BT to VM? help me please!

Ezbeans' · 30-05-2008, 20:39

hello all,

i used to be a cable user, but after moving to a none cable area i had to change to BT, and its been a nightmare (long story short). i want to go with virgin.net, but when i requested my mac code i spoke to a chap who insisted that he was with virgin.net and hes capped all the time, even if he just downloads in none peak times? but in VM's FAQ it says they only monitor peak times, im not a big downloader, and i do not use any p2p apps, however i'v been flagged as a heavy user by BT, and getting speeds of 20-50 download, and twice now its timed out around 10pm for Ãƒâ€šÃ‚Â¾ of an hour.
i did go ahead with the transfer and in 4days i will be with VM but what this guy said is really playing on my mind. i dont want to get trapped again

advice please!

FYI cant get Be

30-05-2008, 20:46

If you want to go with VM ADSL i'd steer cleer, they have extremely bad capping (you get capped for a full week if you hit the stm limit)

If you want the cable, pretty much the same now, they have STM 10am-3pm and 4pm-9pm.

Ezbeans' · 30-05-2008, 20:52

yes. but its better than BT who are capping for a month! for downloading an unknown amount of data? i cant get cable :/

30-05-2008, 20:55

VM restrict you to 50KB/s for a week.

And as soon as you hit the STM limit again (for instance the day your speed is back to normal) your stuck with 50KB/s for a month ago.

How far away are you from your exchange?

Ideally i'd look your exchange up on http://www.samknows.com to see what other ISP's you can go with (click availability checker)

Ezbeans' · 30-05-2008, 21:07

thnx, i did check samknows and another checker in a thread from here, my options are:
AOL,TalkTalk, sky, tiscali
AOL has 40 gig data cap top package, and i've only ever heard horror storys about talktalk and tiscali. i cant get sky because i dont have a TV package. as u can see my options are limited :'( i went from 20mb (cable) with constant speeds to fa. this is so depressing.

Edit VM's cap is 80kBps which is good in the adsl world u guys are lucky with ur cables :'(

philipp · 30-05-2008, 21:33

Keep with BTIpstream and go with entanet. (Does have usage limits but high off peak ones).

Ezbeans' · 30-05-2008, 21:44

Quote:

Originally Posted by philipp

Keep with BTIpstream and go with entanet. (Does have usage limits but high off peak ones).

sounds good. have u got more info

but am i correct in thinking that Virgin.net does not cap or count data in off peak hours?

30-05-2008, 21:47

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ezbeans'

thnx, i did check samknows and another checker in a thread from here, my options are:
AOL,TalkTalk, sky, tiscali
AOL has 40 gig data cap top package, and i've only ever heard horror storys about talktalk and tiscali. i cant get sky because i dont have a TV package. as u can see my options are limited :'( i went from 20mb (cable) with constant speeds to fa. this is so depressing.

Edit VM's cap is 80kBps which is good in the adsl world u guys are lucky with ur cables :'(

You dont need a TV package to get sky ADSL, have you got LLU where you are? if so i'd go with sky.

Ezbeans' · 30-05-2008, 21:59

Quote:

Originally Posted by TraxData

You dont need a TV package to get sky ADSL, have you got LLU where you are? if so i'd go with sky.

i just tryed it and when ticking the box that im not a sky customer it directs me to order cominations TV + bb.
ah found this now "sky Broadband is exclusively available to Sky TV customers."
http://mysky.sky.com/portal/site/sky...y/fromprovider

philipp · 30-05-2008, 22:00

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ezbeans'

sounds good. have u got more info

but am i correct in thinking that Virgin.net does not cap or count data in off peak hours?

Goto one of theris resellers sites such as adsl24 , ukfsn , aquiss for more info about costing and limits. Theres also such thing as ALT with entanet where they reduce the speed when the cental is runnign high but it doesn't go lower than 2mbit and it only affects some hours at the weekend and as off peak starts on the night.

Personally I have 20mbit cable and then I have ADSL on by BT phoneline provided by entanet as a backup (need a internet connection as I work from home so its highly unlikley both be down at the same time.

I do not know what ADSL Virgin.net does regarding to capping.

smeagoly1 · 30-05-2008, 22:08

well all i can say is, if you want to do any gaming online, keep well away from VM ADSL... I'm having a moo of a time. With the new draconian STM the net is a go slow for me now with them. Capped for a week is a joke....but a month!!!! the cap seems so low, even simple updates could tip you over. God forbid, you upgrade a service pack for XP or Vista hahaha
Latency is a major issue, even off-peak, jumping about all over, in the space of a few mins 97ms to the high 500's sometimes.
It's a great shame, as when I was in a cable area, service and speeds where fantastic.

Some other alternatives are looking better all the time, Be and O2.

But if BT and other providers don't get their fingers out of the preverbial soon, the whole ADSL side of things will be a no go. Sad fact, the exchanges and lines can't handle all the extra the net offers, live streaming, catchup Tv etc.

Ezbeans' · 30-05-2008, 23:04

first off, thank you all so far,
i v been looking at adsl24 ect, and they are good. but no unlimited option :/ is this the death of unlimited?

smeagoly1
what is this new stm?
this is what i found in the faq

Quote:

Monitoring traffic:
Well each week we’ll monitor how much data our broadband customers download during peak times only. We measure this in kilobytes (KB). Peak times run from 4pm till midnight. We then add up the total amount of data downloaded over the week per customer. We then rank the list of customers, heaviest users first. From this list, we pick out the top 5% of heaviest users over the week. We reserve the right to traffic manage these customers during peak times. Traffic management lasts for just one week and is only applied during peak times (4pm till midnight).

is this 100% true? they do NOT count data in off peak hours?
on peak is fine as im just gaming

utt · 30-05-2008, 23:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by TraxData

VM restrict you to 50KB/s for a week.

And as soon as you hit the STM limit again (for instance the day your speed is back to normal) your stuck with 50KB/s for a month ago.

How far away are you from your exchange?

Ideally i'd look your exchange up on http://www.samknows.com to see what other ISP's you can go with (click availability checker)

The restriction only applies during peak periods and not all the time.

Trax ... can you be more specific in your info.

bluecar1 · 31-05-2008, 01:18

avoid BT, VM and carphone warehouse (talk talk) as they are in the process of installing DPI kit to spy on your browsing to push adverts to you,

google phorm or webwise to get the picture or look at

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/12...l#post34564022

for more info

31-05-2008, 12:11

I could never go ADSL again and I am thinking of giving up bbi all together stupid caps I just sick of the fact u pay for something and dont get it