http://shop.virginmedia.com/help/traffic-management.html "Customers with Broadband size: 100 (100Mb) – your usage excluding file sharing traffic (see below) is unaffected." ... it does, as I said, affect file sharing traffic
sounds like you had the virgin ADSL service as that is horrid virgin only throttle if you go over your allowance and this ONLY applies to 10mb and 20mb services http://shop.virginmedia.com/help/traffic-management.html 100mb service is totally unlimited, 50mb service had an upload cap but no download cap sometimes during peak times if you keep maxing it out.
Signal loss in RG58 coax would be about 10dB, but VM can adjust levels through the chain from them to you to maintain a good enough signal level above the background noise. Signals travel almost the same speed in coax as down a fibre optic cable (about 1nsec per foot in old money). The ping isn't really owt to do with how long the coax cable is afaik
Have VM announced any prices anyway for 100Mb service? I am on their 'interested' list, but price would be the decider!
I had a Virgin broadband package for a year or more while I was getting TV from Sky, which necessitated a BT phone line. There are no problems with having this except for the cost - it's definitely cheaper to have the 3-in-1 package (TV, phone, broadband) than to go separately.
There does seem to be a high premium for their top service. Cheers for all the advice guys you have made me see sense and only look at the 30/50mbs services. Has anyone had any joy negotiating a deal to attract new customers or is it for renewals only?
If you can speak to a UK sales droid you can negotiate. If you get the Indian call centre you will be lucky to get off the phone without feeling the need to top yourself.
I'm on 50meg and I feel it's worth it. It can be hit and miss what kind of service you receive though. Some areas are more congested (or have old tech) than others. Personally I was getting about 38meg and so I got them out through their newsgroup (now moved to forum) to sort it out. Ended up with a top rate cable (from cab to house) and I now get perfect speeds. 100meg is probably overkill for the most part. Many sites can't dish out more than 3 or 4MB downloads. But I have had it go as high as 7MB's on odd occasions. My advice would be to get 50meg and see how that goes. It is excellent for streaming as well btw.
My advice would be get out of virgin if you can, I've got the 20mb ADSL but have had major issues with them. They're customer service is appalling, expect to be on hold for two hours if you call them in the evening, and expect to pay a large sum if you're on your mobile. Once you get through you will have to talk to 10 different people before you get to someone intelligent enough to deal with your problem/query. They also give you cold calls and offer you additional services for free, as your a valued customer, then your monthly bill goes up by £50. If there was an easy way out I would take it but tied into a contract. I dread to think how many hours on the phone it would take to be able to cut loose from their vicious unrelenting bite
I have the 50mb service fro virgin media. It's great I get 45-50mb using speedtest.org and 1.5mb upload. I have checked the speed at all times of the day and it remains pretty constant. Although I do live in central Birmingham. I rang them up last week to get a Superhub which is wireless and modem combined with four outputs. They sent it out for free. I use to live in Cambridge Where I could only get Adsl and I was so far from the exchange I could only get 1mb during off-peak on a 10mb line from tiscali. Count yourself lucky you can get virgin but it's a 12 month contract and I wouldnt pay the extra for 100mb Although maybe for bragging rights ?
I will be ditching my Sky HD subscription for the basic Virgin package so the cost isnt really a huge issue, its either a half tank of fuel a month or quicker internet. Think im setting on the 50mb service, its not a great deal more per month than the 30mb. Just need to add it up in my head as I do get on fine with 20mb currently.
i have had issue with customer services though back when i was at uni and they are really bad but since ive had Fibre service i have never needed to ring thank god both me and my parents are on virgin and have had zero problems because its the cable service which is excellent, i know thier ADSL service is really really rubbish though. we have never received cold calls or been offered extra stuff and been charged for it after.
We have the 20Mbps fibre service, which (when it works) is absolutely top-notch, with average speeds all day of around 18Mbps, and upload speeds between 1.5 and 2Mbps. When it doesn't work it's almost always the router, so I replaced ours with one that didn't cost 9 pence to produce. You'll want to do the same. The call centres are crap, but sometimes you'll get someone from their Scottish call centre, and that's usually a breath of fresh air. However, this aside, I can't fault the day-to-day broadband and TV service they provide. Get e-billing or be charged £1.50 every time they send you a piece of paper in an envelope.
We've had Virgin for almost 9 years now (back when they were ntl), can't say we've had any problems with internet service. Customer service is pretty hopeless though. Currently on 10mb, considering an upgrade to 30mb when other more pressing concerns are sorted.
Hmm, I have had no issue with Virgins customer service. Course it helps I get everything from them. All my calls to them have involved dialing 150 from my Virgin phone and are free (including broadband help which was added to the free number awhile back). Though mostly I called to inquire about my bills and to negotiate cheaper rates. They were very helpful for me. Oh, and yes, be sure to get ebilling to avoid the £1.50 charge for an envelope, it's cheeky but I notice a number of companies have gone that way - using enviroment as an excuse to squeeze extra cash out of you. Though I guess it works as most people turn to ebilling
One of the issues with 100Mb broadband is that there are actually not that many servers that'll give you anything close to this. I'm on a 100Mb LAN (it's hooked up to a 10Gb connection at the other end, so the bandwidth is always there), and it's really only steam that's able to max out the connection. Most sites will never get over 5MB/s... in most cases, it seems like the 50Mb package would be plenty.
