Broadband Related > ISPs
Recommend ISP for Gaming?
Penguin:
Just to set the situation.
I recently moved to RAF Lyneham and had Sky TV/phone line etc installed, decided to get broadband too cause it sounded alright and means everything is coming out on 1 bill. After 3months of trying to get everything set up my broadband was finally active on the 16th march, unfortunately I didn't get my modem till the 19/20th march so I've had my connection active and usable for just over a week now.
At first things seemed fine, I'm getting around 7mb line (820kB/s) but then come between 6-11pm at night my connection takes a nose dive to between .5mb (30kB/s) and 1mb'ish (120kB/s) so for gaming its pointless. The line drops packets and pretty much every game lags :( even my MMO's like Warhammer and Warcraft.
Rang them up last night (Friday 27th) and had a big argument with them, one of there operators said I had a 14 day Cooling off while another says i have 7, spoke to a manager and he started spouting about BT restricting traffic etc, told them that was a load of crap because i got a mate who's in the block next to mine who's on plusnet and going thru the same exchange and gets around 5mb so its not BT, he still insisted that it was BT and not sky, spouted about sky rent the slams from BT so they control what goes on with them. Though a broadband help person had told me that Sky connect can't cope with the amount of users it has so the speed are heavily restricted at prime evening times. Told her if I'd know about that when i phone to order I wouldn't have ordered.
So at the moment I have my MAC code on order and it should be here some time next week in the post, my problem is i need to find a decent ISP for gaming, especially in the evenings, I know most do limit evening traffic but as long as its not as excessive as Sky I'll be happy.
There's not LLU racks in my exchange and so far I've looked at;
Plusnet Pro package, sounds good with unrestricted traffic though 15gb limit is a bit off putting.
also looked at Zen and IDnet since they seem pretty well rated on this site, but i don't really know much else.
Just wanted to get some opinion's on people who use the above and what its like during 5-11 at night, any help would be greatful.
As for Sky matter, I'll be leaving them just its just hoping I can get out of paying what's looking like £120 because of my contract, annoys me that they say wait 10day when you ring and the cooling off 7days, I'll see what i can do with that.
Thanks for any help given :)
waltergmw:
Hi Penguin,
There are some things worth investigating a little further.
I used the RAF Lyneham phone number and postcode in
http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/adslchecker.php
You're correct that there are no unbundled services, but the speed estimate (and it is only an estimate) suggests 4mbps might be achievable on a line of road distance of 2.25 km to the Bradenstoke BRSSP exchange. However I don't know whether the systems are provided just by BT Openreach or whether some parts are administered by a defence communications contractor.
Contention could well be a problem as I'd guess that many of your colleagues could well be using ADSL services at the same time doing similar things.
Regarding ISPs, I expect that you'll find you get what you pay for.
If you want active help in achieving the best performance you could try Zen and you could explain the problem to their sales team beforehand to see how they comment.
Kind regards,
Walter
kitz:
>> nose dive to between .5mb (30kB/s) and 1mb'ish (120kB/s) so for gaming its pointless. The line drops packets and pretty much every game lags
May just be worth checking that its not a problem with your line. If your SNR gets too low, then this will have the effect of slowing down speeds and dropped packets.
Check your linestats when the problem occurs.
If you want us to have a look at them, we will be happy to do so.
>> he started spouting about BT restricting traffic etc,
hmmm. Well it could be
[*] a line fault /LowSNR as mentioned above.
[*]BTw exchange contention... but in all the times Ive seen exchange contention, I've never seen it affect latency or cause packet drops as BTw do some very minor sort of prioritisation on their dslams/msans. If your speeds are very low and you perform a BTw performance test, it may offer you the opportunity to log on to the BTw network and do a BTw speedtest that bypasses your ISP network. If you are using the sky router though, you cant change the log-in to the BT one required. If you have an older router around though, you may be able to use that.
[*]I have heard that sky connect users are now being throttled at peak times and that it is affecting latency too. Some users have managed to complain and get out of their contract early and migrate elsewhere when speeds 'return to normal'.
>> There's not LLU racks in my exchange and so far I've looked at;
Plusnet Pro has no traffic shaping, but as you rightly say its restricted to a 15GB cap, but any usage during midnight to 8am isnt counted. Users on the Pro package seem to be fairly happy. If you do go over the limt you can purchase extra GBs. Downside would be a 12 month contract.
iirc IDNet had a few hiccups last year, but afaik they seem to be sorted now.
Zen - prices are a bit higher - but many are more than happy to pay a bit extra for their excellent support and reputation and consider them worth it.
Penguin:
As far as I know its not a problem with my line, but I'll post the results from the "show statistics " when my line goes crap on sunday between 5-11pm.
This is the current Statistics at time of posting.
--- Quote ---ADSL Link Downstream Upstream
Connection Speed 8128 kbps 448 kbps
Line Attenuation 20 db 12 db
Noise Margin 13 db 18 db
--- End quote ---
I do think its Sky being over zealous on the throttling issue and going to ring them monday about getting out of my contract because of the failure to provide a decent service even with throttling, I know most if not all ISP's on BT wholesale exchanges do throttle connection's but I don't think the other are as bad as this.
Also I've been doing the BTw Peformance Test as well and during the non peak hours I get the following (I've been recording these in a txt file and time stamping them)
--- Quote ---25/03/09 14:55
Test1 comprises of Best Effort Test: -provides background information.
Your DSL connection rate: 8128 kbps(DOWN-STREAM), 448 kbps(UP-STREAM)
IP profile for your line is - 7150 kbps
Actual IP throughput achieved during the test was - 6417 kbps
If you wish to discuss these results please contact your ISP.
--- End quote ---
This is one I did before I went to work Thursday night
--- Quote ---26/03/09 18:30
Test1 comprises of Best Effort Test: -provides background information.
Your DSL connection rate: 8128 kbps(DOWN-STREAM), 448 kbps(UP-STREAM)
IP profile for your line is - 7150 kbps
Actual IP throughput achieved during the test was - 1051 kbps
If you wish to discuss these results please contact your ISP.
--- End quote ---
I also did one tonight when the line got really bad (30kB/s) and it did like you said, asking me to redo a 2nd test using their log in details which I can't do on the netgear router I have.
As for the other ISP's plusnet Pro does seem to be the ideal option because of how much gaming i do in the evenings and the 12month contract doesn't bother me much (since most things you get these days are 12months) but if they don't count stuff between midnight-8am it makes the package even more appealing (just download late at night basically)
As for the other 2 it seems that really between them and plusnet it looks like i'm going to be ok ISP wise (well better than Sky anyway)
I'll post more Sunday Evening when more that likely my connection will go pants, may do some tracer outes to Warhammer and WoW servers to see the packet loss situation.
Thanks for helping out Kitz :)
UncleUB:
Hi Penguin,
Have a look here,they seem to be one of /if not the highest rated isp's.Not the cheapest,but you get what you pay for.
http://www.fast.co.uk/
also.
http://www.newnet.co.uk/broadband/index.php
Vivaciti are another isp who get excellent ratings.Their new packages might be of interest to you.
http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/2009/03/28/vivaciti-isp-launches-new-broadband-packages.html
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