1GB Cap Letter!!!!

[Chris W]

Originally Posted by 0 morgan 0

There are others services in the UK but not in Wales that offer much more competitive prices than NTL. The service were getting is the shoody uk service we'd expect from our broadband network , dont give me any bull**** about it should be costing us £300 stop having a laugh.

The problem is the only people arguing against are the people that do jack **** on the internet except probably come on this forum. It's people like you who are stupid enough to pay £35 a month for a speed of which they'll never get any use. So you download this forum 0.5 seconds faster... the only real winners here are the people so called "abusing" the service who are actually just using broadband for its intended use and you know it...

woah....! Lose the attitude!!

What about people who download from itunes? If i download a song then i would much prefer it to take 30seconds rather than 3 minutes... or an hour and a half on dial up.

I don't use all of the speed all of the time, but it is nice to have it there sometimes.

Going back to ians car analogy- i might buy a car which can do 0-60 in 6 seconds, doesn't mean that i am going to that every time i accelerate, but if i am late, it might come in handy once in a while. This car would cost me alot more than a model that takes 20 seconds to do 0-60 but if i am willing to pay extra, then that is my choice.

The "uk broadband network" you refer to is a privately owned cable network- ntl paid for it and pay to maintain it. The ADSL network has been funded partially by public money, so yes you could moan about lack of development on this, but ntl's private network is not as relevant to the discussion of poor broadband in the UK as ADSL is. As a private entity ntl can invest what they like in the network and in return they will gain subscribers- which incidentally they seem to be doing quite well, with 1.3m customers- more than any other ISP in the UK.

And as for their being no other competitive ISPs in Wales... i can have 2meg from any ADSL provider so i don't think that your comment is quite justified- it may be the case that in some areas ADSL is not available, but you need to be more specific with your comments.

Originally Posted by 0 morgan 0

There are others services in the UK but not in Wales that offer much more competitive prices than NTL. The service were getting is the shoody uk service we'd expect from our broadband network , dont give me any bull**** about it should be costing us £300 stop having a laugh.

The problem is the only people arguing against are the people that do jack **** on the internet except probably come on this forum. It's people like you who are stupid enough to pay £35 a month for a speed of which they'll never get any use. So you download this forum 0.5 seconds faster... the only real winners here are the people so called "abusing" the service who are actually just using broadband for its intended use and you know it...

please don't presume you can download the internet 24/7 and then insult those that choose not to - they are not 'stupid', they are using the connection as they see fit - 'none of your business' works both ways

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by 0 morgan 0

There are others services in the UK but not in Wales that offer much more competitive prices than NTL. The service were getting is the shoody uk service we'd expect from our broadband network , dont give me any bull**** about it should be costing us £300 stop having a laugh.

The problem is the only people arguing against are the people that do jack **** on the internet except probably come on this forum. It's people like you who are stupid enough to pay £35 a month for a speed of which they'll never get any use. So you download this forum 0.5 seconds faster... the only real winners here are the people so called "abusing" the service who are actually just using broadband for its intended use and you know it...

The £300 doesn't come from me or NTL is has been quoted by more than one ADSL ISP. NTL on the whole give a good service to its users at a reasonable price. Email may have its problems at times but NTL are not alone with this and I can honestly say I have not experienced that much trouble with it. What NTL offer is a broadband service for residential use aimed at the normal internet user. over 90% of users have very few problems and have a usage pattern that falls within the usage limits NTL will be putting in place.

You have no idea how I use the internet so how can you criticise my use and views. I may not use that much bandwidth these days on a regular basis but there are times when I need the advantage of a high speed connection for a short time and I am willing to pay the full cost of having that speed. Many years ago I used to have an internet bill at home that never dropped below £100 per month.

Most of the abusers are not using the internet as it is intended to be used but kid themselves into thinking that their use is normal and acceptable. It isn't normal and it isn't acceptable and before too long you will find out that you have to obey the rules or go elsewhere. You don't get too many regulars bothering to comment these days as all has been said so many times before.

You have made quite an impression with your first few posts on here but not for the right reasons.

[Rik]

I download 5+gigs per day on occasions and if NTL impose this 1gig per day Cap on 3meg I will be on the phone to complain, its not suitable for my usage.

I would be quite happy to pay £70 per month as long as I could download what I wanted when I wanted!!

Or I also wouldnt mind paying so much for every gig over the cap i download, as long as its REASONABLE and REALISTIC.

I download lots of stuff and dont mind paying for it, whether or not its legal or illegal is nothing to do with anyone else apart NTL and myself.

[0 morgan 0]

Originally Posted by monkeybreath

woah....! Lose the attitude!!

What about people who download from itunes? If i download a song then i would much prefer it to take 30seconds rather than 3 minutes... or an hour and a half on dial up.

I don't use all of the speed all of the time, but it is nice to have it there sometimes.

Going back to ians car analogy- i might buy a car which can do 0-60 in 6 seconds, doesn't mean that i am going to that every time i accelerate, but if i am late, it might come in handy once in a while. This car would cost me alot more than a model that takes 20 seconds to do 0-60 but if i am willing to pay extra, then that is my choice.

The "uk broadband network" you refer to is a privately owned cable network- ntl paid for it and pay to maintain it. The ADSL network has been funded partially by public money, so yes you could moan about lack of development on this, but ntl's private network is not as relevant to the discussion of poor broadband in the UK as ADSL is. As a private entity ntl can invest what they like in the network and in return they will gain subscribers- which incidentally they seem to be doing quite well, with 1.3m customers- more than any other ISP in the UK.

And as for their being no other competitive ISPs in Wales... i can have 2meg from any ADSL provider so i don't think that your comment is quite justified- it may be the case that in some areas ADSL is not available, but you need to be more specific with your comments.

But i had a car that did 512k and it now does 2048k i used to go over the speed limit but they still did the upgrade to my car knowing that i'd go over the limit quicker with my upgraded car

pull another one on me mate... and yeah i could get Nildrem for an extra £2 but its still the same speed. In england you can expect alot more for your money i only have to shop around and i've found 8mb for only £39.99 with a 33:1 ratio and a 500gb cap, but of course NTL are in it for the money, nevermind about the customers...

you know why telewest offer unlimited and NTL dont, because telewest havent got the market held... ntl are the only real competition here in wales... whereas telewest have hundreds of ISP's to compete with. Telewest can do it but NTL cant, yet the two use the exact same type of network...

So why do NTL offer a cap at the current moment in time, because as it is, they can... theres no one who can beat them, theres no one to offer cable at a cheaper price, theres no one to offer a no cap connection or a faster service...

So if you want to be apart of that system and not voice your opinion fine, continue driving your car at the basic speed, ignore the pumping engine under the hood. I guess your one of these people that drive a 30k car yet you drive slow - just so everyone can see you...
__________________

Originally Posted by homealone

please don't presume you can download the internet 24/7 and then insult those that choose not to - they are not 'stupid', they are using the connection as they see fit - 'none of your business' works both ways

then when did it become your business that i download as i see fit...

perhaps if we have speed restrictions we should have a minimum speed limit... oh i forgot NTL wouldnt like that :o

Its up to you if you want to pay £35 for a service you could get for £15 etc... however as i pay £35 i try and get my £35 worth.
__________________

Originally Posted by ian@huth

The £300 doesn't come from me or NTL is has been quoted by more than one ADSL ISP. NTL on the whole give a good service to its users at a reasonable price. Email may have its problems at times but NTL are not alone with this and I can honestly say I have not experienced that much trouble with it. What NTL offer is a broadband service for residential use aimed at the normal internet user. over 90% of users have very few problems and have a usage pattern that falls within the usage limits NTL will be putting in place.

You have no idea how I use the internet so how can you criticise my use and views. I may not use that much bandwidth these days on a regular basis but there are times when I need the advantage of a high speed connection for a short time and I am willing to pay the full cost of having that speed. Many years ago I used to have an internet bill at home that never dropped below £100 per month.

Most of the abusers are not using the internet as it is intended to be used but kid themselves into thinking that their use is normal and acceptable. It isn't normal and it isn't acceptable and before too long you will find out that you have to obey the rules or go elsewhere. You don't get too many regulars bothering to comment these days as all has been said so many times before.

You have made quite an impression with your first few posts on here but not for the right reasons.

now see your getting me wrong,
I have no quibble with ntls service, customer support, television package, phone line etc...

I've only ever had a 100% positive response to say about NTL. However they always and i have always been let down with the broadband. The speeds are great however theres no way i should pay £25 when i litteraly download 24/7... for which i could get away with using a 150k service and still get everything i paid for. But NTL saw it fit to upgrade me, therefore i'll download to the specification of the line i was given.
__________________

and im sorry if im leaving a bad impression, i have an opinion and its going to stick. if you dont like it, dont listen... if you want to voice your own you know where the reply button is and im sure you know how this works.

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by Rik

I download 5+gigs per day on occasions and if NTL impose this 1gig per day Cap on 3meg I will be on the phone to complain, its not suitable for my usage.

I would be quite happy to pay £70 per month as long as I could download what I wanted when I wanted!!

Or I also wouldnt mind paying so much for every gig over the cap i download, as long as its REASONABLE and REALISTIC.

I download lots of stuff and dont mind paying for it, whether or not its legal or illegal is nothing to do with anyone else apart NTL and myself.

On a personal level I don't care what people download as long as it doesn't affect my use of my connection and I am not subsidising customers whose usage costs NTL more than the subscription they are paying. Someone has to make up for this loss in revenue and it is the vast majority of normal users. If the cap means that the service is not suitable for your intended use then you have a few rights. You can moderate your usage to fit in with the NTLs wishes, you can complain but I don't think that will get you anywhere or you could move to another supplier.

Willing to pay the price for the service you are getting is highly commendable. The problem with reasonable and realistic is that no two people will have the same view on what they mean.

Saying what you download is nobodies busines apart from yourself and NTL is slightly wrong. There are other people who quite rightly may take an interest in what you are downloading and uploading. You never know who you are talking to on the internet or what they do for a living.

[Chris W]

Originally Posted by 0 morgan 0

But i had a car that did 512k and it now does 2048k i used to go over the speed limit but they still did the upgrade to my car knowing that i'd go over the limit quicker with my upgraded car

So you are happy to break the law just because you can? You realise the penalty for driving 120 is a lot higher than the one for doing 80.

pull another one on me mate... and yeah i could get Nildrem for an extra £2 but its still the same speed. In england you can expect alot more for your money i only have to shop around and i've found 8mb for only £39.99 with a 33:1 ratio and a 500gb cap, but of course NTL are in it for the money, nevermind about the customers...

yes ntl are a private company so their first priority is the shareholders- and therefore their primary interest is making profit. I assume that by "in england" you are aware that these means a few limited areas, and you have to be pretty much sat on the exchange to get the speeds. My g/f lives in central london and the fastest ADSL is still only 2mb.

you know why telewest offer unlimited and NTL dont, because telewest havent got the market held... ntl are the only real competition here in wales... whereas telewest have hundreds of ISP's to compete with. Telewest can do it but NTL cant, yet the two use the exact same type of network...

telewest provide certain areas and ntl provide others- eg, TW serve bristol, but ntl do not, so i don't see where you argument is going... i don't think there are any areas that are served by both cable companies so wherever you are, the biggest choice you will get is ADSL or a cable company.

So why do NTL offer a cap at the current moment in time, because as it is, they can... theres no one who can beat them, theres no one to offer cable at a cheaper price, theres no one to offer a no cap connection or a faster service...

Because of the nature of a cable network if people are hammering their connection (in particular the upstream) this is going to degrade service for other customers. Why should 20 customers suffer because of the actions of 1 when ntl can use a cap to restrict usage. This may make that one person happy, but i doubt very much whether the other 19 will all be annoyed about it. A utalitarian would go for the option that makes the most people happy- and this would appear to be capping the service.

So if you want to be apart of that system and not voice your opinion fine, continue driving your car at the basic speed, ignore the pumping engine under the hood. I guess your one of these people that drive a 30k car yet you drive slow - just so everyone can see you...

I am voicing my opinion- i drive at the speed limit, and for your information i would not by an amazingly powerful car because i do not see the point, same as i would not buy a 4x4 because it does not suit my needs, but now we are getting off topic...

then when did it become your business that i download as i see fit...

go for it... but if you are chastised by ntl for your usage then you should not be surprised- the cap is part of the terms and conditions which you are bound by, if you are not happy with this, take your sevice elsewhere!

now see your getting me wrong,
I have no quibble with ntls service, customer support, television package, phone line etc...

I've only ever had a 100% positive response to say about NTL. However they always and i have always been let down with the broadband. The speeds are great however theres no way i should pay £25 when i litteraly download 24/7... for which i could get away with using a 150k service and still get everything i paid for. But NTL saw it fit to upgrade me, therefore i'll download to the specification of the line i was given.

when you upgraded your speed it was reiterated that the cap exists- so this is the spefication to which you should be working. As stated above, if you have a problem with this then expect to be contacted by ntl regarding your usage.

and im sorry if im leaving a bad impression, i have an opinion and its going to stick. if you dont like it, dont listen... if you want to voice your own you know where the reply button is and im sure you know how this works.

Nothing wrong with having your opinion, but if you listen to and appreciate the opinions of others then you will be welcomed much more warmly. Don't get me wrong, i am not saying that you should agree with me, or anyone else for that matter- there is a difference between being considerate to others's opinions and agreeing with them, and IMHO you are currently walking a fine line.

We all know that you are not happy with a capped service- you have made that quite clear, so i think emphasising and repeating that on this forum will not get you anywhere. Perhaps you need to take the complaints up with ntl in hope for a resolution, or alternatively, seek an alternative ISP.

[mrlipring]

Can anyone please explain to me the reasoning behind business connections being *unlimited* during office hours, but costing the same per month?

I know there's a setup fee, but after that, the service is better, and you get far higher limits.

During business hours you can do 12GB a day, 5 days a week, and all of a sudden, in a single week, you've done what home users are allowed to do in two months. and you're ALLOWED to.

I don't understand the logic behind this difference in service level.

Maybe i'm missing something obvious, but why is there this difference in allowed transfer?

[Mauldor]

May I add a bit about the comment made "as long as they dont effect my Usage" - Do we agree that only users connected to the same UBR will effect a person useage yes? For example, if I use my connection full on for week on end (which I dont btw, just saying) - I would not be effecting a person lets say in Nottingham right?

Maybe my area is rather quiet but if the network was in such a bad state, then I would have expereinced a lot of slow downs in my 4-5 years of having NTL, yet no, I have not - but hang on the network is in a mess aint it? How can they say in one breath that there is not enough bandwidth to go around one minute and the next offering a free upgrade to a lot faster speed, both download & upload - was it not mentioned that Upload was the main Cause as there is not enough of it yet now we have a higher upload limit?

FuD comes to mind, spread enough and make it seem like its in a mess, then something like a restriction does not seem as bad maybe?

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by mrlipring

Can anyone please explain to me the reasoning behind business connections being *unlimited* during office hours, but costing the same per month?

I know there's a setup fee, but after that, the service is better, and you get far higher limits.

During business hours you can do 12GB a day, 5 days a week, and all of a sudden, in a single week, you've done what home users are allowed to do in two months. and you're ALLOWED to.

I don't understand the logic behind this difference in service level.

Maybe i'm missing something obvious, but why is there this difference in allowed transfer?

I could be wrong, but I *think* you have to sign an 18 month contract for business.

[Chrysalis]

ntl like bt wholesale have costs of around 10-20p per gig, a user downloads 100gig it costs ntl £20 in bandwidth costs not £200. Of course it is a different matter if usage patterns are causing a ubr to be saturated and money is spent on upgrades, but even these upgrades are one of costs and so are can be recuparated. NTL are lacking a £50 product with a 150gig limit, and yes that is profitable for a isp of NTL's size.

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by 0 morgan 0

There are others services in the UK but not in Wales that offer much more competitive prices than NTL. The service were getting is the shoody uk service we'd expect from our broadband network , dont give me any bull**** about it should be costing us £300 stop having a laugh.

What? You don't have ADSL in Wales? Quick. Somebody tell Russ, his Pipex connection can't be working as the underlying technology it requires is not there..

Seriously. Unless you live in a remote area of Wales that doesn't have ADSL, then you have as much competition there as we do in England. The only difference is there are two cable companies in England. But, each has there own area (for instance, I live in an NTL cable area and cannot have Telewest). True, NTL ADSL is available in Telewest areas, but NTL cable isn't.

With ADSL, however, you DO have alternate ISPs.

The problem is the only people arguing against are the people that do jack **** on the internet except probably come on this forum. It's people like you who are stupid enough to pay £35 a month for a speed of which they'll never get any use. So you download this forum 0.5 seconds faster... the only real winners here are the people so called "abusing" the service who are actually just using broadband for its intended use and you know it...

Please do not assume that just because somebody does not have the same amount of downloads as you that they don't do anything. I've been using the 'Net (and WWW) since '94 (so I am an experienced user). I do all the stuff that people use as an excuse for breaking the 1G a day download limit like streaming, downloading game demos, OS (Windows XP, 2003, Mac OSX and Linux) patches and service packs, driver updates, antivirus updates and firewall updates, linux distros, xbox live. I sometimes even use VPN and Remote Desktop to connect to my machines at work. There is also one other user in my house. I rarely go through the 1 Gig cap though.

Just because you CAN download 24/7 doesn't mean you have to. Now, I am not saying what you should (or shouldn't) download - that's not my place. Nor is it NTL's unless it violates the Acceptable Usage Policy or Terms & Conditions of their service. The Cap HAS been in their AUP for several years now, so by continued use of the service, you have agreed to it (regardless of wether it was in force at the time you signed up)

Regarding my opinion of the cap? I have argued for the cap in the past (I can see the need for it, but I can also see that it could be a pain), but have stated that IF the cap becomes a problem, I will leave NTL. You are probably free to do the same.

[ian@huth]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

ntl like bt wholesale have costs of around 10-20p per gig, a user downloads 100gig it costs ntl £20 in bandwidth costs not £200. Of course it is a different matter if usage patterns are causing a ubr to be saturated and money is spent on upgrades, but even these upgrades are one of costs and so are can be recuparated. NTL are lacking a £50 product with a 150gig limit, and yes that is profitable for a isp of NTL's size.

If we take the cost of 155Mbps CBC BT Central which is £316,20 0 per year, this equates to 52p per GB transferred. I know that this price includes a profit for BT and that LLU ISPs may have a lower cost per GB. The first thing to note though is that price per GB is only 52p if the pipe is running at 100% capacity 24/7/365. Naturally if it is 100% utilised there will be contention issues for users who are routed through it. There are also many other costs involved which include such things as provision and maintenance of equipment which increase as the volume of traffic increases.

Where customers are placed geographically and their usage patterns affect the cost of providing the service. It is a constant battle by NTL to keep the network running at optimum levels so that customers are not unduly affected by changes in usage patterns and they do that very well. This can only be done by having sufficient capacity to deal with these changes which means that costs have got to be higher than what they would be with 100% utilisation.

so saying running costs per customer per month is say £10 (plucked out of the ether lol ) a 3 meg customer downloading 30 gig at 52p per gig = £15.60 thats £12 possible profit per customer per month,Ukonline are offering 8 meg with 500 gig limit starting in my town by end of this month ,bye bye ntl me thinks even if i get a drop off cuz of distance im still onto a winner woohoo lol lol.

Ive seen a lot about abusers and breaking the law etc I just hope that everyone who has the opinion of piracy (which is what we are talking about abusers downloading going over the cap) has never watched a copied dvd,or bought bootleg vodka or beer or bootleg tobacco of copied a cd off a friend or installed xp pro from dubious sources, the list is endless,Im sure theres very few on here who are totaly clean and innocent

[jonifen]

I've read the majority of this thread (it gets boring in work sometimes ) and I'll continue to stand by my thoughts...
1Gb is a little harsh for people who share their connection to other PCs in the same house. 2Gb is much better and something you could surely only break by getting linux distros and things of an "illegal nature".