Sky Broadband

[Chrysalis]

Originally Posted by James Henry

See the previous, Ofcom are guessing and extrapolating while the BSG data is alledgedly from the operators themselves.

A quick look at adslguide shows a user at 4.1km receiving over 8Mbit.

http://img426.imageshack.us/img426/8...60608124na.jpg is at least 1.4KM long, looking at the stats and depending on the effect the router could have I'd say about 1.7 (attenuation @ 300khz / 10) and shows 20Mbit.

I think ofcom used the formula that actual line distance compared to straight line is 1.4 or 140%, personally I think that seems too low. I wonder if BT are using as crow flies as their figures are higher.

Yeah I know its very possible for longer lines to over perform, but because also lines under perform its best to assume they cancel each other out.

---------- Post added at 19:02 ---------- Previous post was at 19:00 ----------

Hmm he got a very low attenuation, how sure is it that the line is 4.1km with a 24 attenuation. 20mbit is impossible at 4km no matter how good the noise.

[James Henry]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

I think ofcom used the formula that actual line distance compared to straight line is 1.4 or 140%, personally I think that seems too low. I wonder if BT are using as crow flies as their figures are higher.

Yeah I know its very possible for longer lines to over perform, but because also lines under perform its best to assume they cancel each other out.

---------- Post added at 19:02 ---------- Previous post was at 19:00 ----------

Hmm he got a very low attenuation, how sure is it that the line is 4.1km with a 24 attenuation. 20mbit is impossible at 4km no matter how good the noise.

I suggested it was at least 1.4km and probably around 1.7, said nothing about 4.1? Was referring to another guy receiving 8Mbit at around that range.

---------- Post added at 07:12 ---------- Previous post was at 07:11 ----------

Originally Posted by Griffin

Myself i find its best to get a real comparison from people who have the different services. I also find that most companies & official bodies seem to follow this addage:- if you can't dazzle them with brilliance baffle them with bull****

That's the key really. Unbiased opinions. All too rare these days though

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by James Henry

You reckon they make a ton of profit on LLU now? You're mistaken if you think that's the case.

I think, thanks to the recent(ish) collapse of the comms market, and thanks to the next one that I think we are heading for, then very few TelCos or ISPs make a profit, excessive or otherwise.

I'm aware that you can't draw a circle and say xxx will get x speed there - I do actually work with the stuff every day I don't base what I know on reading forums.

I would have thought that line quality would be a major contributory factor to speed. After all, if you have a bad line, you are not going to get good speeds even if you are next door to the exchange.

Similarly, if you have a good line, you will get better speeds over longer distances.

[Chrysalis]

Stuart yeah thats correct, some people on adslgudie for instance posting and rightly so that they peed off with been 500m from exchange and haveing a line that 3km long, others post with say a 2km line and low attenuation but have massive noise on their line again slowing down their speeds. Its possible to have low noise but high fluctuation so bursts of noise that force BT to raise your SNR to make the line stable, again reducing your speed.

Likewise its possible to have a long line that has very low noise and it over performs but I think the former is more common then the latter.

[kronas]

just saw the sky advert for the broadband service, so i went ahead and pressed red on my sky+ remote, nothing new to report really, everything we already know, just more clearly explained, pages were quick to load (take note NTL) you could register your interest through the STB, or going to the sky broadband website.

its a 12 month contract to the service level you subscribe to.

[James Henry]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

Stuart yeah thats correct, some people on adslgudie for instance posting and rightly so that they peed off with been 500m from exchange and haveing a line that 3km long, others post with say a 2km line and low attenuation but have massive noise on their line again slowing down their speeds. Its possible to have low noise but high fluctuation so bursts of noise that force BT to raise your SNR to make the line stable, again reducing your speed.

Likewise its possible to have a long line that has very low noise and it over performs but I think the former is more common then the latter.

Amazingly there's also been the odd person here and there who's enjoying a pretty reasonable service on ADSL.

Who'd have thought that with considerably over 100 million subscribers on ADSL there'd be a few happy people.

Sorry Chrysalis but I think you're forgetting that, just as here, ADSLGuide is not going to be frequented for the most part by people who are there to say how wonderful and stable their service is. You're also again extrapolating your own issues and those of a few other people as being the vast majority.

I appreciate that BT haven't done the greatest job with their rollout of Max DSL but that shouldn't be confused with DSL being a bad technology. Again mine works beautifully and I'd imagine I'm in the vast majority there. That majority is pretty much silent while the minority are far more vocal.

Unfortunate that this thread is again degenerating into a cable vs DSL discussion, really who gives a **** about the technology, if the companies using it offer the wrong products at the wrong prices or don't use the technology properly it's all completely irrelevant.

[Chrysalis]

of course, the poll on adslguide shows under 50% are having no problems or had problems but now resolved, again I know that figure will not be fully representative since people on there will be unbalanced. The fiure I will go by is the ofcom 2km figure tho who can probably expect a reliable service of 16meg or close to it. For 10meg yes I agree it will be a higher figure but have no idea what, but I think it will be under 50%.

Sorry to add, I am not disputing the technology and agree its the way its been handled, with FTTC dsl will be a pretty kickass product for the most part.

[tonecold]

Originally Posted by handyman

After all they have already offered completly free internet.

NTL have????

You're thinking YEARS Ago in the days of dialup...

Sky have offered their lowest BB for free..

Originally Posted by tonecold

NTL have????

You're thinking YEARS Ago in the days of dialup...

Sky have offered their lowest BB for free..

Yea but what good is a 2 gig cap to anyone in these days. Bet you there is some big charges in the small print for going over.

So let me get this right. If its off net it has a 2gig cap and is heavily traffic shaped. That's forward thinking. (service is provide by ukonline which has a traffic shaping policy at this time)

[James Henry]

Originally Posted by unlimited

Yea but what good is a 2 gig cap to anyone in these days. Bet you there is some big charges in the small print for going over.

So let me get this right. If its off net it has a 2gig cap and is heavily traffic shaped. That's forward thinking.

There's no free service offnet, £17.99 a month, 40GB cap and that lovely traffic shaping

Originally Posted by James Henry

There's no free service offnet, £17.99 a month, 40GB cap and that lovely traffic shaping

I stand corrected

Still 40 gig is very low for some of us. as you well know MR Henry

[James Henry]

Originally Posted by unlimited

I stand corrected

Still 40 gig is very low for some of us. as you well know MR Henry

Yes, that's MR Henry to you

Agreed, for some people 40GB/month isn't a viable product. A higher priced unlimited tier would be good but *shrug*

[kronas]

Originally Posted by James Henry

Yes, that's MR Henry to you

Agreed, for some people 40GB/month isn't a viable product. A higher priced unlimited tier would be good but *shrug*

you have forgot, according to some ISP's we need super fast connections for web browsing and downloading emails, pretty much thats it

[Chrysalis]

To reply to james henrys point on sky lead thread and other comments on this one, most of my fripes are with BT and the way long lines are not been dealt with. In terms of contention I have noticed much less of it on adsl, and in terms of sky I expect them to be successful as they always seem to pull things off and they may even have the muscle to make BT do tasks that my current isp nildram cant seem to do. Also with it been LLU it shouldnt fall foul of the BRAS capping system.

I wouldnt rely on ofcom tho james henry to make sure BT arent spinning bad numbers, since the cop out is the product is sold as up to 16meg and if people can get 256kbit then all is well and good. They even allow occasional desynchs as part of the product defenition.

[James Henry]

Originally Posted by Chrysalis

I wouldnt rely on ofcom tho james henry to make sure BT arent spinning bad numbers, since the cop out is the product is sold as up to 16meg and if people can get 256kbit then all is well and good. They even allow occasional desynchs as part of the product defenition.

Ofcom are pretty harsh to BT and the whole 'advanced brodband services' thing that they might take some interest in would expect levels of performance from BT. If BT lie about the quality of their loop and don't deliver Ofcom get tetchy as do other stakeholders and unbundlers.

Occasional desynchs are of course a part of the product definition, they are a fact of life with analogue broadband be it delivered via coax or UTP.