Some questions about Virgin media 50Mb service

Hello all

I am with with BT Infinity 76 Mb, option 2 at the moment and get full speed up and down but it is costing too much even retentions team cannot do it lower than £19.85 per month for the fibre service so I am going with Virgin 50Mb service and Telephone line with XL talk.
I have had no problems with the service from BT and I use on average 400 GB per month ,I hear that Virgin restrict upload so my plan is to do it all after 11 pm and before 11 am.
Anyway my questions are

1. can i use my Asus RT-N66U with this service and is it worth it if the super hub is up to par ?
2. I got a mac code from bt intending to go to plusnet but I got a great deal for virgin so I went straight with them so my question is will I have to pay any disconnection fee as I am going from BT fibre to Virgin cable ?
I spoke to a BT and they said when virgin take over the landline the broadband will cease so i dont have to cancel the fibre service .... so is that right ?
3.I am pretty sure that Virgin Media is new to my area so I should get great speeds ,no congestion ?
My area is London E1/E2 Area [Shoreditch was my BT Fibre Cabinet/Exchange] [ Virgin area is 22]

Thank you very much

If you use modem mode on the superhub the asus will probably be a better router

I would expect a cease charge from the shut down of the old broadband, bt may swallow it if you are lucky

On speeds until you have it you won't know.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

If you use modem mode on the superhub the asus will probably be a better router

I would expect a cease charge from the shut down of the old broadband, bt may swallow it if you are lucky

On speeds until you have it you won't know.

Thanks for the quick reply !

In reply to a post by tairo:

3.I am pretty sure that Virgin Media is new to my area so I should get great speeds ,no congestion ?
My area is London E1/E2 Area [Shoreditch was my BT Fibre Cabinet/Exchange] [ Virgin area is 22]

Thank you very much

I wouldn't count on it completely especially if it's London. Completely depends on the utilization in your area.

One thing to bear in mind: The upload speeds on Virgin Media are diabolical in comparison to FTTC!
One thing I miss about home when down in university is how stable the FTTC connection is both latency wise and speed wise.

Here is a normal latency shot from our 100 Mbps connection with VM: My Broadband Ping

And our latency at home with BT 80/20: My Broadband Ping

Upload: On our VM 100Mbps package we get a measly 6Mbps upload which is rubbish for a 100Mbps package.

If you don't mind 4.7-5Mbps upload then it won't really affect you.
But trust me; going from the full 80/20Mbps package to a 50/5Mbps package is a big decrease if you upload a lot of files.

I do upload a lot of files but i am in a position where I can do this overnight so slow speeds wont affect me that much ...... I hope !!

In reply to a post by tairo:

I do upload a lot of files but i am in a position where I can do this overnight so slow speeds wont affect me that much ...... I hope !!

If you don't mind waiting overnight then I don't think you'll have a problem with Virgin Media.

Be aware though that uploading/congesting the upstream channels on a VM connection have a bigger effect on any downstream communication than on a BT FTTC based connection. E.g. If you are uploading a movie and trying to download a file, things will slow down much more than you're used too on FTTC.

I just realised something , say for example that I am not happy with the service and want to cancel within 14 days and want to go to say Plusnet ,would that be an issue as the telephone line is with Virgin not BT ?

The phone line is over a different set of copper, i.e. virgin copper rather than openreach copper.

So it will be like signing up to PlusNet with a new line, but should be a fairly easy re-start of existing line. Main thing is if you want the number to remain, getting Virgin Media to port the number back again.

so how hard will it be to get virgin to release the same number back when I am done with the service to another provider like sky/plusnet ?

Only time I've seen people have problems is when the number was from an original Virgin number pool, as it started off in the WLR/BT camp should be no problem.