VFast Testing 100Mbit Service

In reference to www.vfast.co.uk:

VFast Testing 100Mbit Service
Vfast are currently testing a 100Mbit product, we will shortly be contacting selected customers in Thanet, Maidstone & Kingshill.

Somebody here is on the Thanet network so this may be of interest to you.

**Edit** SlimJ - You're being served from the Thanet network aren't you?

Edited by Yaz (Sat 30-Oct-10 16:47:28)

Hi Yaz,

We changed Slimj's equipment last week so he can go onto the new network, i think he is now getting around 20mbit before the trial

Where are you based ?

Regards
Darren

Hi Darren,

I'm served off of the Dunkirk mast overlooking Blean.

I spoke with yourself a few weeks back when I called to enquire about moving up onto the Max package.

Yasin

Ah yes , i remember, we are doing Dunkirk this week and upgrading the backhaul the following week. We will then be upgrading end users. I would anticipate Dunkirk users getting similar speeds.

Regards
Darren

You beat me to it. 100Mbps is impressive head line speed, I wonder what the reality will be. Will be far faster than BT offer and a life line for those that can't get broadband through normal methods. Good to see Vfast are still pushing the limits. Would be good if they could get their coverage added to thinkbroadband maps!

Thanks for the update Darren.

Looking forward to the coming months.

It certainly is an impressive head line speed though I would expect a lower throughput in reality (IP overheads, contention etc.).

For those who are unlikely to benefit from traditional broadband methods, wireless services are still needed to plug the gap. I will continue to follow the rollout of FTTC/P (Canterbury is set to be upgraded Sept 2011) as having options is always a good thing.

Last but not least, I submitted a Coverage ticket last week regarding the ThinkBroadBand Maps and Jonathan said that this had been mentioned.

FYI Canterbury is scheduled for some time 2012 now. Keeps slipping! Was 31st March 2011, then September 2011 then September 2012 and now some time by end of 2012. Hopefully this will mean FTTH when Canterbury finally gets done. Gives Vfast plenty of time to offer their service before BT.

Hi Yaz,

Yes, I was upgraded last week, the engineers turned up unannounced and upgraded while I was at work, then had a picture message from my brother who was at home showing speedtest speeds of 15mbps down and 10mbps up!! I was wondering what he was going on about as we were barely getting above 2-3mbps before, so it was a nice surprise to come home to.

I've not had a chance to really test the connection out as I've been away on a stag weekend in Amsterdam. But early tests were great, the 1Gb test file to download from this site took about 10 minutes, a 180mb HD video podcast from iTunes took about 2 minutes, 1080p HD video from YouTube will pretty much stream. Overall the connection feels much snappier and the pings are as low as 11ms which should prove excellent for gaming.

Jonathan suggested about the faster speeds but didn't indicate exactly how fast, but I read that Orbital were trialling 100mbit connections so wondered how long before VFast would also start offering this speed. Will be interested to see these speeds but I really don't know what the hell I'll be using these speeds for!! lol. But if this happens I think it would make a great media piece, how an area such as Manston has gone from a non stable ADSL internet connection struggling to reach 0.5mbps, to receiving speeds of up to 100mbit through the air (Darren, if you need a case study please let me know).

Also the new antenna on the chimney is much smaller and discreet so I'm impressed by that too.

Where have you read about the change of date? The documents linked to on the Openreach site still list Sept 2011 (Openreach FTTC) though admittedly they are now a few weeks old.