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News Virgin pledges 100Mb broadband for third of UK

Discussion in 'Article Discussion' started by Claave, 3 Nov 2011.

  1. Omnituens

    Omnituens What's a Dremel?

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    apparently i can get 100mb, but I am happy with the 50. I'd LIKE 100, but 50 is ok.
     
  2. r3loaded

    r3loaded Minimodder

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    I did about 1.2TB back in September - they didn't say a thing either. I believe one rep on their forum mentioned that they don't classify you as detrimental to their network unless you're pulling in something like 4TB(!) or more per month.

    Several people here mentioned that they're close to VM's lines but can't get the service at their house. If that's the case, it's worth check this page here as they can usually sort something for you: http://community.virginmedia.com/t5...available-We-might-be-able-to-help/td-p/20585
     
  3. debs3759

    debs3759 Was that a warranty I just broke?

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    I had to move home to get Virgin a few years ago. they had been telling me for 5 years that they have no plans to ever put cables there, despite being in a suburban area (a few miles from a small town, 10 miles from Nottingham). I told them in 2008 that I wanted their fastest available broadband, and I only realised a few weeks ago that there are 2 available services faster than mine - I'm on 10Mb and could be on 50Mb! It turns out that 10Mb is fast enough for most of what I do, in fact quite a lot of technical sites can't keep up with me :)

    Mind you, I do wonder at times if the reason I have trouble connecting to some sites might be a problem with Virgin. They servers regularly break in the early hours, when it can take hours to fix them. At least, I assume they are breaking as I never get warned in advance that they will be down for servicing! A stable 24/7 connection is more important to me than fast speeds, so I may stay at my current speds and just change providers, seeing as how so many phone/broadband packages now also contain some form of TV service and I don't need all the film/sport channels :)
     
  4. Meaty Pete

    Meaty Pete King of the Potato People

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    They aren't really rolling out any more cable except on new builds to be honest so give up on any hope and move house.

    Every ISP has speed issues and dropouts. Only reason u would get a significantly slower service would be either a fault or oversubscription. virgin has the fastest average speeds. Even their 10mb is faster than EVERY other providers 20mb service. And that's Ofcoms findings

    The 'super'hub is cack and is the problem 9 times out of 10 so switch it to modem only mode and daisy chain another router to it

    We seem to live in a world where we pay someone for Internet and just have to hope we aren't one of the minority that gets **** on. I don't agree with it and believe it should be better regulated
     
  5. samkiller42

    samkiller42 For i AM Cheesecake!!

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    Think i will stick with Bethere, Can't really fault them, When i first signed up, estimated 18mb, and actually had 13mb, Moved and was estimated at 5mb, and actually get 4mb. I don't think that's too bad for a 100 year old copper cable.

    Sam
     
  6. ffjason

    ffjason What's a Dremel?

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    if only they fixed their current service before trying to improve it :(
     
  7. ccxo

    ccxo On top of a hill

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    Only a fraction of their customer base will upgrade up to 100Mb, their 50Mb package is more then enough for the average user.
    If Virgin actually went and filled in area's that they have missed it would be a better investment of their funds.

    Only a few more years and BT will have expanded their Fibre network further then Virgins coverage, at least it works and has a choice of providers to avoid bad traffic management.
     
  8. cool_dude

    cool_dude Minimodder

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    Perhaps it might be a good idea for them to reduce their prices also :D
     
  9. CashMoney

    CashMoney What's a Dremel?

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    I don't like Virgin's restrictions to P2P on principal alone, and from experience I know it affects other services (or did) and not just NNTP and Torrents. That said, I'm on 50Mbit and have been for 2 + years. I do the majority of my downloading after midnight, and in that 2 years, despite being very vocal in the beginning when they applied the new throttling, I've only been affected by it 3-4 times ever that I recall.
    Other than that, I do around 250GB a month, have had no complaints from Virgin about excessive usage, always get between 47-49Mb anytime of the day regardless of the type of downloading I do, and have always had a quick response from them to any problems I've had with the service. They are open to negotiation on the price of the service they offer as well. Whilst I don't want to take away anything from folks who genuinely do have problems with the Virgin service, I do read in a lot of tech/broadband forums more than a few folks defending Virgin compared with other ISP's; that's got to count for something. Statistics do show that Virgin's average "up to" speeds are much closer to the headline speeds than others.

    When the new throttling was introduced, I was only 3 months in to a new contract, and it was my intention to finish the contract and to save some money by dropping down to 30Mb because of it, despite how pumped I was for 100Mb. But my experience so far, I'm considering reconsidering ...

    It's a shame only a 3rd of the UK can get access to Virgin cable services, and a shame that not everyone gets an experience like I've had ... usually that's me, so I've probably jinxed the whole thing now!
     
  10. rogerrabbits

    rogerrabbits What's a Dremel?

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    It's hard to get too excited about Virgin's services when they have such a harsh fair usage policy. I also find that it's got harsh caps on youtube content too.
     
  11. metarinka

    metarinka What's a Dremel?

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    To all you brits what's the cost of 50 and 100mb service. I can't fiber optic here in pittsburgh pennsylvania, comcast will give cable (which problems means fiber optic backbone)

    anyways I'm paying $69 a month for comcast blast which is 30 mbp/s with a 250gb limit I occasionally hit.
    they offer a 105 Mb/s connection for the great price of only $200/month ... I'm not making that up.

    While the internet itself has been fast, stable and uptime great. The cost isn't desirable. I don't have a tv so this is my only bill, but it's still kinda ridiculous. cost 70-100/month when you start adding in internet. and recently I've been going over the 250gb a month limit as my gf streams a lot of tv during the day.
     
  12. sp4nky

    sp4nky BF3: Aardfrith WoT: McGubbins

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    50MB is £25 per month after the initial 3 month discout; 100MB is £35 per month.

    I used to pay £25 per month for a 10MB service. I'm currently on the 30MB service, which costs £18.50 per month.
     
  13. rogerrabbits

    rogerrabbits What's a Dremel?

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    I pay a fortune but it's my own fault really because it's the same deal I got almost 2 years ago, and I just need to call them to re-arrange a better deal. I live with my parents so we split the bill 50/50. Our monthly bill is about £110 a month which I'm guessing is similar to that $200.

    But for that we get 20mbit cable (2mbit upload), a phone line with free national calls any time, cable tv including sports (only lacks movie channels), and two V+ boxes (like a tivo basically) so we can watch different channels at the same time. We quite like what we have but it's just too much. Times are tough so we want to cut it down a bit.
     
  14. damien c

    damien c Mad FPS Gamer

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    LOL switch to BT and find out what there restrictions are especially there monthly limit, which I have been informed is 300gb per month, however that might be wrong but that is what I have heard.

    The other thing with the likes of BT etc is that they have a switch that all there customer's connect to, and if I remember correctly they are only suppose to put about 800 people on them but they are putting anything up to 5000 on them, again just something I have been told and that is one of the reason's the speed's are so slow on BT and others as well as the distance.
     
  15. damien c

    damien c Mad FPS Gamer

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    There is no policy what so ever regading Youtube.

    The issues with Youtube are down to Youtube, simply because of the way they deal with video's and there servers.

    If a video has a low amount of views it is put on there overloaded server's with lower bandwidth, if it has a large amount of views then it is put on there high capacity servers with higher amounts of bandwidth.

    I can go to Youtube at any time of the day, and watch a 1080p instantly with no trouble and so can everyone I know on Virgin.

    Granted there are areas that are over subscribed etc, but there is no policy within Virgin to limit the amount of bandwidth you can use on your connection for watching Youtube.

    I wish people would actually do abit of research regarding what is actually in the Traffic Management stuff instead of just spouting rubbish that is 100% false.
     
  16. damien c

    damien c Mad FPS Gamer

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    Seriously though, look in to what the Traffic Management stuff is on other provider's and what there monthly usuage is.

    Then when companies say "We don't slow your speed down" look at the speed you would get from them at your house, then compare it to what you would get from Virgin considering when they do slow it down it is down to 4.5mb, and that is about the average that other ISP's can provide or more.

    Not only that but wait and see what happens soon.
     
  17. scuppy

    scuppy Minimodder

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    makes no difference to those of use stuck out in the sticks struggling on unstable 1Mb ADSL :(
     
  18. David

    David μoʍ ɼouმ qᴉq λon ƨbԍuq ϝʁλᴉuმ ϝo ʁԍɑq ϝμᴉƨ

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    I've never lived in a cabled area, but I wouldn't mind the option of Virgin's TV/Broadband package. Such a shame it's unlikely.

    I'll just have to make do with my 20meg (12-14meg actual) line and Sky+. I don't like Sky too much, but I am considering their TV/Phone/Broadband deal, simply because the 80gig monthly cap I have at the moment is struggling to serve a family of four; and I'd be willing to accept some traffic shaping for the extra leeway of an unlimited account.
     
  19. yakyb

    yakyb i hate the person above me

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    i'll be honest im happy with 6 Down (although 20 would be nice)

    im much more concerned with my low upload speed
     
  20. mediapcAddict

    mediapcAddict What's a Dremel?

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