Theres basically 2 sorts of speeds
Sync speed - which is the speed at which you connect to the exchange at. From this we can deduce the condition of your line - and along with other line stats - the condition of your line.
Throughput speed - which is the 'realtime' speed that you see when downloading. Theres various factors that can affect this, but slower throughput can be down to congestion either at the ISP level or at the exchange.
You can check for BTw based exchange contention
here.
>> but it is via Eclipse, not LLU
It was your sync speed of 8160 that led me to believe that you may be LLU'd.
BT wholesale maximum sync speed is 8128... and for an interleaved line it is usually 7616 (but a very good line can under certain circumstances still see up to 8128).
Eclipse have been stealthily transferring users over to Tiscali LLU for a couple of years now and sometimes wont even admit to the customer that their line is LLU'd.
Best way of checking is either seeing if you can log into the
BTw performance tester.. LLU connections wont be able to connect.
or another test is that the Tiscali MSANs arent configured to accept LLC-Based settings in your router and will only connect using VC-Mux Based.