Which ISP would be reliable enough for video streaming?

Is your ISP reliable enough for video streaming?
Are you able watch a 1 hour TV programme or an on-demand film via your ISP and expect to watch it through without interruption?

We get Virgin Media in Stevenage, but their service just isn't reliable enough to watch TV programmes or streaming videos online. We'd like to move to another ISP but the headline download speeds offer no clue about how reliable their service is. BT offer plenty of bandwidth but is it free from interruptions? We'd stay with Virgin Media if they could reliably deliver 5-10% of the peak speed, but they can't seem to manage even that!

Please don't suggest calling VM's customer service - I can't understand them most of the time!

Any helpful advice would be very much appreciated.
Thanks.

Any/None! Depends on your connection speed from exchange. If it is sufficient then any else none.

I have no trouble streaming for hours on an EE connection @ 19-20 Meg. Same will go for any BTw based ISP.

I'd be shocked and dismayed at any ISP that couldn't deliver a video stream if the actual connection speed was adequate. I assume (I hope!) you're a VM ADSL customer if you're having problems. What speed is your connection?

We're a Virgin cable customer, not ADSL. I gather from VM forums that we're not the only ones with reliability problems, even if I ignore people who really have a WiFi problem.

Virgin replaced our single channel Ambit modem with a multi-channel superhub four months ago but that didn't seem to make much difference to the reliability. Modem metrics (SNRs, errors etc) look OK.

Typical daily ping graph from 2 days ago is here (I hope):
My Broadband Ping

Virgin's last suggestion was upgrading to 30MB, while tying us in with a new contract! Now why would I want to do that?

Stevenage is quite a big place.....If you are in SG1 then you are right next to the exchange and any ADSL supplier will give you iwhat you want. I am in SG2 and ADSL was rubbish, (~3.2 Mbps). I went with Sky fiibre and sync, permanently, at 39999/10000 Kbps. No problems at all with multiple streaming.

Edited by deleted (Wed 16-Jul-14 17:43:10)

In reply to a post by Baritone:

Virgin's last suggestion was upgrading to 30MB, while tying us in with a new contract! Now why would I want to do that?

Possibly you're on the legacy 10Mbps product which I think uses DOCSIS 2 protocol over the cable coax, and the newer speeds use the DOCSIS 3 protocol.

VM should know, its their network, but its possible that in your area DOCSIS 2 is oversubscribed, and DOCSIS 3 is fine - but you would need VM to confirm this before signing any contract.

VM has problems in regional ways, so they might be fine here in Hampshire, and awful in Stevenage. Switching to an FTTC provider would be a good move if you want higher speeds and consistency. It often costs a bit more than VM though.

BT Infinity 2 here (Sidmouth, Devon).

Down 30Mbps, Up 12Mbps. Do see contention at times, dropping to 15Mbps occasionally.

Can have two people streaming wirelessly at the same time without jittering.

Hope this helps a little.

In reply to a post by XRaySpeX:

Any/None! Depends on your connection speed from exchange. If it is sufficient then any else none.

This is the issue !
There seems no way of telling in advance whether the ISPs connections beyond your exchange will cope with peak demands.
And with fibre contracts being over 12 months a real dilema in choosing an ISP for performance.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

Possibly you're on the legacy 10Mbps product which I think uses DOCSIS 2 protocol over the cable coax, and the newer speeds use the DOCSIS 3 protocol.

The guy has a Superhub, he's using DOCSIS 3.

Are you hammering the upload on that connection at times, uploading content?