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Author Topic: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)  (Read 13364 times)

Chris P Duck

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Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« on: February 13, 2016, 02:31:51 PM »

Hello all
Currently on a long line ADSL2+ and now have the option to connect to FTTC (top of my road). Ive lost touch with what's available and finding it a bit confusing TBH.
Long story short, I had a nightmare with BT whilst on max etc and swore to only use smaller slightly more expensive business type ISPs for customer service and supposedly better business products.
On the old MAX/ 2+ there were low contention business offers and "normal" connections, is this still the case with FTTC? Would I notice a difference between a business product and a residential one ie high traffic slowdowns, shaping etc.?

Happy to pay a bit more for service but don't want to pay for a "business" service I dont really need.

Finally, any suggestions based on the above? With Timico at the moment for BB, BT line rental at a rather pricey £19 for 4.5meg and £17 rental evening/weekend..
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FTTC 80mb/20mb |  Infinity2
Exchange- Colwyn Bay WNBC | ISP BT
Ping ms 21
Download Mbps 68.15
Upload Mbps 18.56

Dray

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #1 on: February 13, 2016, 02:38:58 PM »

If your estimate given by the DSL checker http://www.dslchecker.bt.com/adsl/adslchecker.welcome is quite high, you probably won't notice any sort of slowdown. There are plenty of offerings out there for cheap telephone lines e.g. Pulse8 and then you could get a broadband only package from Plusnet, IDnet, Zen, etc, or go for an all-in-one from BT, Plusnet, Talktalk, Sky etc.
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Chris P Duck

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #2 on: February 13, 2016, 02:43:38 PM »

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FTTC 80mb/20mb |  Infinity2
Exchange- Colwyn Bay WNBC | ISP BT
Ping ms 21
Download Mbps 68.15
Upload Mbps 18.56

licquorice

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #3 on: February 13, 2016, 02:46:09 PM »

If your estimate given by the DSL checker http://www.dslchecker.bt.com/adsl/adslchecker.welcome is quite high, you probably won't notice any sort of slowdown.

Not necessarily, there are quite a few problems with congestion being reported over on the BT forums. Sync speed won't help if there's not enough backhaul.
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Weaver

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #4 on: February 13, 2016, 02:47:54 PM »

Talk to Andrews and Arnold, see http://aa.net.uk/broadband-home1.html

You can read about them on Ispreview too.

I'll be happy to answer questions, as of course will they and so will their existing customers who are available to chat to on IRC : http://aa.net.uk/kb-irc.html
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Weaver

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #5 on: February 13, 2016, 02:53:39 PM »

Andrews and Arnold are dedicated to banishing congestion and making sure you get full speed according to whatever you line can deliver. They have a monitoring programme checking congestion within their own network and within partner networks (BTW or TalkTalk Wholesale) :
    http://clueless.aa.net.uk/congestion.cgi

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Weaver

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #6 on: February 13, 2016, 02:56:26 PM »

A couple of questions about you yourself: Would you consider yourself a what low, medium, very-high user? Are you out of the house in the day?

For something you mentioned earlier : Does it drive you wild having to talk to idiot customer service staff?
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Dray

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #7 on: February 13, 2016, 03:03:31 PM »

Going from a perfect 4.5 Mbps to an even heavily congested 80 Mbps won't be a problem.
However I don't see any congestion anyway :)
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licquorice

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #8 on: February 13, 2016, 03:07:34 PM »

Going from a perfect 4.5 Mbps to an even heavily congested 80 Mbps won't be a problem.
However I don't see any congestion anyway :)

Again, not necessarily. Sub 1Mbps speeds are being reported by folks with 80 Mbps sync speed. It doesn't appear to be hugely widespread but it does exist, seems to be mainly in Scotland.
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Dray

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #9 on: February 13, 2016, 03:10:15 PM »

I take reports like that on the BT Community forum with a pinch of salt. Anyway, it's just a matter of time before BT fixes the congestion or it's usually some local fault anyway.
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Weaver

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #10 on: February 13, 2016, 03:11:45 PM »

I see regular local reports of congestion within the BTW network where AA have had a go at BT about problems with particular exchanges  or a certain pipe somewhere or some hardware that needs to be swapped out.
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Chris P Duck

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #11 on: February 13, 2016, 04:23:00 PM »

Thanks for the replies so far, will try and do some additional research on ISPs mentioned.

A couple of questions about you yourself: Would you consider yourself a what low, medium, very-high user? Are you out of the house in the day?
For something you mentioned earlier : Does it drive you wild having to talk to idiot customer service staff?

Currently average about 40gb/month, mainly streaming content. Would possibly stream more if the service was up to it! Not sure what that is classed as.
House is occupied most days but the useage tends to be evenings.
Yes, I can't abide being passed around endless departments and pinged back and forth between India and the UK who contradict each other and seemingly know less than I do!
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FTTC 80mb/20mb |  Infinity2
Exchange- Colwyn Bay WNBC | ISP BT
Ping ms 21
Download Mbps 68.15
Upload Mbps 18.56

Weaver

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #12 on: February 13, 2016, 04:36:43 PM »

Let us know how you get on.
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kitz

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #13 on: February 14, 2016, 08:52:54 PM »

Just saying hi Chris.   Long time no see hope that you are well.  ^-^

Quote
Currently average about 40gb/month, mainly streaming content. Would possibly stream more if the service was up to it! Not sure what that is classed as.

Sounds similar to mine,  usage shot up after getting fttc, although that could in part be due to much more streaming content available and being able to use HD.   I dont know what my monthly usage is now as the Plusnet VMBU is broken and doesnt record my usage (they say doesnt matter as Im on unlimited), but I think last time I looked it was about 80.

As regards to congestion, there has been some localised issues with the BT SVLANs, but touch wood most of those seem to get resolved fairly quickly.   It doesnt take them months like it used to with the old VPs.   I used to pay a bit more for max premium but have never bothered when on fttc.

I have seen some issues which seem more related to the BTw MSILs  (manchester and a couple of the london ones)  those took a bit longer to be fixed.   The worst episodes used to be the usual peak evening time when my speeds could go down to 20-30Mbps.    That said multiple threaded stuff would go through at line rate, so it wasn't even obvious on some speedtesters.   

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Chris P Duck

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Re: Moving to FTTC, advice please :)
« Reply #14 on: February 16, 2016, 10:56:24 PM »

So, is there such a thing as "low contention" business fibre products and "normal" as there is on ADSL?
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FTTC 80mb/20mb |  Infinity2
Exchange- Colwyn Bay WNBC | ISP BT
Ping ms 21
Download Mbps 68.15
Upload Mbps 18.56
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