Sky Broadband
 

So i thought i'd get it as we have loads of pc's all sharing the same connection (ntl 10meg).

with it being just £10 for 16meg download cant harm anyone even thou i have been reading up on sky in forums and they sound worse than ntl.

anyway cant complain getting 12meg at night and about 8 during peak times, but the one thing i love about it is the upload

hitting 90kbs day and night for £10 a month am happy :)

so when are ntl going to start givin ths kind of upload for the price ?

Re: Sky Broadband
 

90Kbs?

Seems rather low actually, I'm getting about 480Kbps up on my ntl 10Mb connection. Carefull about maxing our your upload too. :)

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I assume machead meant KBps (KB/s, kilobytes per second) rather than kbps (kb/s, kilobits per second).


90 kilobytes per second equals over 700 kilobits per second.

AFAIK, Sky Broadband's 16mbps "Max" service has an upload speed of 768kbps.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

yeah this is what i meant :)

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I'm also on ntl's 10mbit service and am going to jump ship to Sky BB (MAX service) soon. Well worth £10!

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Sky Broadband MAX, Is Unlimited So No Peek/Off-Peek Times Having Full Speed Day/Night... Having A Upload Of: 768Kbps Which is 93.75 kB/s Is Well Worth The Money (£10).

If Anyone Is A Sky Broadband MAX User, They Also Could Run A Speed Test On Both Upload/Download @ www.testmy.net.

You Could Also Check Out http://www.samknows.com/broadband/phoneno.php To See What Cable/ADSL/SDSL/LLU Services You Currently Have In Your Area.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I am glad that you are happy with Sky Broadband Max, but you need to be careful, as unlimited is caveated by their "Fair Use Policy" - but you should be OK as long as you are not p2p'ing or downloading excessively. ;)

SkyBroadband page 8
If you subscribe to a Product that does not have a Usage Cap, our Fair Use Policy (“FUP”) will apply to you and anybody that you allow to use Sky Broadband.
Why have a Fair Use Policy?
Sky is committed to ensuring that our systems and network (“Sky Network”) and Sky Broadband are fast, reliable and great value for all of our customers. Our FUP is designed to help us keep that promise to you. The bandwidth that is available on our network is shared by all customers that are active on the network at a particular point in time. So, Sky relies on our users being fair and considerate of others in their broadband usage. If one person takes up too much or all the bandwidth, this results in a loss of service quality and speed for other users, and in some cases where one customer’s usage is excessive in the extreme, this can have a long-lasting detrimental effect on the rest of our users and the Sky Network.
Am I going to be affected by the Fair Use Policy?
Our FUP normally has little or no effect on the average broadband user. For example, if you do not excessively use file sharing software (including peer-to-peer) or regularly download very large files, you will most probably never be affected by the policy.
However, if your use of Sky Broadband becomes consistently excessive and has an adverse impact on the Sky Network and/or other users, our FUP enables us to intervene.
How can I manage my usage?
There are a number of ways to manage your usage, however the most effective is to keep your use of file sharing software (including peer-to-peer) and uploading and downloading of very large files reasonable.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

The Term excessively, Exactly How Much In GB? I Use Around 40GB a Month...

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Whatever they decide, re their statement
"Therefore, we think to impose an actual figure on what we consider to be “excessiveà¢Ã¢â€šÂ¬Ã‚Â� use is not necessarily helpful and may penalise users unfairly. What is deemed excessive will be determined by a number of factors including (but not limited to) the length of time which your excessive usage continues for, as well as the amount of bandwidth being used."

Re: Sky Broadband
 

i have seen 250Gb per month banded about but not sure iof that is an offical figure

Re: Sky Broadband
 

If 250Gb Is The Case, I Wont Be Uploading More Than 40Gb Anyway! Thanks For The Info.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

But with sky broadband you have to have a phone line & with ntl/virgin media broadband you don't have to have a phone line.

So ntl/virgin media broadand is better value at £10 pm. sky broadband is £26 pm plus rental phone line from BT. thats £11 on top of £26 pm.

pm - Per Month.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

and if you have sky already and go for the max option it is £10 a month not 26, thats only if you dont already have sky

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Plus phone line rental.....

Re: Sky Broadband
 

which is £11 so its £21 for line and upto 16meg internet

Re: Sky Broadband
 

And?

See I dont get this arguement. Most people have a land line anyway so the line rental is not extra to them. The only extra is the £10 for the Sky BB. Before I got Be unlimited I was paying £11 for line rental for 3 years before this. I got used to paying it and therefore when I ordered my Be Unlimited the only extra I had to pay was £24.

I get 22mb stable and I am very happy with it. So how about stopping the line rental issue and starting a real debate rather then a cable fanboy answer.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I think the point I (and others) are trying to make is that when people post costings to compare NTL with other ISPs, they often leave out the non-NTL line rental cost - not being a "fanboy", just trying to ensure people have all the information. Even if you were paying it before, it is still a cost to be included in the comparison.

btw, I am a reasonably content NTL customer, not a "fanboy".

Re: Sky Broadband
 

That's just it. If you go from a fully-NTL setup (TV, Broadband and Phone), you DO need to include Line rental in your calculations if you are moving to any ADSL service. NTL don't charge line rental as such, as it is built in to your DTV or BB cost. So, it isn't necessarily a cable fanboy answer.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

i have just the phone and internet with ntl, admittedly its 2 phone lines and it comes to about 65-70 quid a month, if i was to move to sky broadband and a BT line i would be saving about 20quid a month probably more depending on which BT option to take with the phone line

Re: Sky Broadband
 

to be fair I think a lot of people on adsl probably only have a line now for the adsl itself, mobiles are becoming very dominant.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I have sky for tv & ntl/Virgin media for phone & internet.
I pay £24.99pm for 4mb BB
£24.99pm for 24 unlimited phone
Total £49.98pm.

Sky works out
Line rental £11.00pm
24 unlimited phone £5.00pm
up to 16mb BB £10.00pm
Total £26.00pm

Not much over half the price for a possible faster connection

Re: Sky Broadband
 

might be good value if you got a nice short line, if you havent you could be in for a shock.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I have seen lines over 2km hit 12mb before.

And even longer lines only getting 7-8mb its still worth £10

Re: Sky Broadband
 

what about lines hitting under a few meg and you a heavy user?

Its £21 if you otherwise wouldnt have a phone line.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Most people have a phoneline anyway. So the phoneline is not included into the cost.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Still cheaper than virgins 10MB at £35 and I look at is this way:

I pay £21 for 16MB BB from sky and I get a free phone line! ;)

Re: Sky Broadband
 

They have one because they have to, most modern broadband companies go out of their way to force you to have a phoneline, anyone with adsl has to have one or they cant have adsl, ntl made me have one but I have read that some people have managed to have broadband only on that at least.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Until we all have UPSes in our homes I think most will continue to have a landline for use in emergencys. A lot of people could replace their landlines but don't, in my case it's for ADSL and so that people don't have to fork out to phone me.

You are in the minority, and are vehemently anti-ADSL anyway due to the poor quality of your line. Hundreds of posts here and on Thinkbroadband confirm this, so you'll excuse me if I don't take what you say as gospel.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Its not because of my phoneline, I still expect a majority would keep a phoneline but I reckon it would be less then 60% why? people now days have mobiles and have less disposable cash and line rental is one expenditure that can be saved. Assuming people would all have a phoneline anyway is wrong and I was just pointing that out.

Hundreds of posts confirm I have a poor line or confirm people would have a line regardless of adsl?

I get attacked enough by associates of BT on thinkbroadband its a very hostile forum(ones who wont confirm it but the time they put in to reply to negatives suggests it), funny enough it never happened here when I was unahppy with ntl.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

sorry to gatecrash this post, but would anyone with Sky be willing to ping+trace and IP for me? im looking for isp's with good latency to move to.

If someone is willing please pm me!

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Upto being the operative words. Unless you live in, on top, or adjoining an exchange, then it's unlikely that you're likely to get even close to that. Out of interest I checked what my maximum speed would be - a paltry 1MB, which is half the slowest speed that Virgin Media offer. Okay, so you don't always get the full 2, 4 or 10MB offered by VM, but you're going to get much closer to the advertised speed with them than Sky.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I dont live on top or in my exchange and I cant see it from my house but I get 19mb.

Whats your point?

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Be, how far away are you from the exchange, point to point? I'm trying to get an idea about what I could expect

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Where can we chk our max speed on adsl?

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Yea right!

NTL 10MB = 4.5 - 7MB in my area! ;)

Re: Sky Broadband
 

As per my previous post, here's my latency with UKOnline, a part of the Sky family, Sky latency may be higher depending on your line. ;)


Pinging www.bbc.net.uk [212.58.224.116] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 212.58.224.116: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=247
Reply from 212.58.224.116: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=247
Reply from 212.58.224.116: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=247
Reply from 212.58.224.116: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=247

Ping statistics for 212.58.224.116:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 8ms, Maximum = 8ms, Average = 8ms

Bit high tonight, usually 6-7... probably the wireless.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Well according to Sam Knows I am 262 metres and according to Be my line is 756 metres

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Straight line here 550m, line is over 1.4km and I sync up at over 20Mbit which allows me to download at over 2200kB/s.

Pinging www.bbc.net.uk [212.58.224.83] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 212.58.224.83: bytes=32 time=7ms TTL=247
Reply from 212.58.224.83: bytes=32 time=7ms TTL=247
Reply from 212.58.224.83: bytes=32 time=6ms TTL=247
Reply from 212.58.224.83: bytes=32 time=7ms TTL=247

Ping statistics for 212.58.224.83:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 6ms, Maximum = 7ms, Average = 6ms

There's a download running on another PC so only speed testing around 10Mbit at the mo :)

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Line distance is only one factor in the speed issue (as a SKY employee I'm sure you know this already) and things like exchange equipment, quality of line, quality of equipment on the line and congestion all play a part in ADSL speeds.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I actually got sky and currently am with bulldog but not entirely happy with them specially there billing and customer services and i so wanna go to sky but they dont do static ip as i am running website from home and than they got 40gb limit which isnt really very good for me, i may move to them if they start doing static ip. :D

Re: Sky Broadband
 

you would be able to see if clear line of sight then :)

---------- Post added at 19:07 ---------- Previous post was at 18:59 ----------

quality of line is a big factor.

for carl j to get 20mbit on a 1.4km line is very unusual and is not the norm but of course it is possible, BTs local loop network seems to be of very inconsistent quality, what people should be aware of tho his direct route is just over half a km.

Some lines have alimiumn others have thin copper, some have poor joints, some have poor exchange equipment, some have interference all of which will reduce performance.

On my line I observed the following behaviour to give you an idea of how exchange equipment can affect synch speed.

Initially 7000kbit on 6db noise margin, fast mode noise bursts during office hours.
After lift and shift (move to diff line card port but same dslam) 6400kbit synch speed same noise bursts.
After cease and reprovide (different dslam) 6400kbit synch speed, much reduced upstream synch strength (down from over 1000kbit to 700kbit introducing lower noise margin and errors on upstream) and noise bursts now happen at weekends as well but still daytime only.

As I understand it plugging into a dslam isnt like plugging in a network cable they have to attach the naked wires and judging from my experience its entirely possible to get a poor connection. My attenuation also changed every time they moved me around in the exchange as well. Currently my upstream attenuation is lower then before with the reduced upstream performance which doesnt make sense at all.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

A lovely way to put a negative spin on the fact my line is very good and I get 20Mbit at 1.4km :)

Some have none of the above :)

That's you, you're one of over 8 million DSL connections in the UK on one of over 5,000 enabled exchanges :)

That'd be the jumpering you're referring to, which is generally very good as it's done with precision tools. Not many links done with a soldering iron anymore but yes they are done occasionally in old exchanges. Though it's nicely arranged you have a copper connection with cable too, albeit a coax cable which is shielded. You do get the noise of both youself and anyone else who shares that combined link to the fibre node after all as they are combined, while with DSL you have a dedicated cable and bandwidth right to the DSLAM.

Of course you didn't mention that in your DSL bashing.

Please do carry on. DSL bad, cable good. :)

---------- Post added at 20:37 ---------- Previous post was at 20:33 ----------

Sky is capitals now? News to me.

Anyway yes I'm aware of this however on LLU the quality of the equipment at the exchange is normally fairly well known, and congestion on Sky LLU, unlike cable, doesn't happen :)

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I am not dsl bashing I am just been realistic.

When I moved over to adsl my expectations were too high, people read you get 20mbit and may think well I got 1.3km on samknows I will be fine. Even a 1.3km real distance not straight line will most likely get considerably below 20mbit so there is no point making people think otherwise.

The truth is the vast majority of lines are over 2km.
The vast majority of people will not get 16mbit on skys service.
The vast majority of people will not get 7.15mbit on BTs service.
Some people will get very good speeds on sky, I have never said otherwise.
It is more of a gamble then cable unless you already know for sure how other lines perform on your postcode.
Sky is cheap and probably the best value adsl service around providing you in one of their LLU areas.

So thats my viewpoint it isnt entirely negative at all but realistic.

The dedicated cable offers what advantage? if reduced noise remember there is crosstalk and I think you would find it hard to argue that a long poor quality 30 year old copper cable even if dedicated would have less noise then a short newer shared cable.

So we have established on very short lines xDSL is possibly a superior technology and on longer,poorer lines it is inferior, most lines are not very short meaning as a rule of thumb xDSL is inferior.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

My points exactly - Sky's upto 8MB is misleading to most of the general public.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

What part of upto is misleading. If people fail to read that bit then thats there fault. They have never guaranteed 8mb

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Of course, the service provided by Sky can (along with other DSL providers) suffer due to line quality and they can also suffer where their service interfaces with BT, as even in LLU lines, BT do get involved even if it's purely just to allow access to the exchange.

For instance, when I applied to Be, BT flagged a possible problem on my line and stopped the upgrade. It took THREE calls to BT to persuade them that Be is not an LLU provider and that therfore, me speaking to BT wholesale would not only be pointless, but it wouldn't be possible, as BT wholesale don't speak to end customers. It took a further three alls to find out what the problem was, and eventually get someone to fix it (the problem was, they had my connection down as hardwired, not socketed).

That's also without taking into account any line quality issues.

I am not saying Virgin is perfect. Far from it. They can still suffer line quality issues, and also have bad customer service, but in all my years as a customer, I've never had as bad service from NTL (as they were) as I have from BT.

The upside of an LLU connection is that, as Carl says, they don't suffer congestion as badly as Cable.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

well the up to analogy traditionally maens you can use it up to that speed, fairly simple. Like if you can buy a car that does upto 150mph if pushed it should reach that speed, not random cars that can do something in between 0 and 150mph. If you brought a car that could do up to 150mph but it only maxed out at 50mph on the motorway I think you wouldnt be very happy.

On cable broadband the up to speeds are because of contention but at off peak times everyone should be able to achieve the up to speed. This is where the confusion is with adsl, the up to speed has a different meaning and is misleading.

---------- Post added at 20:27 ---------- Previous post was at 20:25 ----------

I agree, although my ntl service was poor at least NTL admitted it was poor, compensated me and tried to fix it. With BT its a case of tough luck we know there is noone else that can give you broadband so take it or leave it. I dont use BT as an isp but they are the wholesale provider, there is nothing my isp can do about my line likewise an LLU provider would also be powerless.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Thats a bad example. I do get what you saying. Trust me. But a car does not have restrictions like a ADSL line may.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

you right if it did it would soon be all over the news and people boycotting the car manufacturer, one reason adsl is allowed to continue like this is because most people are unaware they not even getting the rated speeds. They see its faster then dialup and thats enough to keep them satisfied, users like me and you who check out our router stats and browse these type of forums are a minority.

Cable is also guilty to a lesser extenct with some areas having very heavy congestion and the peak time throttling they are trialling.

But sky broadband for the cost I think is good value, for the vast majority of people its good enough.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

I think if the restrcitions of ADSL could be lifted they would be. But sadly they cant. Longer the line weaker the signal.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Its not a restriction its a incapability to deliver due to ancient infrastructure used. The likes of sky cant do anything about it only BT can. It can be fixed its not impossible it needs local loop investment to shorten the copper loops with fibre to cabinets.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Which sadly is tricky due to BT being forced to unbundle any fibre they lay by both Ofcom and European law at a price decided by the government. BT have been wanting to do it for a while but with the current regulatory environment actively discouraging such investment it's not likely for a while.

What with VM going into chapter 11 and swapping the company in return for the money used to build the networks they need all the help they can get, clearly.

Just something to bear in mind when doing the comparisons between BT and cable. Both had original networks paid for by someone else, one is required to provide service (Universal Service Obligation), required to open that network up to others to provide their own services, and has the prices and conditions of both unbundling and interconnections controlled by government even to the point where the contention ratios that it can run its' DSL products at at an exchange level are controlled. The other one, erm, has no obligations to provide service, no obligation to allow access to its' network, no outside control of its' prices or conditions of provision of service.

Trying to exempt, as was done in http://www.cedmagazine.com/article/CA6335949.html for the German incumbent telco causes a law suit from Europe.

So really why would a company want to invest billions when they can sit on their ass and milk the status quo for a while knowing that investing those billions will cause them to take a hit on their profits rather than increase them.

BT - the UK telecomms charity.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

The Chapter 11 was over four years ago, and was before NTL and Telewest merged, and then the take-over of Virgin Mobile and the re-branding.

That's like blaming BT for any problems O2 have now (even though they are owned by Telefonica) because in 2002 BT owned BT Cellnet. :dozey:

btw, I agree with you re BT - I think there is enough competition now (but the Operators wanting LLU probably wouldn't agree).

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Ummm I'm saying nothing about the effect it had on their service merely that the end result is that the debt for equity swap meant that the current company didn't pay for its' network. Try reading more closely before coming out with the :dozey: perhaps?

Re: Sky Broadband
 

When these companies say you need to have a BT line to be able to take up their broadband. How do you get that BT line, do you have to physically sign over to BT and become a customer of theirs?

It's just I am still paying £17.99 for 1MB broadband. I have an old PACE box that won't go higher than 1MB and everytime I have called up to request a change to a new Samsung box they say either they have not got any available or they don't offer that exchange anymore. Also an engineer even advised me to call and request a Stand Alone Cable modem to be fitted seperately, but they won't do that either.

So I'm thinking of switching over to SKY. I've been wanting to go for HD anyway.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Forgive me if my knowledge isn't great, but who is this someone else that paid for the cable network?

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Sad to say I dont disagree with you, only recently the chairman of ofcom made a silly statement saying fiber isnt a stable technology and the argument for fiber to the cabinet is weak. Thats about as close as recommending against investment as you can get,

---------- Post added at 03:11 ---------- Previous post was at 03:02 ----------

Ofcoms game isnt working, its generated some competition in the cities with LLU providers fighting for profiteable exchanges but left everyone else with only BT as a provider and lower level of service which BT is forced to provide due to regulation (higher bw costs etc.) Not everyone in city areas has it good either due to the restrictions on investment many lines are poor quality. One of the worst things that have happened is the BT openreach breaking away from BT, openreach now only get a pittance in revenue per line but are responsible for the local loop which is in desperate need of investment.

To give you idea of result of this regulation.

Ceasing adsl used to be free, now has a fee because LLU providers had a fee meaning everyone has to pay it, if isps dont pass on charge to customers they have to take hit in profit or add to monthly subs.
Harder to resolve faults as customers cant speak to openreach directly.
More red tape in general within BT.

There is a thread on adslguide now where it seems sky could soon be in trouble with trading standards, no idea how much truth is in this but apperently they selling adsl2+ on exchanges knowing that they wont be provisioning it due to lack of dslam ports and then providing adsl1 and telling customers there is no capacity in the exchange.

---------- Post added at 03:12 ---------- Previous post was at 03:11 ----------

I remember ntl didnt exist when cable was laid here, cable was laid by various regional networks who I think ntl and telewest brought out. Diamond cable laid it here.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Yeah i knew the answer, he was saying something incorrect.

BT had a network paid for by the public.

Virgin had a network paid for by lots of smaller companies who all merged and bought each other out. It would be more accurate to say Virgin paid for their own network, not by someone else.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Without at least one part of the regulatory framework (the enforced access to lines) based upon it's reported performance, I suspect BT wouldn't as co-operative as it apparently is.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Eurobell laid all the cable down here in Plymouth prior to becoming Telewest.

Re: Sky Broadband
 

Yep, you need an actual BT line.

http://www2.bt.com/static/i/btretail...one_lines.html



If you do stick with Virgin, they really should fit a SACM for you...

Re: Sky Broadband
 

If you're getting internet through the set top box, then that implies that you are in a previous Cable and Wireless area. My understanding is that to standardise platforms across the country, the internet is no longer provided through set top boxes for new customers. I've just added the V+ box to my package - there is a Pace box downstairs, and a Samsung upstairs where the broadband connection comes from. The Pace box is being swapped - so there is no change to the current broadband connection, however when I called Customer Service, they immediately offered the Stand Alone Cable modem as a self-install kit or with an engineer to come and do it for me. The self-install kits are sent out through the post. I took the easy option and asked if the engineer could fit it at the same time as the V+ box...

It might be worth calling Customer Services now and asking if you can change your connection to SACM. Not sure if it is applicable though across the country, but I was told that it would mean that I now receive two bills, one for television, telephone etc, and one for internet access.