General : Traffic Management Update

[RainmakerRaw]

So now you can download without penalty, as long as you don't use either of the two most popular download protocols in the world. Um... lol?

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by RainmakerRaw

So now you can download without penalty, as long as you don't use either of the two most popular download protocols in the world. Um... lol?

I have been downloading on supernews on and off all day at full speed which for me is 120meg, i just make sure i am using port 443 on ssl and then there is no slowdown.

[djmagnifique]

I get no reduction in speed on newesgroups and i'm using the Virgin Media provided servers.

CAn't comment on torrents as I don't use them very often.

[johnholmes]

Originally Posted by djmagnifique

I get no reduction in speed on newesgroups and i'm using the Virgin Media provided servers.

CAn't comment on torrents as I don't use them very often.

Throttled to 75% of line speed in peak times only.

[Synthetic]

Not an issue if your usenet provider offers SSL

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by Synthetic

Not an issue if your usenet provider offers SSL

Indeed

Of course on BT Infinity option 2 I'm truely unlimited no management or throttling at all. Just like I did have with Sky, welcome to the party VM customers (if a little late).

[ianch99]

Now the download STM is lifted, will this mean the problem of mega-downloaders affecting their neighbours broadband speeds will be more of an issue?

In the past, I remember a number of people commenting on the physical design of the VM local network being more affected by this than the FTTC/Infinity design.

If VM have lifted this cap, are they just hoping that the previous mega-downloaders that may have been part of the reason they introduced it in the first place have moved off to Sky, etc.

or will the promise of unlimited 152 Mb download speeds 24x7 encourage them to come back?

[Kabaal]

There is so much backwards and forwards with VM's traffic management that i wouldn't be surprised if it's back on the downstream before long. Mind you the one they just removed was so little that the speed was still faster than FTTC even when managed.

[Risco]

I think it is great there is no traffic management, so long as the mega downloaders don't come back and kill peak speeds like before. It is always a small minority as usual that ruins it for the masses....

[Kushan]

Originally Posted by Risco

I think it is great there is no traffic management, so long as the mega downloaders don't come back and kill peak speeds like before. It is always a small minority as usual that ruins it for the masses....

They reduced STM to a small amount a few months ago, to the point where most people probably didn't care if they were STM'd or not. Mega downloaders included, especially those on 120meg, as the STM was to 100Meg. This isn't going to make a huge impact, either the network will cope or it won't but you'll always have heavy downloaders no matter what.

[johnholmes]

AIUI The P2P is not shaped by line speed but by capacity on the downstream group, with a maximum allocation of 25% of the downstream group shared between all customers so it can go well below 114Mbps and, indeed, with the current network the maximum shared between all P2P / NNTP users on a single network segment is ~100Mbps.

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/6...#news_comments

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by Kushan

They reduced STM to a small amount a few months ago, to the point where most people probably didn't care if they were STM'd or not. Mega downloaders included, especially those on 120meg, as the STM was to 100Meg. This isn't going to make a huge impact, either the network will cope or it won't but you'll always have heavy downloaders no matter what.

My m8 who is on infinity was stunned when i told him my download speed was faster when managed than his was unmanaged.

[horseman]

Originally Posted by johnholmes

http://www.thinkbroadband.com/news/6...#news_comments

Now that is interesting because AIUI when explained to me several years ago, it was based on a 25% reserve downstream bandwidth capacity?
The Allot/DART servers were also placed on backbone peering points as at the time this reduced the incoming cost between ISP's.

The above seems more plausible in terms of compromising on net neutrality for incoming bandwidth at network edge?
The main reason facing VM/ISP's is as we all should know that P2P overlay is completely independent of the classical "client-server" paradigm.

Some extracts from a now somewhat old 2010 white paper illustrates this:





However in recent years VM announced the (Allot)DART servers were being re-dispositioned towards the core. So what has changed? Well the explosion of upstream demand perhaps is one thing which also begs the question of two opposing philosophies:
1. Net neutrality and protocol agnostic
2. Fair distribution of capacity between users



One wonders whether the P2P traffic limited/contained within ISP internal network has now become more of a significant cost than inter-ISP peering costs?
Perversely containing more of P2P traffic internally would therefore be more cost effective for ISP anyway?
However despite the P2P methodology apportioning upstream bandwidth between peers, as we measure this more granularly then even the limited upstream capacity must therefore come under pressure?

So is VM moving DART towards the end user in order to now regulate the upstream more than just downstream previously? After all regulating seeders upstream on internal P2P would both regulate internal leechers down stream but also the external transit costs to other ISP's?

Or far more likely have I missed something obvious? Forthcoming P4P perhaps?

Ref:The Network Operator's Perspective on Peer-to-Peer: Business Threats or Opportunities?

[General Maximus]

I would love to see the figures on how many customers have been leaving VM. It must be bad for VM to get rid of traffic management altogether. As they have been doing it in bits over the last year I am hoping they are going to start easing the upstream resitrictions as well and see how that goes.