great news on switching, hope your enjoying the service as much as i do, although i have recently switched to a 3rd party router as the vodafone supplied is just rubbish, i started getting dropouts literally 3 times a day, had a replacement and that also started doing the same, since changing the router, with a little setup time, i was back online within 10 mins and have not had a dropout or any issue for over 45 days, link to the router i have switched to, great bit of kit and worth every penny.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/...0?ie=UTF8&th=1
regarding the routing issue with servers, when i do speed tests i do find it can change widely, most of the time my connection chooses manchester or leeds but sometime can go as far as london, it does not affect my connection or ping in anyway though.
this is my speed test on my 500/500 (wired ethernet)