month for a service that is 90% below par (therefore my bill should be about 50 pence a month (plus VAT) I am looking forward to receiving your green Coms plc ISDN modem so I can really get up to speed.
Basically you have no concept of what a modern Internet Company is or what its Customers need. Nor do you even comprehend what Public Relations stands for! (I am available on a Thursday afternoon to drop by and explain the simple concepts like �Dear Sir, sorry, etc�? After all what else will I be doing with �Dialup Coms.plc� service?
Even your support staff whilst trying to be helpful have no idea why this is happening and are getting hammered by rightly indignant customers, The best they can do is offer you a MAC code.
This all reminds me of a certain Gerald Ratner whose chain of jewelry shops disappeared down the tubes after saying, and I quote "because it's total [censored]." If that is censored or you have never heard of that company then you can read it at this link (assuming your weekend 56k speed with Coms plc will get you there���
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerald_Ratner
Me thinks you had better start learning to treat your customers with a little more respect and increase your PR and level of service because at the moment you are selling the proverbial pile of effluent and have the nerve to call yourselves an Internet provider? plus you want to charge me 40 quid a month? Get real!!!

Katzo the Coms plc Dialup Kitty.

Edited by deleted (Sun 23-Mar-14 15:11:10)

Katzo the Coms plc Dialup Guinea Pig*

Fixed it for you.

I think that's my biggest issue outside of the ironic communication issue.. over the last two weeks I feel like a Guinea Pig for their service. Regardless though, they took over a company that had a fantastic reputation for their service and they've had a lot to live up to. The nice guy in me sympathizes with them as I'm sure they didn't want these issues just as much as I don't but the bottom line for me is that their service is nowhere near up to the standard I've been used to for for the last 5+ years and I'll be glad once my migration is complete and hopefully can go back to non throttled connection and not having to time my gaming sessions around my dodgy internet service.

Edited by deleted (Sun 23-Mar-14 13:46:46)

Hi Aibreeze
What really gets my goat is the lies or if Paul Richens Operation Director wants me to put it another way "they are being liberal with the truth" ie I feel like a mushroom, kept in the dark and regularly having manure tipped on my head! Come on Coms plc�����try being honest for once.

This company should not be in the communications industry. My contact states unlimited I have not renewed or ever received and differing terms and conditions from this company.

Never have I received email from this bunch. I don't even know where my monthly bill is? Have I received any notification of when its due? NO. This company has no idea what it is doing.

Like you jumping ship is the only option but as I admit I am a heavy user (hence joining James and ADSL24) where to I jump top? Most customers paid the premium price to enjoy the superb service ADSL24 offered me
.
In the meantime I think my Coms plc piece of string has dried out and need watering to increase speed.

Does Coms really stand for Cowboys Operating Manual Services? Anyone come up with a a better set After all we are not doing anything whilst Coms has to my knowledge screwed done Ports 119 80 23 563 and whatever you guys have found until 01.00 Monday morning. Ridiculous and a joke!

So guys where does the Katzo Kitty jump to? All ideas welcome

Seriously.......where do I go to find an honest reliable Internet provider? You know a company that can understand the English definition of �Unlimited� �Service� etc

My contact states unlimited I have not renewed or ever received and differing terms and conditions from this company.

By the definition of unlimited we still are on unlimited usage. They havent block p2p/usenet, just throttled it, but its still unlimited

But i agree that more communication is needed

I noticed my torrents stuck at 450kb/sec today and googled "coms torrent throttling" and this came up.

I've had countless problems with coms since this swap over. I can't login to my account, the password reset feature sends me a new password which also doesn't work, 2 outtages and now this. I'm moving house in a couple of months so can't even request a MAC!

Well their unlimited dsl service has a usage limit of 1000gb so isn't unlimited. Being honest I can't see many people going over that cap in a month but they shouldn't call their service unlimited when it has a limit.

Edited by deleted (Sun 23-Mar-14 14:48:49)

You can use this website and it's free tools to check anything about speed on the Internet, yo do need Java installed to use it though and if you use peerblock you'll need to turn that off before you run the tests!!


http://broadband.mpi-sws.org/transparency/bttest.php


Steve

o2 do the same. Unlimited calls and texts but it isnt.

Think its more to protect again someone just sending out spam messages than anything.

I suggest you alter the word you use containing the asterisks.

Your post in general reflects how you feel, but the mods if they see that (they call it "filter avoidance") won't edit it out. They near always delete the whole post. Which would upset you!

Cheers for that duly edited the word. Like unlimited that word is in the English Dictionary
For all to read.

Point taken about their version of unlimited��.If you are of a mind to lash out 40 quid a month and have usenet downloads take 37 hours and are happy with it then so be it. I am used to the ADSL24 way of paying my money and getting the service! Not the Coms plc way

Please remember that they promised (and still do) to equal or better ADSL24 and ADSL24 customer�s contacts would be honored? Now apparently I have not read page 407 sub paragraphs 87 that entitle them to do what they want they want. (or wherever they hid it

Fact remains if I pay a lot of money for a service is it do much to expect it to be delivered and suitable correspondance it received and replied prior to the act of capping being carried out?

Sorry to me this is a breach of contract

FIFA still sucks but I'm not going to support with this anymore. I've got my MAC code so I'm out, not going to pay £40 odd a month to a company that promises one thing and does another all while not letting the customer know until they complain about said issue.

Plusnet, Zen or Xilo guys?

Plusnet. True unlimited. No throttling. Gaming and VOIP prioritised.

As of 5:30, back to lag spikes making Titanfall nearly unplayable. Torrents also throttled to <150kbps, this is getting beyond a joke now, what's the next solution, ban p2p completely?

Thanks, I was leaning towards Plusnet Unlimited Fibre. It's half what I'm currently paying too so that's a bonus

Only problem is you get stuck on BT with their IP Profiling

I was looking at Xilo. Exactly same package as im on now (TT LLU, 100gb usage, 8-8pm peak and weekend offpeak). That for me would be the same as truely unlimited as wouldnt use that much

Edited by bobble_bob (Sun 23-Mar-14 17:48:13)

BT Wholesale IP Profile on FTTC is 0.9679 of sync and adjusts immediately the sync changes.

Plusnet sets its own copy of that within a few hours, rounded down to the 10^th of a Mbps below. E.g. IP Profile 63.47Mbps >> Plusnet Current line speed 63.4Mbps.

The Plusnet copying is known to fail occasionally and cause a problem if the adjustment was upwards. Support can reset it. Phone calls at the moment seem to take a while - the new call centre doesn't seem to be fully up to speed yet. There's also a current debate on about the absolute maximum speed test result on PN FTTC maybe being about 74Mbps instead of the 76/77Mbps seen on some other ISPs.

So it isn't all good, but the online support and real-life product experience are.

Sky and TalkTalk don't have any IP Profiling, but I don't think they resell those. Sky 80/20 is £10pm more than PN.

Ah im just on the old fashioned adsl

In reply to a post by Katzo:

2. The same price per month as ADSL24 (WRONG) Cost per month went up!

Now in the English dictionary the word �unlimited� is very well documented (except if you are an accountant or solicitor doing the small print for rogue internet companies, then it means whatever they choose it to).

Katzo the Coms plc Dialup Kitty.

The price has not gone up unless you chose a different package, though their billing was out of sync with adls24, so last month was more expensive as they bought things into line, but the rate remains the same.

"
Never have I received email from this bunch. I don't even know where my monthly bill is? Have I received any notification of when its due? NO. This company has no idea what it is doing." Ummm, see above. No bill yet price gone up

" Most customers paid the premium price to enjoy the superb service ADSL24 offered me". Yes quite.

In terms of "unlimited" it still is. However, like 99.9% of other companies it is subject to a "Fair Use Policy", and lets be honest 1 Terabyte is a hell of lot of bandwidth to basically expect for free.

I am not sticking up for Coms, but just get your facts right. Not happy, then get your MAC.

I am not happy either and unless things improve dramatically (even my basic surfing crawls now some evenings) I too shall be going, but spouting off tosh gets nowhere.

Woody

99.9% companies use fair usage policy? That's a pretty bold statement, I spent less than an hour searching for an isp to migrate to and found plenty that didn't operate under a FUP

Yes to be fair, some have now dropped them, though many now throttle instead...
but I do accept 99.9% was perhaps over the top.
woody

Yes mine went up by £2.00 per month and ir was not out of sync? Same date and time of month! No idea Why? I had to go looking for it..........where as I used to get an email telling me. OK have we got that straight now?

No I have not had any emails other than the original one that told me I was going "green" slowly? NO I was never told I had downloaded to much and therefore would be capped? OR for how long this would occur? Month/Years etc

How can anyone use the "unlimited" and "FUP" in the same sentence? Just don't go together, AND I was never advised of any max download or FUP?

99.9%? I think not........Now that is tosh .Would like to see proof of that statement?

Not happy? to true BUT where do I jump to find a company that is as good as I had with ADSL24? Because I would like to get off this "high speed dial up" and spend my money with a reliable company that can offer me what I had!

Simple really Now can anyone give me a good suggestion as to who to throw my money at? I did ask that in the first post I made but no one bounced in with positive suggestions..........

I think well over 90% of ISPs operate either an FUP or Allowance system, at least during peak hours. But if we look at the number of users subject to such restraints the picture changes dramatically.

On unlimited products, BT, Sky and Plusnet do not apply them. What their customer split is between unlimited and allowance connections I don't know, but these have millions of customers so the UK population subject to FUPs must be well below 90%, never mind 99.9%.

In reply to a post by Katzo:

How can anyone use the "unlimited" and "FUP" in the same sentence? Just don't go together ....

OfCom The ASA agree with you. ISPs can no longer say their product is unlimited and subject to an FUP/1GB cap.

Edited by RobertoS (Sun 23-Mar-14 22:23:57)

I guess that doesn't include it in the name of the service then? Coms for example has three products with unlimited in their titles (Coms DSL Unlimited,, Coms Complete DSL Unlimited and Coms Fibre Unlimited) all of which come with an allowance set at 1000gb and even mentions FUP on their sales page.

It's the ASA, not OfCom sorry. I've edited the post. This News Article is about it.

Maybe they can get away with 1TB, though that article suggests a lot more. Someone watching a lot of HD TV catchup could se an awful lot.

havent been on these forums for years..as never had a problem...noticed last weekend something wasnt right and tonight..cant even download past 100kb/s..truly shocked what ive read in this thread..defo gettin my mac code..not purly coz of the throttling but the SNEAKY WAY they have done it and the LIES..cant stand liars and this paul richens seems very untrustworthy indeed,

i thought thrttling died out with the dinosaur 512mb adsl.....adsl24 seem to have manage without doin this
why am i payin for an office package wth now restrictions..sorry but i work hard for my money and in this day and age every penny counts...coms will loose my custom..and ill be posting my info on coms on various social networking sites. (NEWS TRAVELS FAST).

i miss adsl24

i cant stand coms

Wonder what Plusnet/Xilo who both offer unlimited products would say if you maxed out say a 60mpbs connection 24/7 downloading stuff via p2p/usenet

The one thing regarding adsl24 not throttling is they sold the company to coms. Now did they sell as they realised that an untrottled network wasnt financially working for them? Who knows but certainly over the last few years more and more bandwidth is being used with streaming, gaming etc so maybe things werent working at adsl24 HQ

Plusnet are quite definite about it. It is truly unlimited. As are Sky and BT, possibly EE. I don't know about TT. Xilo I haven't checked their T & Cs.

Edit: Doesn't matter anymore I guess, I'm not on Coms much longer, I can hold out for a while. Shame to see an ISP I highly recommended to many, many friends end up like this though

Edited by deleted (Sun 23-Mar-14 23:22:01)

Fine for me (well fine as in throttled). Port 119 too

+1

Well said!!

Steve

Edited by stevepressman (Mon 24-Mar-14 01:33:13)

Hi Levi

Appreciate that you don't know me personally or professionally and may not have seen my engaging on the forums but before you make further personal attacks, I'd be more than happy to discuss with you individually as I have with with some other ADSL24 users.

Responding to queries on a public forum means walking an incredibly thin line. I have chosen to engage with users on this forum because I think its the right thing to do. All I ask is that there is a balanced view on issues rather than conclusions being drawn without all the detail and information available. I have responded directly to every single request into my PM box and will continue to do so. I have been able to resolve most issues and for those where it hasn't met customer expectations then we have gone our separate ways with a (virtual) handshake and even a smile.

I've dropped you a PM but appreciate as a casual user you may not check your box on a regular basis.

Happy to be part of this community and work with people to provide information and where possible find solutions. I hope that a mature approach can benefit everyone.

Just to recap, we HAVE been testing traffic management, we didn't tell the world, (which I apologised for last Monday) and DO need to publish the policy on our website once we have concluded testing.
There is NO personal vendetta against any single user, we are only concerned with balancing the network for ALL users.

I also appreciate that it used to be different but things change and we have to adapt to those changes. If we do nothing then the online experience for users will significantly impact a large number of customers. Having a measure of control is the responsible thing to do.
Not everyone is going to agree with what I have said or the policy's we wish to employ and that might cause a level of dissatisfaction.
I'll be straight with what we intend to do at the end of the test period and you have the choice to accept the changes or switch to another supplier. In an ideal world nothing would change and everyone would be happy but unfortunately for me, Coms and our users we do need to make some changes.
Of course I don't want people to leave but I have to accept & understand that some people will choose to do so as a result of their own user experience.

There will be a statement on our website later this week explaining what we are doing as per our obligations to the Ofcom code of practice relating to Broadband Speeds.

Thanks and once again, please do not hesitate to contact me directly if I can answer any of your questions or queries.

Paul

Thanks Paul. Can you link to the statement when its out as be interested to read it?

LeviActionslacks's post may have been rather badly constructed, but the core of what he is saying does appear to be true - and the core of what Coms have been saying does appear to be... well, lies.

On the ADSL24/Coms website FAQ page:

Will there be any traffic shaping on the Coms network?

A: No. Coms appreciates the need for transparent services and the network is free from FUP and traffic shaping

You have now admitted that there is indeed traffic shaping.

In an email dated 12-Dec-2013 from Coms:

There will be no adverse effect on your monthly usage limit, or maximum available broadband speed

The introduction of throttling/shaping has an adverse effect on maximum available broadband speed.

And in an email dated 21-Jan-2014 from Coms:

As promised there are no changes to your price or contract and your service won�t be downgraded in any way

The introduction of throttling/shaping is a downgrade in service.

Perhaps us users should be contacting Ofcom about this? Coms have promised no downgrades before the switchover from ADSL24 (and we have emails as documented evidence of these promises) and are now downgrading our service.

That's all well and dandy, but you haven't addressed this statement directly:

"As promised there are no changes to your price or contract and your service won�t be downgraded in any way."

Hi Shroompicker

Fair comment, I only addressed it by saying things have changed.

At the time of the statement there was no intention to change the price, contract or service in any way. We have been able to keep that promise for contract terms and pricing. Because of a number of reported issues with packet loss, this caused us to review the management of the network (service) during peak times in order to find a resolution.
This resulted in us investigating how other ISP's mange their networks and our network team using their own experience leading to the trial of traffic management software in order to resolve the issue.
We have been tweaking the profiles in order to get a balance and prioritise real time traffic. P2P and newsgroups have been impacted as a result and we will publish on our website what the policy will be when we complete testing this week.

Difficult argument to 'win' when addressing the issue of lying as service for some customers has changed. I hope that I can make the case that the intention is never to be dishonest and the speed of responding to real time events makes it easy for speculation & conjecture and difficult to manage but we will make efforts to improve this.
I can only apologise for this necessary change to those who are affected, as the intention is to ensure that as many users as possible get the best online service as is possible from our network. There are a number of users where this change will effect their online experience and I expect many of them will be dissatisfied by its not possible to please 100% of the base. Having worked in the industry for 20 years I've yet to see any business have 100% customer satisfaction but it doesn't make complaints any less relevant. When we have made mistakes we need to learn from them and some lessons are harder than others. We are learning and putting those lessons learned into practice.

Regarding Ofcom you raise an important point, the code is voluntary and neither Coms or ADSL24 were signatories to the 2010 code. I will put this right by signing Coms up to the code http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/telecoms/codes-of-p... as well as ensuring we have measures in place to manage and monitor our compliance to the code.

We have work to do, we haven't always got it right but we will continue to work hard to address issues and not sweep them under the carpet.

Incidentally there is a useful website we have found which might be of use to you regarding uptime of several services that the team are using in the diagnostic phase http://downdetector.co.uk/ hope it has some use for you all.

Thanks,
Paul

Thanks for the extensive reply, Paul.

I will leave it for a couple of weeks before deciding if I will move elsewhere.

Hi Bob

Absolutely, I'll make sure I post an update and link to the page.
Thanks,
Paul

Having worked in the industry for 20 years I've yet to see any business have 100% customer satisfaction but it doesn't make complaints any less relevant.

ADSL24 must have been pretty close. Put your service back to the way it was with ADSL24 and you'll be much closer to 100% than you must be now...

If you add traffic throttling/shaping and start responding to helpdesk tickets raised about slow speed with "replace your micro-filters, router, cables, whatever" (yes, just had that old rubbish), then you are just the same as 90% of the other broadband providers out there. In which case perhaps we would be better switching to one of the other identikit providers that provides poor service, because at least they would be cheaper...

Edited by deleted (Mon 24-Mar-14 12:53:18)

In reply to a post by ColinA3:

Having worked in the industry for 20 years I've yet to see any business have 100% customer satisfaction but it doesn't make complaints any less relevant.

If you add traffic throttling/shaping and start responding to calls about slow speed with "replace your micro-filters, router, cables, whatever" (yes, just had the old rubbish), then you are just the same as 90% of the other broadband providers out there.

1000x this. I acknowledge that I don't quite understand the trials faced by ISPs and I can sympathize to an extent with the situation Coms is under however having support try and schedule an engineer visit twice with me while behind the scenes, people knew that the problem wasn't on my end is a joke. Sort your "Coms" out please.

Edited by deleted (Mon 24-Mar-14 12:59:56)

Hi Paul

Just got back from a hospital visit and your company has me throttled @ 13.45 Or have you put your clocks back and this is the new 16.00?

944.6 KB/s..............

We really do need some answers as to what us your customers can expect
for the monies you require per month?

Yes Port 119,80,23 and 563........all running at above speeds? Just been on to your staff
No I have not been a naughty boy and have not excided your limit. So why,why are you doing all this?
Time me thinks for some plain good old fashioned honesty here.

I also feel sorry for your staff who try very hard to appease and keep someone�s higher up very bad PR mistake under control���praise to them all.

Edited by deleted (Mon 24-Mar-14 14:45:37)

It seems to me that the traffic shaping is in place from 8am-1am Mon-Sun unless Paul can tell us otherwise.

Also noticed that usage from 7-8am is showing up as usage from 8-9am , although I did contact CS about this and they told me it was teething problems and would not count agains my allowance.

I have PM Paul and asked for notice as to when we can except TS and he has not answered me yet. So Paul can you please tell us what times is traffic shaping implemented from and until??

Regards

Steve

No one at Coms plc seems able to provide any answers as to when the traffic management applies to and from? From my connection it just drops to about 100/200 KB/s @ 16.00?

I mean Port 80 is the Web browser for heaven�s sake!

Unbelievable that any rational Company could make this big a PR mistake. Well one that would like to keep its reputation and profits intact. Would recommend MC but I believe that gentleman has other problems as well LOL

Hi Steve

We haven't finished testing yet but will have by the end of this week. So at the moment timings are slightly different day to day week to week. We have only been testing for a couple of weeks and are keen to ensure we have enough data to be confident on the findings rather than taking a view in the short term.
I hope to have something available by Friday at the latest, published on the website and the link copied here.

I'm going to be offline from now until tomorrow morning so if anyone has a specific Coms related query please PM me and I'll pick it up when I'm back online on Tuesday morning.

Thanks,
Paul

Yes, I've got a question I'd like answered.

If Coms is to become yet another identikit provider, with traffic throttling, poor speeds, poor support, poor communication to customers etc, then what is there left to differentiate you from Plusnet etc?

For example, your unlimited price for Coms DSL Unlimited is £30/month. Plusnet's unlimited package is £12.49/month.

The reason the ADSL24's, Xilo's, Zen's etc of this world are able to charge higher prices is that they don't use traffic throttling and have great customer service and communication.

If you are going to turn against your customers by removing all of those features, then you need to cut your prices in half. Otherwise, what's the point in Coms?

Seriously, I'd like to know what you think about this.

I've now requested a MAC code from Coms which I have received and ordered with Plusnet, and gave them the mac code.
Now someone has replied to my ticket on Coms asking whether I want a mac code or because I have a phone with Coms too - do I want them to cease the line too?
The reply from coms with my MAC code has mysteriously disappeared too.

I want to move my phone and fibre over to plusnet - which is the correct answer to this?

A 'cease' to me sounds like stopping the landline then having that week wait until you can then order broadband on it again - not something I want!

In reply to a post by ColinA3:

Seriously, I'd like to know what you think about this.

I agree, what now makes you stand out, I would assume your average punter goes for the plusnets etc, the people that use the more bespoke services are more savvy.

You may soon see a large migration, however that may indeed be the end game you want? (I suspect it is..)

Communication is key, especially when you are dealing with savvy people, this you should know after being in the industry (or any) for 20 years..

What is the idea customer you want to support? It cannot be the same as the cookie cutter plusnets?

I'm going through the same process right now as I'm phone and broadband with Coms. I've requested a cease for Friday and will get line rental via the PO before I can place an order with another provider. This is what I've gathered from Coms and Xilo.

After a bit of Googling, I guess it's because it full LLU / fully unbundled / "MPF". A messy process.

When I moved from Sky though (full LLU) to ADSL24 it was seamless - no loss of phone/internet.
Though that did involve a fibre provide as well though...

Edited by Lucifa42 (Mon 24-Mar-14 16:15:08)

Im getting 50kbps on usenet atm. Its getting lower

Same for torrents. Isn't it getting to the point where throttling isn't the only solution? Hopefully they are just testing it but if packet loss/general stability is so dire that they need to throttle p2p users to 50kbps, then I think the problem runs just a little bit deeper. I guess maybe they are just trying to back p2p users into a corner and get them to leave? Sure feels that way.

Edited by deleted (Mon 24-Mar-14 16:52:35)

Well speeds/times are changing hour by hour so i assume its testing to see what the network can handle without effecting users and getting as much data as poss. Packetloss has been minimal when it was 400kbps at peak times

See what statement comes out on Friday

Edited by bobble_bob (Mon 24-Mar-14 16:58:54)

It's quite interesting watching the slow death of an ISP.