Comments on: Rubbish British broadband speeds; this post is for posterity

By: joey

joey — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 17:23:08 +0000

heythere becareful…..

By: Kip Hakes

Kip Hakes — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 14:54:17 +0000

Yup – Sadly Billericay is a piss poor exchange – my former boss has AOL Broadband, and isn't all that far from the exchange, but his speeds are still dire. Looks like you'll have to move to Chelmsford mate – most of it is served by Virgin cable.

By: Ewan

Ewan — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 14:18:33 +0000

Not available here…

By: Ewan

Ewan — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 14:18:17 +0000

It would take Ben approximately 3.8 days to achieve the upload with his 6mb/upload speeds. Me? 5 months

I have the option of paying about a grand a month for a 2mb leased line…. or I can use the shite 'consumer' broadband. There is no inbetween here for some strange reason. And the exchange is definitely overloaded.

By: Ewan

Ewan — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 14:16:16 +0000

I know that sounds like a really smart point Alex -- I'd be making it, if I wasn't experiencing just how shite the infrastructure is here.

Dan Lane, the MIR tech contributor spent many an hour bashing me for not changing from British Telecom.

"Use Be Unlimited!" He chirruped.

Don't have that here.

He then went through a list of different providers. All of them don't have a point of presence.

You would, of course, be forgiven for thinking that I'm living in the middle of nowhere, a hundred miles from the nearest exchange.

No.

I'm in Billericay in Essex. The postcode is CM12 or CM11. The exchange dialing code is 01277. Look it up and you'll see just how badly we're served.

I am going to move LITERALLY because of the shite internet speeds.

By: joey

joey — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 11:23:08 +0000

heythere becareful…..

By: Moshe Maeir

Moshe Maeir — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 09:38:57 +0000

Ewan will be uploading files for the next 5 months wow! http://tinyurl.com/czfb28

[Original tweet, Topsy page]

By: Kip Hakes

Kip Hakes — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 08:54:17 +0000

By: Ewan @ MIR

Ewan @ MIR — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 08:18:33 +0000

Not available here…

By: Ewan @ MIR

Ewan @ MIR — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 08:18:17 +0000

It would take Ben approximately 3.8 days to achieve the upload with his 6mb/upload speeds. Me? 5 months

By: Ewan @ MIR

Ewan @ MIR — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 08:16:16 +0000

By: Moshe Maeir

Moshe Maeir — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 04:38:57 +0000

Ewan will be uploading files for the next 5 months wow! http://tinyurl.com/czfb28

By: Fai

Fai — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 02:59:42 +0000

200GB of data?! My entanet connection up north only allows 300GB of data transfer FOR THE MONTH during offpeak periods, and even then, you would really need to maximize use of your 8mbps connection for the most of the offpeak period to exceed the giving allowance. But 200GB in one go! Most consumer ISPs would disown you if you even sneeze half of that much data.

Saying that, the transfer speeds I get with them were terrific (400KB/s+ download is not unusual from a decent server - I've managed to max out at ~700kb/s from microsoft.com) for how much we pay, despite them using BT centrals. I've heard they've been somewhat more congested as of late though, as a victim of their own success.

Here in central London, I'm on a consumer BT line, and you can guess despite the 8mbit sync, the transfer speeds are terrible (equiv to 2mbps downloads? and at *most* if I'm lucky, 30KB/s uploads).

You do get what you pay for , especially with the smaller, lesser known but more expensive ISPs.

By: Grant

Grant — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 02:09:14 +0000

Three words.

Cable. Virgin Media.

(And if you're with them I'm very disappointed in them!)

By: Alex Kerr

Alex Kerr — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 23:37:04 +0000

Isn't it more likely to be a case of how shit your provider's infrastructure is, and in that case why don't you switch? Also are you perhaps connected into an overloaded local exchange? Just wondering how representative your experience is of other people's experiences. I know in Wimbledon on Virgin Broadband I get better rates than this. Why not try Be Internet – they're supposed to be great aren't they?