Appalling speeds in Manchester

Retrovertigo · 03-02-2009, 23:01

Things seemed to have gotten better a while back after I had had some serious speeds problems, but they are back with a vengeance.

I'm on 20meg and last night at 2am I was getting 250k while trying to grab Lost off the newsgroups. I'm currently trying to get something else off the newsgroups and am getting less than 200k.

I have given up ever trying to speak to tech support when it gets bad like this because they admit my area is oversubscribed and that they are going to be doing something with UBR's? or something "soon" - soon having now lasted almost a year!

I can't believe it could even be considered legal to sell someone a 20meg line and be only providing 2-300k at best.

I have given up on playing games on Xbox Live because the lag was so bad. And demos that once downloaded in a matter of minutes now take hours.

Surely I'm not alone. Manchester is a big place and I am surprised on coming here tonight that there aren't more threads. Or are people just as fed up as I am now and have given up on hoping something will be done about this.

MagicMan · 04-02-2009, 09:27

Quote:

Originally Posted by Retrovertigo

I'm on 20meg and last night at 2am I was getting 250k while trying to grab Lost off the newsgroups. I'm currently trying to get something else off the newsgroups and am getting less than 200k.

I can't believe it could even be considered legal to sell someone a 20meg line and be only providing 2-300k at best.

Legal??? Like downloading episodes of Lost you mean??

Pot....Kettle....Black :p

roland69uk · 04-02-2009, 12:21

I was getting around 5meg yesterday for some reason, today is better at
Download Speed: 14058 kbps (1757.3 KB/sec ) Upload Speed: 697 kbps (87.1 KB/sec )

Retrovertigo · 04-02-2009, 16:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by MagicMan

Legal??? Like downloading episodes of Lost you mean??

Pot....Kettle....Black :p

haha, how did I know someone would mention that. You don't think they supply up to 50meg just to make websites load faster do you

To be serious though (aside from the fact I don't see anything wrong with grabbing a show from a channel I pay Sky for anyway!) is that it should be half decent at 2am. I would hope that when a lot of people are asleep they can provide reasonable speeds in my area, but apparently not.

South Manchester is reknowned for being over subbed with all the students. It's a shame there isn't some kind of ombudsman checking for how many people they take on, compared with the quality of service they give. They are knowingly selling 20meg on the cheap knowing damned well it can't possibly be maintained in the area I am in.

I've heard the "up to" sympathisers before. But up to should have a bare minimum. 200k isn't acceptable in anyones book.

joglynne · 04-02-2009, 17:15

I will probably live to regret saying this but I am in South Manchester, on the Baguley server, and have not ..touch wood... had any significant drop in my download speeds since having suffered really bad speeds for several months last year.

If it's any consolation it's my understanding, from reading other threads in the past, that once the 50MB roll out happens on an over subscribed UBR then the lower tiers that are experiencing over subscription should normally notice an improvement to their service.

I know that this isn't much help at the moment but there is always the option to downgrade and save least some money whilst VM get their act together.

Bill · 04-02-2009, 20:25

Is virgin blocking bit torrent upstream, I've been trying to use utorrent to get some Ubuntu distros, downstream is ok but I'm not sharing anything up.

This some new restriction?

Ignitionnet · 04-02-2009, 21:05

No blocking of BT.

MagicMan · 05-02-2009, 09:13

Quote:

Originally Posted by Retrovertigo

haha, how did I know someone would mention that. You don't think they supply up to 50meg just to make websites load faster do you

Yeah sorry, I couldn't resist

Not a very constructive post from me was it lol

I completely agree with what you are saying, I was having issues on newsgroups the other week, speeds dropping to 60K/s after 5 minutes regardless of what time of day it was. I'm in South Manchester as well (Altrincham area) but its not much of a student area.

Anyway, my problem seemed to cure itself after 3 or 4 days. Hope yours does aswell. Only getting 10% of the advertised bandwidth is definitely cause for concern.

deek72 · 05-02-2009, 12:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by MagicMan

Legal??? Like downloading episodes of Lost you mean??

Pot....Kettle....Black :p

Oh shut up! Every single person on here downloads stuff they are not entitled to, even if it's just one MP3. Anyone who says otherwise is a liar.

MagicMan · 06-02-2009, 08:52

Quote:

Originally Posted by deek72

Oh shut up! Every single person on here downloads stuff they are not entitled to, even if it's just one MP3. Anyone who says otherwise is a liar.

OMG!!! It was a joke.....humour.....hence the smilies. Lighten up!

ntluser · 06-02-2009, 17:46

Must admit that service has been poorer over the last week. My browser seemed to take ages to load my home page on occasion. Outlook kept complaining that it could not connect to the server. It seemed to vary from day to day and from hour to hour. Wondered if Virgin were doing any work on the Baguley server.

roland69uk · 09-02-2009, 11:34

Quote:

Originally Posted by ntluser

Wondered if Virgin were doing any work on the Baguley server.

I was under the impression the problems there are due to the fact that it is over subscribed???

Retrovertigo · 16-02-2009, 20:16

If I could be bothered I would show a screenshot of my current download speed off usenet - 95k!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have just switched on my machine and that is the speed I am greeted with. They throttle users for "over use" and yet this is still the best they can provide me with of an evening. That is beyond a joke and I can't believe a 20meg line is giving me such a pathetically low speed no matter how over subscribed the area is.

I know there is nothing wrong with my equipment because if I try very first thing in the morning - or as I did last night, just past 3am, I can get a reasonable speed. Even then it never gets above 10meg though.

Surely someone somewhere must know if there are problems in Manchester, because frankly 95k is taking the p**s!

Magilla · 17-02-2009, 16:02

Quote:

Originally Posted by Retrovertigo

If I could be bothered I would show a screenshot of my current download speed off usenet - 95k!!!!!!!!!!!!

You're not alone, Sheffield is currently suffering aswell, often much worse. Since Sept'08.

ntluser · 17-02-2009, 16:17

Quote:

Originally Posted by Retrovertigo

If I could be bothered I would show a screenshot of my current download speed off usenet - 95k!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have just switched on my machine and that is the speed I am greeted with. They throttle users for "over use" and yet this is still the best they can provide me with of an evening. That is beyond a joke and I can't believe a 20meg line is giving me such a pathetically low speed no matter how over subscribed the area is.

I know there is nothing wrong with my equipment because if I try very first thing in the morning - or as I did last night, just past 3am, I can get a reasonable speed. Even then it never gets above 10meg though.

Surely someone somewhere must know if there are problems in Manchester, because frankly 95k is taking the p**s!

I think Virgin Media divide Manchester into two areas north and south.I'm in the south area on the Baguley Server on the 20mb service and my speeds are pretty good. Which server are you on?