Real world throughput no provider offers assurance over. If you want that, you need a leased line, be prepared to spend £1500 a month or so for 300mbit.

Not true. Isp's may not put this on their website or in their t&c's, but I know of a number that do or at least quote a minimum.

BT for one I think do, and I also have an email somewhere from another ISP that guarantee throughput.

You may have to specifically ask what it is though.

The figures I have seen are:

15 - assurance rate
40 -
40 - guaranteed 90% of the time

I think it should be routine question to ask of a new provider before signing up.

Regards
Mac

Edited by deleted (Sun 29-Jan-17 12:03:22)

Yes - BT do when you sign up. Mine was 63mbps and I get full speed under 100M from the NGA

Talk Talk Business also do - and they say that if they can not fix it within 15 days you can leave without penalty.

Those are the only 2 I have experience with who do that.

The point Nemeth made about a leased line is valid to me. Cable connects at full speed but this varies in the real world, where as a leased line is connection with 24/7 full speed or nothing

At least that's how I think they work? Never had one.

Edited by deleted (Sun 29-Jan-17 12:09:09)

No ISP guarantees a minimum throughput for consumer services.

BT Wholesale and Openreach provide prioritisation rates, but that's all - nothing guaranteed.

Edited by deleted (Sun 29-Jan-17 12:13:47)

In reply to a post by arronlowley:

virgin was good for me, until a year later, im not sticking by them, id rather less speed and a more reliable connection. also ignition some night i do see double figures, the other night i had 86Mbps.

im probably one of the only people in the area who has 300/20 and i suffer the most and it really isnt fair at all, i should be prioritised, but nope, virgin simply care only about money.

Yeah that was my point. When a 300Mb contract is dropping to that level there's a really good reason to complain.

I'm afraid there is no viable way to prioritise without running the risk of a single customer seriously affecting performance for everyone else, and there could be a couple of hundred or more of them, sharing the bandwidth.

I suspect you're in an area on 12 downstream channels. VM probably shouldn't have released 300Mb there in the first place.

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Min line speed (minimum line speed) is VERY DIFFERENT to your current problem.

With Virgin Media you have a fixed line speed based on the product sold.

NOTE: Not saying what Virgin is doing is right, but simply that there is a reason they can do it, there is no law saying they cannot

As with PON and FTTP cable connects at the full speed available to the modem, or to the cable segment, whichever is lower.

VM varies between 600Mb and 1.2Gb of downstream capacity. Will be at GPON levels downstream in the not too distant.

As I said elsewhere I strongly suspect OP was provisioned on an area using the legacy Cisco or Motorola equipment, limited to 600Mb. My own area's node, bits of which are newly enabled, is on that equipment pending upgrades and 300Mb is not available. I imagine they released as load was relatively low, and were planning upgrades to the newer equipment which have, at least in the case of the hubsite serving here, been delayed.

Those who may remember when BT Wholesale had a bunch of issues with performance a couple of years back, VM are in that situation much of the time when it comes to upgrades to relieve capacity problems, with the added bonus of having to replace equipment out in the field in a bunch of areas as they are running out of bandwidth at the RF level.

When that's done and the DOCSIS 3.1 equipment is in place things will be a ton better, it's just taking a really long time in a large part due to VM's legacy as a bunch of smaller companies.

When I worked for ntl there were some really bizarre sites hosting broadband routers. A converted public toilet and an outhouse near a pub come to mind immediately. Moving equipment around, handling the optics, and upgrading power and cooling in sites used originally for cable TV and now used for linear and on-demand TV, routers and transmission equipment, with a side order of CCAP is painful. VM don't have the luxury of a load of additional space freed up by a migration from analogue telephony to digital switched.

it also brings factors outside of control Upgrading cooling requires planning permission, upgrading power relies on the local power company, running out of space requires extensions to be built or additional property to be acquired.

Worst part for VM is that at some point they'll be moving more and more equipment out of those sites and into cabinets in the field.

I'm not excusing anything that's happened, but just trying to add some colour. Relative to the situation VM are in the capacity planning and upgrade requirements on Openreach, BT Wholesale and individual ISPs are relatively trivial, there's loads more to go wrong and get wrong.

In reply to a post by Ignitionnet:

In reply to a post by arronlowley:

virgin was good for me, until a year later, im not sticking by them, id rather less speed and a more reliable connection. also ignition some night i do see double figures, the other night i had 86Mbps.

im probably one of the only people in the area who has 300/20 and i suffer the most and it really isnt fair at all, i should be prioritised, but nope, virgin simply care only about money.

Yeah that was my point. When a 300Mb contract is dropping to that level there's a really good reason to complain.

I'm afraid there is no viable way to prioritise without running the risk of a single customer seriously affecting performance for everyone else, and there could be a couple of hundred or more of them, sharing the bandwidth.

I suspect you're in an area on 12 downstream channels. VM probably shouldn't have released 300Mb there in the first place.

12 channels is about 456mbit. A single customer on 300 should be fine.

The guy is using wireless, albeit 802.11ac, so his speed tests are pretty meaningless anyway.

In reply to a post by Icaras:

I disagree with this. To be fair most providers on the Openreach network don't suffer these massive slowdowns at peak time.

Most providers don't slow down to 160mbit? You mean most providers don't offer anything like this speed at any time.

Hell, BT provision infinity 4 fttp on 250mbit vlans where you'll often see contention and you will never exceed 250mbit...

In reply to a post by nemeth782:

12 channels is about 456mbit. A single customer on 300 should be fine.

The guy is using wireless, albeit 802.11ac, so his speed tests are pretty meaningless anyway.

12 channels is 600Mb. For a single customer on 300 to be fine needs everyone else on the bonded group to not be using more than 300Mb so relies on how many other modems are on the group.

I doubt the guy's wireless is fine all day then suddenly slows down at peak periods, especially given VM have confirmed his area has capacity issues.

A 12 channel node running at 80% has ~120Mb left for a 300Mb customer's burst which is kinda where the OP's service is during some peak periods.

And if you complain and fall below them they will do like most retail providers, let you leave if its not just a one off

In reply to a post by nemeth782:

Hell, BT provision infinity 4 fttp on 250mbit vlans where you'll often see contention and you will never exceed 250mbit...

That was a system bug - 330/30 is not provisioned on a 250Mb VLAN.