Virgin Media Broadband

[The Stafford Beast]

I've been with VM for some time now and have had a nice 10meg connection running at about 9.5meg 'real' speed since they upgraded me.

However, this weekend it's sadly dropped down to a measly 2.5meg (if I'm lucky). Even the BBC news and YouTube videos are downloading slowly and require much buffering.

Would this be due to the bank holiday weekend (everyone using BitTorrent) or would it be more of a deeper issue? I don't think they deserve my £25 this month!...

 

[wmrcomputers]

To me it sounds more like you've hit the cap, IE.. you've downloaded over a certain amount of data during peak hours and therefore had your bandwidth reduced to keep it fair for other people losing out on bandwidth.

If you run a speed test at www.speedtest.net after 24 hours you should see your speed back to normal.

I would say it's unlikely to be bank holiday trafic to be honest, although it could be a signal fault from the "green box" you are connected up to. 12 months ago we were getting terrible speeds and sometimes couldn't even connect, and it turned out that the signal levelling device for our street was buggered - it was just that it only affected us as we were the furthest away from the green box. Took months before they finally relised the problem, we'd had new cables laid first and everything.

Saying that, don't be put off. IMO Virgin Media is still BY FAR the most reliable type of broadband you can get. Everybody i know with ADSL broadband get's problems galore compared to VM customers.

If after 24 hours your speed is still bad, get on the phone and give them some grief

 

[tek-monkey]

It 'should' be throttled for 5 hours from the point you hit the cap, at least it used to be. Thats why my bit torrent server only runs at certain times.

 

[The Stafford Beast]

Thanks guys...
To be honest, I hardly use the internet at home. Usually for surfing the net and downloading email. I only use BitTorrent for downloading Linux disks or the latest Windows beta test (as I DO have a legit beta key for it), so I doubt I'm reaching the cap monthly cap.

However, I am happy to report that I am now back up to 9.6meg this morning after rebooting my cable modem, router and PC. Could've been anything!

 

[tek-monkey]

The cap isn't monthly, its twice daily. IIRC its 09:00-15:00 and 16:00-21:00. Use more than about a gig during one of these times and get yo ass capped for 5 hours (25% of normal speed). Which makes their unlimited package a tad limited...

 

[The Stafford Beast]

Which makes their unlimited package a tad limited...

I'd say. Although I still doubt I'd used a gig during the bank holiday. Never mind. They seem ok-ish now anyway. 6.7meg down 426k up. I'll settle for that.

 

[Gramaisc]

I'm getting 2.35 on TalkTalk at the moment, but It's normally around 3.7.
700k up.

 

[John Marwood]

conspiracies abound

 

[My Name is URL]

Virgin Media suck ass.... never been happier since I left them, not aided by the fact that I went to O2 and they are the dogs danglies... and about £2 a month which is bargrainous.

 

[tek-monkey]

Yeah, but you need a phone line

 

[My Name is URL]

Yeah, but you need a phone line

True, but if you got one anyway then its no extra cost and even if you haven't it's £11.75 a month + £2 for O2 = £13.75 a month...

Admittedly less speed than Virgin but no stupid throttling and great service for about £5 a month less.

 

[tek-monkey]

TBH the throttling doesn't bother me, all torrents now go through my uberserver and it only downloads overnight while we're in bed. Also I get 20Mb for £16

However, at the new house I may change over. Will see, the survey threw up a few things so need to talk to my solicitor.

 

[tek-monkey]

Broadband tax on its way!

But they're only taxing phone lines, regardless of actually having broadband, so thats a win for my VM connection!

 

[My Name is URL]

I wouldn't worry too much, after the election it'll get thrown in the bin along with Labour.

Typical labour thinking though.

 

[shoes]

The £6 annual fee will be levied against every home phone line, regardless of whether or not the owner is already connected to a broadband internet service, and the £175 million raised will be used to pay for the next generation of super-fast broadband services.

Excuse me!?!?!?! I presume by this then that the line rental and subscription costs of the service are 100% profit and overheads and not a penny is invested in R&D?!? F**k off!

 

[db]

i'm sure everyone can cope with £6 a year lol.. i'll happily pay £6 a year to aid quicker broadband development..

not that i'll have to, seeing as, like tek, i don't have a phone line lol..

 

[shoes]

again its not the cost that irritates me its the principle. how exactly is this going to benefit anyone? sure you might be able to get more surfing done but is it going to mean less people sitting on their fat arses getting unhealthy and using the internet? no. is it going to help the nhs having to deal with all the people spending all their time on the internet and not exercising? no. is it going to line the pockets of this broken failing government via what if quite frankly yet another insulting 'tax'? yes.

how about striking a deal with this massively profitable service providing enterprises rather than taking YET MORE from the working person? gosh, what a concept!

 

[wmrcomputers]

I'm not into politics, but am I right in saying that as it's a tax this goes to the government?? In which case how is it their job to upgrade the future of broadband???
Isn't this what we all pay our ISP's for? Surely some of the profits should be regularly going into upgrading for the future?

So... when is the taxi tax going to start for nicer looking taxi's? Baked bean tax? Toilet paper tax? Or am i missing the point? :s lol

 

[db]

I'm not into politics, but am I right in saying that as it's a tax this goes to the government?? In which case how is it their job to upgrade the future of broadband???
Isn't this what we all pay our ISP's for? Surely some of the profits should be regularly going into upgrading for the future?

this tax was proposed ages ago, but initially it was only going to be levied on people who did have phone lines but didn't have broadband.. the idea of the tax is to raise money to help the government get more people online - they want to help the those who aren't already connected join the information super A-road!

so it's not a tax to improve broadband service per se, it's more to improve technology so that more people can become connected.. ISPs aren't willing to plow money into rural areas and stuff as there's no money in it, so that's why the government want to lend a hand.. it's not just raising money to give the rest of us 100gb connections!

 

[shoes]

ah well yet another reason to not be with BT any more (the bastards lol). Like you and tek I am also on virgin.

How long before we get a fiber optic tax or just a general non-phone line user tax?