Virgin Media Broadband Speed

bistob · 02-10-2007, 20:54

There is a lot of talk on the net - and concern from Ofcom - that broadband providers are not providing what they advertise. I have a Virgin account in the Grays Essex area. During the early morning I get approximately 19.6Mb tested against Speedtest.net and confirmed with thinkbroadband and downloading games from Virgin (all speeds are within a few Kb) I get an upload speed of 710-725 always.

However during the day the download speed is is less at 8-12Mb. For at least the last two weeks the speed in the evening is a slow 4-5Mb. Like others commenting on this site I am paying a big premium for 20Mb. I am realistic and understand that speeds may vary with load, net overhead etc BUT not 15Mb. My equipment is state of the art Apple so no slowness there.

I complained tonight and to be fair on Virgin I did get a call back within 30 mins to explain that there is a network speed issue in the evening and they are looking into it. I will of course report back on any changes.

So network planners and managers at Virgin please take note and do something about this quickly please. Alternatively marketing please adjust your advertising to say most of the time 5Mb, sometimes 10 and occasionally 20Mb!

Cableforum how about a poll to see what people are really getting?

BTW it really miffs me to pay 25p to complain about this situation.
Bisto

nicke261192 · 02-10-2007, 22:04

Two Words

Traffic Management!

You are downloading too much, slow down

02-10-2007, 23:19

Quote:

Originally Posted by bistob

There is a lot of talk on the net - and concern from Ofcom - that broadband providers are not providing what they advertise. I have a Virgin account in the Grays Essex area. During the early morning I get approximately 19.6Mb tested against Speedtest.net and confirmed with thinkbroadband and downloading games from Virgin (all speeds are within a few Kb) I get an upload speed of 710-725 always.

However during the day the download speed is is less at 8-12Mb. For at least the last two weeks the speed in the evening is a slow 4-5Mb. Like others commenting on this site I am paying a big premium for 20Mb. I am realistic and understand that speeds may vary with load, net overhead etc BUT not 15Mb. My equipment is state of the art Apple so no slowness there.

I complained tonight and to be fair on Virgin I did get a call back within 30 mins to explain that there is a network speed issue in the evening and they are looking into it. I will of course report back on any changes.

So network planners and managers at Virgin please take note and do something about this quickly please. Alternatively marketing please adjust your advertising to say most of the time 5Mb, sometimes 10 and occasionally 20Mb!

Cableforum how about a poll to see what people are really getting?

BTW it really miffs me to pay 25p to complain about this situation.
Bisto

I think you raise some valid points, Bisto - especially as my family, had close association with Grays/Chadwell

Bonglet · 02-10-2007, 23:26

This is still on ongoing issue to people who download nothing during the traffic shaping period dont keep saying traffic managment please because it simply isnt.

boomerangsback · 03-10-2007, 09:03

im same guys .Speeds in morning are fine, after 12 noon they begin to drop. By early eveing im down to around 1.5 Mb.
This started happening about 2 weeks ago. Speeds were not upto what they should be before but i could tollerate them.

Maybe those with the same issues could post thier first part of post code. Mine is ST15.

We may find out which area "a change in networking " has effected.

Btw its not shaping because its not used before early evening. I just switch on pc in morning to monitor my speed at the moment.

ultimate · 08-10-2007, 16:48

I am in SK10, my speed on the whole was fine until I noticed it last week, my speed is crap after 7pm and back to normal after 10pm, when I say crap, I mean it varies between 1 - 3 mb, and it should be 4mb. Still usable but I have paid to 4mb!!

mrtonk · 08-10-2007, 19:18

I'm in ST8 and same here, rang Tech Support last week and got the brush off that I had too many connections running on my PC, even though It had been slow on all my other network devices (laptop,360 etc) but couldn't be bothered to argue the toss with some incompetent in India at 25p a min.

Speed seems good in the morning, but when I get home from work it's painfully slow getting around 0.8mb downstream on a 4mb connection.

ultimate · 08-10-2007, 19:34

I call this a disgrace from a 4mb line don't you?

Mon, 08 Oct 2007 18:28:11 GMT

Test 1: 1024K took 4547 ms = 225.2 KB/sec, approx 1856 Kbps, 1.81 Mbps
Test 2: 1024K took 6703 ms = 152.8 KB/sec, approx 1259 Kbps, 1.23 Mbps
Test 3: 1024K took 4891 ms = 209.4 KB/sec, approx 1725 Kbps, 1.68 Mbps
Test 4: 2048K took 26078 ms = 78.5 KB/sec, approx 647 Kbps, 0.63 Mbps

Overall Average Speed = approx 1372 Kbps, 1.34 Mbps

setch · 08-10-2007, 20:00

Maybe Virgin are keeping the speeds low on purpose? What is the average call length to India. 10 mins = Ã‚Â£2.50 per call and if they can get 100,000 people to call per day, then that equates to Ã‚Â£91,500,000.00 pa.

ultimate · 08-10-2007, 20:10

I am thinking of defecting to BT and Tiscali, my office in Manchester uses Tiscali, for Ã‚Â£20, we have 8Mb BB, line rental and also free 24-7 landline UK calls, I am seriously think of ditching VM if this pityful speed keeps up. VM has become a seriously aggressive money grabbing corporation.

Mr Black · 08-10-2007, 20:20

I'm in Corringham, Essex and mine has got a lot slower over the last couple of weeks. I also find that web pages take a lot longer to load now. I don't think I download enough to worry about traffic managment.

---------- Post added at 20:20 ---------- Previous post was at 20:18 ----------

Quote:

Originally Posted by ultimate

I call this a disgrace from a 4mb line don't you?

Mon, 08 Oct 2007 18:28:11 GMT

Test 1: 1024K took 4547 ms = 225.2 KB/sec, approx 1856 Kbps, 1.81 Mbps
Test 2: 1024K took 6703 ms = 152.8 KB/sec, approx 1259 Kbps, 1.23 Mbps
Test 3: 1024K took 4891 ms = 209.4 KB/sec, approx 1725 Kbps, 1.68 Mbps
Test 4: 2048K took 26078 ms = 78.5 KB/sec, approx 647 Kbps, 0.63 Mbps

Overall Average Speed = approx 1372 Kbps, 1.34 Mbps

How do you do this test?

ultimate · 08-10-2007, 20:42

Looks like the loss of speed is everywhere in the country!

The test is near the top of this page "speed test", make sure your browser do not block pop up windows.

iTekweni · 08-10-2007, 21:13

I pay for 20 meg and this is what I am getting most nights.

Mon, 8 Oct 2007 20:08:18 UTC

Test 1: 1024K took 9625 ms = 106.4 KB/sec, approx 877 Kbps, 0.86 Mbps
Test 2: 1024K took 10594 ms = 96.7 KB/sec, approx 797 Kbps, 0.78 Mbps
Test 3: 1024K took 13735 ms = 74.6 KB/sec, approx 615 Kbps, 0.6 Mbps
Test 4: 2048K took 22359 ms = 91.6 KB/sec, approx 755 Kbps, 0.74 Mbps

Overall Average Speed = approx 761 Kbps, 0.75 Mbps

and before anyone mentions traffic management then look at this and see how much I have downloaded so far this month.

----------------------
Daily Traffic Report
----------------------

All Connections [2007-09-28 --- 2007-10-08]

------------------------------------------------------------------------
Date Day Downloaded Uploaded Both
------------------------------------------------------------------------
2007-10-08 Monday 55.44 MB 13.90 MB 69.34 MB
2007-10-07 Sunday 9.65 MB 2.32 MB 11.97 MB
2007-10-06 Saturday 2.70 GB 85.80 MB 2.78 GB
2007-10-05 Friday 220.25 MB 23.08 MB 243.33 MB
2007-10-04 Thursday 432.67 MB 27.67 MB 460.33 MB
2007-10-03 Wednesday 118.27 MB 13.25 MB 131.52 MB
2007-10-02 Tuesday 13.52 MB 3.51 MB 17.03 MB
2007-10-01 Monday 67.73 MB 11.80 MB 79.52 MB
2007-09-30 Sunday 97.54 MB 10.76 MB 108.31 MB
2007-09-29 Saturday 128.99 MB 15.97 MB 144.96 MB
2007-09-28 Friday 13.51 MB 591.8 KB 14.09 MB
------------------------------------------------------------------------

The report was generated by Bandwidth Monitor http://www.bwmonitor.com/

Shootist · 08-10-2007, 21:26

I'm not a heavy downloader at all, my PC is used mainly for e-mails, net browsing and gaming. Gaming has become a complete joke in the evening and is only possible early in the day and early hours of the morning - which are the times when I can't play!

During the 6 years I was with NTL I never had a problem, and the service was fine up until 1 week ago. What's going on with VM? Greedy overselling without giving a damn about how it will impact their service?

alferret · 08-10-2007, 21:42

Quote:

Originally Posted by bistob

I have a Virgin account in the Grays Essex area.

Ayup m8, I used to be from Grays, but for me to get full speed out of VM I had to pre-empt the service and move to Mansfield

Mine works luverly