Virgin Media 50Mb?

[tombull]

So, what's the deal with VM 50Mbps?

I've just ordered it as my current connection (Be @ 24Mbps) won't sync at over 4Mbps. I've just moved to a house which seems to be the furthest distance from the telephone exchange as you can get within the M25!

So what should I look out for? Will I get 'traffic-managed' like I used to on the Virgin 10Mbps connection I got rid of a few years back? Will I actually get 50Mbps? Or something close?

What are your experiences?

Cheers, Tom

[shbris]

officially you'll have no download limits, but max out your connection for days at a time and you might find it slowing down

where do you live? if u could only get 4mb on a 24mb phoneline from your exchange it might have been hasty to order a 50mb!!

[tombull]

I live in South Ealing... and on a road where Virgin promise they have 50Mb service - so I've got my fingers crossed that they can actually deliver.

The reason for the rubbish ADSL connection is that I'm **exactly** in the spot furthest from all three of the local exchanges - and the exchange that actually delivers service to my house happens to be the furthest exchange of all three!

[burble]

officially you'll have no download limits, but max out your connection for days at a time and you might find it slowing down

So far that hasn't happened to me. I went to Canada for a couple of weeks in November and left a few Tb of usenet downloads queued up. The download speeds remained pretty much constant.

if u could only get 4mb on a 24mb phoneline from your exchange it might have been hasty to order a 50mb!!

Why? Cable networks work differently to ADSL so the length of a telephone line is completely irrelevant.

[tombull]

So far that hasn't happened to me. I went to Canada for a couple of weeks in November and left a few Tb of usenet downloads queued up. The download speeds remained pretty much constant.

OK, That's made me happy!

[burble]

On the whole I'm happy with the 50Mbit service but there is an ongoing fault in my area which kills my connection a couple of times a week. I'm chatting with Virgin tech support in Manchester about it so hopefully it'll be sorted soon.

That problem aside, it's great! Whilst I'm not a fan of speedtest sites, this one gives an accurate result for my connection.

[tombull]

this one gives an accurate result for my connection[/URL].

Cool! And is that generally the same speed any time of day (apart from the disconnections)...? Also, do you transfer much? I'm assuming yes, given that you're paying for a 50Mb connection! And if so, do you find your transfer rates going down when you've been downloading a lot in a particular day / week / month?

What I'm worried about is VM doing what they did when I used to use their 10Mb connection. I would have a constant ~6Mb transfer downloading from my server 24/7, and it would be fine for the first few days of the month. As soon as I'd transferred more than x Gb (can't remember how big x was, maybe 10Gb?) in the month the rate would drop to 1Mbps exactly, and the internet suddenly became unusable... they've given up this ridiculous policy then?

[burble]

Yep, I get the same speed irrespective of time of day. Oh yeah, I transfer lots. I work from home a lot so that along with browsing and other stuff soon adds up. Yesterday I downloaded around 80Gb. So far today I've downloaded about 6Gb just on my work laptop.

The reason your 10Mbit connection slowed down was because of VM's STM (Subscriber Traffic Management) which as you'd said slows you down after x amount of data has been transferred. The limit should only have been in place for a period of hours though, not the rest of the month.

There is no STM on the 50Mbit platform and Virgin have said that they currently have no plans to add it. That doesn't mean they won't in the future of course.

STM remains on all the other platforms though.

[tombull]

Fantastic. Thanks for the info... really looking forward to getting connected now!

[Zak33]

On the whole I'm happy with the 50Mbit service but there is an ongoing fault in my area which kills my connection a couple of times a week. I'm chatting with Virgin tech support in Manchester about it so hopefully it'll be sorted soon.

That problem aside, it's great! Whilst I'm not a fan of speedtest sites, this one gives an accurate result for my connection.

burble.. that is FAST man,,, hellish fast!

[Jiff Lemon]

The folks have it back home and can honestly say its obscene.

Its how broadband in this country SHOULD be. It's all too easy to see how services such as TV on demand, video rental etc could be delivered with ease.

[shbris]

So far that hasn't happened to me. I went to Canada for a couple of weeks in November and left a few Tb of usenet downloads queued up. The download speeds remained pretty much constant.



Why? Cable networks work differently to ADSL so the length of a telephone line is completely irrelevant.

hence it might, just pointing out they will always have their limits of what they'll put up with!!

and yeh in theory it shouldn't make a difference, but in reality distance and other factors make a difference. otherwise why does my virgin slow down in evening, and why is my house closer to the exchange better connection than mates further away on same package?

[Terbinator]

The thing is one service may always be faster than the other no matter if you go ADS/DSL or satellite. the nly way your going to find out is by switching and if its slower just cancel and go back to your old/new ISP.

[dirky]

hmm that speedtest site in the OP just said I have 1807kbps, not bad for 10mbit

Download Speed: 1807 kbps (225.9 KB/sec ) Upload Speed: 204 kbps (25.5 KB/sec )

Edit: just re-ran it - Download Speed: 7765 kbps (970.6 KB/sec ) Upload Speed: 487 kbps (60.9 KB/sec )
hmm

[burble]

burble.. that is FAST man,,, hellish fast!

It is rather nice That's not the fastest speed test I've recorded either, I've had a few hit 52Mbit.

[burble]

hence it might, just pointing out they will always have their limits of what they'll put up with!!

and yeh in theory it shouldn't make a difference, but in reality distance and other factors make a difference. otherwise why does my virgin slow down in evening, and why is my house closer to the exchange better connection than mates further away on same package?

Exchanges have nothing to do with VM's cable network - the equipment that provides the connection isn't in an exchange, it's in a green cabinet somewhere in the local area.

I guess I'm quite lucky to have the green cabinet for my connection about 15m away from my front door.