In reply to a post by uno:

75GB actually

We're reviewing that though too and looking to work towards peak/off-peak much like with our standard BT-based Home/Office service.

Matt

OT: I understand it may be commercially sensitive but do you plan on getting near the entanet style usage options? Also any price point, interleaving options, DLM or higher upstream options?

Even if the usage pattern is close im still interested as its the only ADSL2+ avaliable here

In reply to a post by aquiss:

Good Morning,

I'm not sure if our Opal based services would be a close fit for your requirements?
http://www.aquiss.net/broadband-family-value.php

£35/month for 100GB is a little on the expensive side when compared to similar offerings from Vivacti and uno. I'll keep it in mind, though.

***What follows is all related to TalkTalk's monitoring system. It's interesting, though, because I think I irrefutably demonstrate that their system is illegal.***

The following is taken from a document on openrightsgroup.org, in which they explain in greater detail, from information provided to them by TalkTalk, how the system works:

"However, URLs that are deemed to be �bad� will leave the automated system and be reported to TalkTalk personnel. They may be used, for example, to allow TalkTalk to work with legitimate website owners to help resolve whatever malware infection they may have."

If capturing and then manually reviewing data from customers is not in violation of the RIPA, then what is? Paraphrased passage from the RIPA for reference:

"a person intercepts a communication in the course of its transmission by means of a telecommunication system if, and only if, he so monitors transmissions made by means of the system, as to make some or all of the contents of the communication available, while being transmitted, to a person other than the sender or intended recipient of the communication."

Monitors transmissions? Check
Makes the contents available to a person other than the intended recipient? Check
Illegal? Check

If they claim that they are allowed to do this, then they are claiming they can manually review all data you transmit and receive, and doing so is completely legal. The URL is contained in the data portion of a packet - because it's data.

In most statements, they do not mention the manual review of URLs by employees, so if you twisted the RIPA, it could be considered legal. But manually reviewing URLs by personnel is a clear violation. I personally suspect they are doing much more with the data.

TalkTalk also claim that they have a magic oracle that can "anonymise" any string. Yeah right. Removing everything that follows a question mark in HTTP requests IS NOT anonymisation. A machine cannot anonymise every URL. It's impossible. Stop lying.

Regulators are either: too inept, too lazy, or corrupt. Hanlon's razor would lead me to believe it's the former, but in a case where they have had the work done for them (i.e. members of the public have clearly stated what TalkTalk are doing and why it's illegal), I think the other two possibilities are just as likely.

This may not be such a problem now, because only TalkTalk do it; everyone is free to use another ISP. The problem is that if TalkTalk are allowed to do this, then there's nothing stopping the other ISPs from doing the same. I'm sure some of the more smaller ISPs would not engage in such things, but how long before it's embedded in routing equipment and/or BT's infrastructure and impossible to avoid? If everyone sits idly by, that's what will happen. Thank god for encryption. They'll have a tough time outlawing that.

When is your heavy use? Spread relativity evenly over the whole day everyday or could you move it away from weekday working hours if it isn't already?

If the latter then A&A might be suitable. £26.60 would get you four "units" which would equate to 150Gb off-peak and 1Gb in peak time (or 1.5 peak and 100 off, or any other mix) on BT's 20CN network, or 2Gb peak plus 300Gb off (or other combinations like 4Gb peak, 200Gb off) on the 21CN backhaul if that is available on your exchange. See http://aaisp.net.uk/broadband-units.html for more info and a cost calculator. Their billing is pretty flexible (units are called off by the byte so you can mix the peak use and off-peak use differently each month, unused quota can be carried forward one month, and overuse called off against next month instead of being charged the over-use rate unless you go significantly over) and their control panel gives you a good view of what you have used and when.

Uploaded data is unmetered (with a basic "don't go nuts policy" attached, but there are people uploading lots on 10Mbit upstream FTTC connections so you probably don't have to worry abut any upstream FUP on an ADSL2 line).

Oh, and they claim not to filter/monitor at all (http://aa.net.uk/news-censorship.html), a claim that I've not specifically tested myself but I have no reason to believe it is false (they weren't affected by the IWF Wikipedia issue, so they definitely don't subscribe to that as they state) - so that should help you with concerns about other organisations being fed your browsing habits.

If you need to download a lot during the day monday-to-friday then their plans are no good to you because at one or two Gbytes per unit it is quite expensive, otherwise it seems their product matches your requirements and price range. There is a period in the night (0200 to 0600) when things are cheaper (called off at 1000G/unit not 50 or 100), which is useful if some of your activity can be automated overnight (or if you keep unusual hours due to shift work or such, and so might actively use the 'net at that sort of time) - if you can make enough use of that you could probably make do with the minimum 2 unit/month tariff which is less than £20.

Edited by deleted (Sun 24-Jul-11 19:00:50)

Why on earth would the OP want to go from a ADSL2+ Opal LLU to a BT based ADSL1 A&A ipstream service and pay a small fortune in the process? I think the only solution for him/her is Vivaciti's Surfwise package (Opal LLU based):
http://www.vivaciti.net/product/1/home-internet/17/s...

Why on earth would the OP want to go from a ADSL2+ Opal LLU to a BT based ADSL1 A&A ipstream service and pay a small fortune in the process?

It depends on his exact expected use pattern. You are right in that the Opal option looks to fit the description of his needs and budget, and it does avoid a chunk more of BT's network (moving back to parts of BT in order to get FTTC from A&A after a few years using Be's LLU backhaul). The OP did not state what exchange he was on, so I have no way to determine if ADSL2+ is available without LLU in their area, and in any case maximum speed may not be a particular concern.

The OP asked for options, and I just added an option to the discussion that fitted the stated requirements (dependant on some fine details that were not specified).

Depending on how often (s)he goes over 100Gb, by how much, and how much under in the other months, how much of that traffic is upstream (the page you linked to give no detail as to whether upstream is metered on that plan, so I'll assume is as unmetered upstream bandwidth is usually explicitly stated in product descriptions when present in the plan), and how much of that traffic could be scheduled for the cheap early morning slot, an A&A 2 unit plan (costing about the same as the plan you linked to) with the flexibility regarding carry-over and carry-under might make it considerably more attractive.

Of course other factors (like if they want to avoid BT's backhaul, or need/want to transfer a noticeable amount downstream during the 9-to-6 period on week days) might make the Opal based deal a "no brain needed" decision and the A&A one completely unsuitable. There might be other factors that weight heavily in that direction too (if there are, it would be helpful to the OP for you to state them if you know them so the OP can use that information when comparing the options).

A&A's stance on filtering may be something the OP considers significant too (the plan you linked to had no detail on such things, so they'd have to check with the ISP in question to see what their stance is, if such things are in fact significant). Other fine details the discussion hasn't even touched on might make a difference too (so the OP would be well advised to read the detail provided by the respective ISPs, and contact them with questions where the detail is missing, if the larger details have not already made the decision completely one sided).

To say one of the two plans is the only one that could be right, without knowing the expected use details that would help distinguish between the two, seems rather short sighted to me - hence I stated the assumptions under which I thought the option I talked about would be worth considering and conversely under what circumstances it could be dismissed as unsuitable (either absolutely or when compared to the other option(s)).

Worth pointing out that there is some traffic management on the Vivaciti surfwise packages which you can pay to have taken off and make unlimited.

You get less allowance with Xilo but I don't think they have any traffic management.

Yeah but the OP wants to pay less than 30 notes pm for 100GB data so he'd have to put up with Vivaciti's throttling. I'm sure he realises a totally unthrottled connection with at least 100gb data ain't gonna come cheap (you don't get owt for nowt in this world!)

The traffic managment on Surfwise only applies during "office hours" and I think is limited to P2P traffic, this might not be an issue for the OP.

It does not affect the BBC iPlayer download service for me.

8am to 7.30pm Monday to Friday.

I'm on the surfwise complete package with the file sharing addon and have few complaints. Certainly none with throughput or latency.
I have noticed a couple of occasions of 20% packet loss that lasted around 15 mins or so recently which killed the connection and downtime of up to an hour a few times a month ago, normally in the middle of the night but once midday.

Can't think of any issues in the last year apart from those recent ones which I think is pretty good.

I pay £46.80. Assuming £11 line rental makes the broadband £35.80 which isn't that far from £30 with the bonus of being unlimited and unmanaged.

In reply to a post by gmoorc:

8am to 7.30pm Monday to Friday.

I'm on the surfwise complete package with the file sharing addon and have few complaints. Certainly none with throughput or latency.
I have noticed a couple of occasions of 20% packet loss that lasted around 15 mins or so recently which killed the connection and downtime of up to an hour a few times a month ago, normally in the middle of the night but once midday.

Can't think of any issues in the last year apart from those recent ones which I think is pretty good.

I pay £46.80. Assuming £11 line rental makes the broadband £35.80 which isn't that far from £30 with the bonus of being unlimited and unmanaged.

Was looking at the Surfwise package via vivaciti.

What sort of usage are you putting through it out of interest?

What upload speeds are you getting and can you tweak target margins?

Looks like unlimited addon takes it £40 PM.

Edited by deleted (Mon 25-Jul-11 17:39:22)