50meg - I don't care!

I've been an avid internet user since the mid 90's.

I upgraded to Telewest's broadband when it launched and moved to ADSL when i did.

Over the years my useage has changed, beginning with usenet and web pages, i found i was moving more to IRC and music downloads. Eventually downloading video content - often quite a lot of it.

These days I use the net to stream a little here and there, browse a few pages and check email.

I have a 10mb broadband connection and can't at the moment think of a single reason to upgrade.

Are Virgin doing this for marketing purposes more than anything?

Innovation is good but isn't it all rather pointless right now?

Depends how impatient you are. Granted there'll be nothing you can do on 50Mbit that you can't do on ten but what you can do you can do 5 times faster. That's worth something to me anyway.

John.

Lets face it though, unless you're frequently downloading massive files then you aren't going to notice much benefit for the increase in subs.

Prior to 3G the talk in the mobile industry was of a "killer app", something which would make the transition from 2/2.5g to 3/3.5g essential.

I don't think that ever came, more a combination of desktop apps ported to mobile devices making them just "more useful".

For the next step in broadband speed for most (who are more inclined to watch their outgoings now) is there really the demand or need for the hype? I'm not convinced. Is this likely to be taken up mainly by those early adopters? If so, i was one, this is a step far beyond my requirements. I couldn't find a use for it - even 10mb more than satisfies my needs!

Perhaps those who work from home will find it useful in some ways but like i say, even 10mb is suitable for that in most cases!

I'm not gonna call it a "bust" because demand will be there at some point. Just not convinced there is a need for it now.. seems like (for a change) the technology is ahead of the requirements!

Households with one internet user probably will find little need now, but if in a home with 2 or 3 people who all do a fair bit online, then it will help make things smoother for all.

What is the upload meant to be on this?

1.5, but 1.75 rumour around for �52 a month.

Rising to 2.5 once network is ready

Proper DVD quality film downloads become feasible and the wait for a 1.5GB games console download becomes pretty small at around 5 minutes.

If there is traffic management and it costs too much then it will be just a marketing exercise, over �60 would be worthless, over �50 is a bit too much. �42 would be the magic price point to get an awful lot of XL customers to upgrade.

Alas it is down to the accountants and not the geeks to set prices on this sort of thing

I'd have thought 1.5 might be a bit low for a shared line if people are all using it.

Mind you, you could probably split this ok between 3/4 users depending what they're using it for.

Traffic management might be a bone of contention though.

I'm not sure the DVD quality downloads thing is that important. Streaming decent quality stuff on demand is probably more important now and lets face it, the virgin cable stb does a reasonably good job of this!

>Alas it is down to the accountants and not the geeks to set prices on this sort of thing

I guess like anything over time it will have to decrease in price. I'd be interested as a ADSL customer going to my supplier and saying "now virgin are doing 1m = �1 effectively, i expect you to drop your prices in line with this". Highly unlikely as you'd need a significant demand from customers for this and being honest, most people don't really pay that much attention to what competitors are offering!

I agree with your comments.

The big question for us in N1 is will it actually work in Dalston?

The best Virgin Media can provide XL users here with is sub 900 kbs downloads from around 20:30 through 01:30.

To each complainer, fixes and dates are promised in the form of F ticket numbers and handily disappear into a black hole after the the due date.

---------

The HOPE is raised.

"There is currently a capacity issue that is ongoing in your area. This has
been logged under the fault reference F......... with fix date of / / / and will during peak times
cause restricted throughput. However you should find that outside of peak
times your full speeds will be achievable. We apologise for any
inconvenience this may be causing"

AND AFTER DATE DUE also note the new way of planning and operating is: - "HOPE"

"................................................. the slow speed issue is due to a high
utilisation in the area. Unfortunately the relief date originally planned
has passed for reasons we are not aware of. At this point in time there is
no set relief date. I apologise for this inconvenience and hope that a
relief is set soon and the issue is resolved ASAP."

--------

As your readers may be aware of, this situation has gone on here since the merger and on the basis of user posts elsewhere similar situations are developing in other urban areas.

Meanwhile Virgin Media up sells to the lower bandwidth users when they complain of speed and irresponsibly continue to sell to new users that what it does not have to sell. Virgin Media appears to be operating analogously to the Ponzi like schemes of the Investment Community that could be classed as fraudulent had it not been mitigated by the December 5 Offtel Code of Practice.

A question I cannot get answered. Will DOCSIS 3.0 delivered over already over-subscribed infrastructure actually perform as it should. Or rather, when is a separate network not a separate network?

Edit added the actual quotes from VM

Edited by deleted (Mon 15-Dec-08 10:53:21)