ntl Confirms 10Mb Broadband Speed Increase

[Chrysalis]

Originally Posted by Ignition

You'd be surprised how well this actually works, just to remind services will be capped, which helps, could easily enough be traffic shaped to protect real time services, and I've seen services working quite well with over 200 modems on a 256QAM downstream, as high as 1000 infact, these modems mostly being 5.5Mbps/640kbps and 10Mbps/1Mbps.

Usage patterns do vary though, some cards have 200 modems on them and average less than 4Mbps downstream throughput, others get nearly maxed on the same number of modems now.

The joys of capacity planning, capping the 10Mbps will help a lot though, TW will get slaughtered in student areas especially, such as for example Leicester with De Montford, etc in that area

If it's any comfort to you a load of new kit has gone into Leicester, it's now one of the best provisioned areas for bandwidth per modem on the network if not the best, and more to come, so relax!

So although Leics is docsis with the upgrades it has tons of them now I guess. I dont know how much area one ubr covers, but I am in a residental family area but only couple of streets away from the student houses.

I can see your point about telewest with uncapped 10mbit, the thought is a lot more scary for them, unmetered speeds I feel should be lower. So time will tell what happens.

[IanUK]

TW will get slaughtered in student areas especially, such as for example Leicester with De Montford, etc in that area

This seems to be the general consensus, however I'm not aware of any 'Telewest Sucks' or 'Blueyonderhell' type sites - this is not a moan at anyone, I'm sure there probably *are* such sites, I don't look for them as I'm not on Telewest, but does the fact that Telewest are uncapped actually mean they have a bad service ?

Again, not moaning, just wanting to be educated

For instance, does everyone moan about the TW proxies like they do about the NTL ones ?

[Ignition]

Originally Posted by IanUK

This seems to be the general consensus, however I'm not aware of any 'Telewest Sucks' or 'Blueyonderhell' type sites - this is not a moan at anyone, I'm sure there probably *are* such sites, I don't look for them as I'm not on Telewest, but does the fact that Telewest are uncapped actually mean they have a bad service ?

Again, not moaning, just wanting to be educated

For instance, does everyone moan about the TW proxies like they do about the NTL ones ?

TW proxies aren't mandatory and transparent dude.

There are a few people who've had dire experiences with Telewest and some with speed issues, check none other than the Telewest section of this very site.

[IanUK]

TW proxies aren't mandatory and transparent dude

Ah, I didn't know that, I thought they were the same as NTL.
Shame NTL's are mandatory

There are a few people who've had dire experiences with Telewest and some with speed issues, check none other than the Telewest section of this very site.

Ok, cheers - I just wondered, I'll take a look - it will be interesting to see how their uncapped service compares to NTL's capped service in the next year or so, I guess then we'll see whose users are moaning the most

[nn012]

TW will get slaughtered in student areas especially, such as for example Leicester with De Montford, etc in that area

Just to clear your post TW dont cover Leicestershire.

There are a few people who've had dire experiences with Telewest and some with speed issues, check none other than the Telewest section of this very site.

The keyword being few, Telewest are in the process of upgrading it network so it can handles these pressures - related story . The majority of customers are more than satisfactory with blueyonder and it has built up a good reputation for being uncapped, for its quality of service and customer care. It came within the top 10 in this months which? magazine survey of broadband and dial up isp satisfaction, ntl was on there too but it came last ie a 'dont buy' in both the dial up and broadband surveys.

[Ignition]

Originally Posted by nn012

Just to clear your post TW dont cover Leicestershire.

Astoundingly enough I am aware of this and was using Leicestershire as an example, it's actually an ntl franchise. If you prefer we can use the areas around the Birmingham unis, which are Telewest areas, as an example of a 'studenty' area.

The keyword being few, Telewest are in the process of upgrading it network so it can handles these pressures. The majority of customers are more than satisfactory with blueyonder and it has built up a good reputation for being uncapped, for its quality of service and customer care. It came withinin the top 10 in this months which? magazine survey of broadband and dial up isp satisfaction, ntl was on there too but it came last ie a 'dont buy' in both the dial up and broadband surveys.

Don't see where I'm bigging up ntl I'm merely saying that Telewest will have issues. TW engineers are probably as concerned about the capacity issues as anyone else. Also not convinced by the fact there are only a few issues on here - how many TW to NTL custs are on here? How many TW customers with speed issues have been cured through changing of upstream (indicating congestion on the existing one)? How hard is it for TW customers to understand that 384k upstream is being offered because they can't do much more and remain uncapped or their network will die?

TW major upgrades are in core network, to the same standard locally as ntl's, nothing more. The previous tier uplift was done through existing capacity mostly which is now basically gone so, like ntl, they are having to upgrade to keep up.

Whether it'll work or not we'll see. Congestion is without a doubt inevitable though, if you think in areas of high usage TW can sustain 10Mbit without congestion you're deluding yourself.

Which surveys relate more to customer service methinks rather than the actual quality of the connection, when ntl works it's fine.

[Chrysalis]

Many times I do wish telewest were here, the amount of times I pull my hair out over ntl.

I think the survey's look pretty accurate from where I stand. I dont know anyone on nildram or telewest who is unhappy, know a few unhappy bulldog people and tons of unhappy ntl'ers.

I think what frustrates people and certianly frustrate's me is ntl's stubborness they insist the proxies have no major issues, they insist their tech support is fine, they insist the postcode lottery service is fair. Telewest have made their proxies optional, they rolled out digital across all their network so their services are universal and they dont have script bound india tech support which has no way of complaining and providing feedback.

[Griffin]

well it appears most if not all isp's got some people upset about various aspects of their services its about time that they all realised that happy customers = profit, unhappy customers mean probable reductions in operating turnover & eventual loss of dividends for share holders. To this end NTL appear to be doing something positive with the increased speeds being rolled out, just hope they give some generous caps

[Hom3r]

NTL are in my town centre advertising 1Mb for 9.99, I asked him if there was a rough date for 3Mb upgrade to 10Mb, he didn't even know that the uprade was happening nor that 10Mb would be the standard from NTL in the near future?

[pooroldandy]

Just spotted there is some info about the upgrade in ntl's second quarter 2005 results: http://www.ntl.com/mediacentre/press...9%20August.pdf

Sorry if this has already been posted, I gave up reading after page 3

[Chris W]

Originally Posted by david.ewles

NTL are in my town centre advertising 1Mb for 9.99, I asked him if there was a rough date for 3Mb upgrade to 10Mb, he didn't even know that the uprade was happening nor that 10Mb would be the standard from NTL in the near future?

hmm... sales person.... sales people know nothing about anything... (usually including the product they are selling!)

[Robc66]

Originally Posted by Chris W

hmm... sales person.... sales people know nothing about anything... (usually including the product they are selling!)

lol yep....Infact most ppl who work for ntl dont have a clue wot they r on about. I think they just get random people from the street to work for them
especially the people from customer services lol! u end up telling them wot broadband is over the phone cause they dont know

Originally Posted by Robc66

lol yep....Infact most ppl who work for ntl dont have a clue wot they r on about. I think they just get random people from the street to work for them
especially the people from customer services lol! u end up telling them wot broadband is over the phone cause they dont know

It's people like you that get right up my nose with your complete and utter drivel.

Don't like that, well you should be able to find the red rep button and the report post feature on this page.

[None^]

Whenever i have had to phone customer services or tech support, they are knowledgable. Knowledgable to the point of correcting a problem.

Been with NTL 3 or 4 years and can't complain at the support.

[Doofy]

Originally Posted by Bill C

It's people like you that get right up my nose with your complete and utter drivel.

Don't like that, well you should be able to find the red rep button and the report post feature on this page.

On the occasions i have had to phone CS or tech support i have found that they are at most polite, courteous and above all most helpfull, fair enough i have had one or two moments when things have gone awry but they have been very few and far between and easily sorted. Compare this with the experience i have juat had with AOL, my sis in law just gone on to AOL through NTL network installed everything hooked up the modem still no go, rang up AOL CS and was greeted with the rudest, arrogant most unhelpfull woman i have ever spoken to at ANY CS, the call ended up with her saying the line hasnt been authorised we will have to wait for 2 weeks for that to be sorted and promptly hung the phone up on me.