BT Broadband speeds

[rosecott]

I live in a rural area few miles from the nearest telephone exchange. When I went back to BT after a year of unsatisfactory service from Three via a mobile dongle, I was resigned to a slow connection. Recently it has become worse than ever. Today I made several attempts to run BT’s own broadband speed test. 3 times the test could not be completed as the connection speed was too slow and the 4[SUP]th[/SUP] attempt produced:
Download speed = 0 Mb
Upload speed = 0.02 Mb
I also tried the BT Wholesale speed test which was suggested when the normal test failed. That came up with:
Download speed = 0 Mb
Upload speed = 0 Mb
Ping Latency (ms) = 49.13
Any BT engineers on here that might throw me some crumbs of comfort?

 

[G1BB0]

could be a host of things Rose, I am a field engineer and do broadband. I would say more than likely the BRas profile has dropped due to possible errors on the line. It sometimes caps itself for no reason aswell.

pm me your home number and I will fire up my laptop and have a look on the bband checker

also try your modem in the main socket if you have any extension, remove the frontplate (if you have one) and connect straight into the test port and do a test from there

 

[brendy]

Not the help you are looking for Rosecott but http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange_search is handy to see what services are actually installed in your exchange.

 

[G1BB0]

the latency is good which leads me to believe its more of a profile cap due to either errors or random bad luck (RAMBOW is the service that sets speeds/monitors lines and is as temperamental as my ex)

also try www.speedtest.net much better than BT's imho

 

[Smiffy]

the latency is good which leads me to believe its more of a profile cap due to either errors or random bad luck

Exactly what I thought.

 

[Hacker Khan]

could be a host of things Rose, I am a field engineer and do broadband. I would say more than likely the BRas profile has dropped due to possible errors on the line. It sometimes caps itself for no reason aswell.

pm me your home number and I will fire up my laptop and have a look on the bband checker

also try your modem in the main socket if you have any extension, remove the frontplate (if you have one) and connect straight into the test port and do a test from there

Interesting. I have a problem with my BT broadband in that when I get a phone call, it sometimes cuts off my broadband. I have spoke to BT (well some Indian in the call centre who said that there was nothing with my line) but it still occasionally does it. Modem is in the main port. Any ideas?

 

[PhilTheFragger]

Interesting. I have a problem with my BT broadband in that when I get a phone call, it sometimes cuts off my broadband. I have spoke to BT (well some Indian in the call centre who said that there was nothing with my line) but it still occasionally does it. Modem is in the main port. Any ideas?

Do you have filters on all your active phone points, sometimes Sky or a burgler alarm can have a hidden socket.

Every phone point with something plugged into it needs a filter, or splitter

 

[Hacker Khan]

Some filters have been ordered now so I will see what gives.

 

[G1BB0]

Interesting. I have a problem with my BT broadband in that when I get a phone call, it sometimes cuts off my broadband. I have spoke to BT (well some Indian in the call centre who said that there was nothing with my line) but it still occasionally does it. Modem is in the main port. Any ideas?

it can be caused by a HR fault (high resistance) in the network or as stated above incorrect filtering

 

[Hacker Khan]

it can be caused by a HR fault (high resistance) in the network or as stated above incorrect filtering

Thanks again, I will see what gives when the filters arrive.

But it must be said that previously I was with NTL/Virgin for about 15 years and could only remember 1 occasion when it went tits up. Been with BT now for a year and I am having many more problems. I moved providers as I moved houses and now live in the back of beyond, far away from any Virgin or BT cables. But if I was near a Virgin cable I'd go back to them in a heartbeat. Well apart from the fact that they constantly gave better offers to new subscribers and milked the loyal customers. But that seems to be par for the course now for everyone.

 

[bozza]

I looked into getting BT internet where i live and did the online checker to see whats speeds i would get and it estimated between 1mb-3mb which is shocking considering i live right in the middle of a big town and it's a fairly new area.

Ended up just tethering my iphone for my internet as i get unlimitied data on my phone plan and it's fast enought to do everthing i need such as streaming films/downloading and browsing.

 

[Hacker Khan]

I looked into getting BT internet where i live and did the online checker to see whats speeds i would get and it estimated between 1mb-3mb which is shocking considering i live right in the middle of a big town and it's a fairly new area.

Ended up just tethering my iphone for my internet as i get unlimitied data on my phone plan and it's fast enought to do everthing i need such as streaming films/downloading and browsing.

It looks to me from the way BT price things that they are trying to move everyone onto infinity, their new cable service.

Which is great if you have a cable near your house. But if not, and you are reliant on getting it down the phone line I don't see much improvements being made and we are probably going to have a 2 tier system, those on cable enjoying stupidly fast speeds, and those who are not being left behind. Possibly when 4G is readily available it will improve, but in the UK we do seem to be a bit behind the curve when it comes to fast internet access for the majority of the population.

 

[swanny32]

I signed up to Infinity last week, engineer comes out to us next Friday to install it all. As I'm a big gamer I'm really excited about having a quick connection...will also be great for downloading various things....or so I thought. My wife was cutting a clients hair the other day and somehow they got onto the topic of broadband. She lives down the road from us and has Infinity....she reckons it's crap and that it keeps dropping out! Needless to say, my excitement has dwindled somewhat and I'm now a little nervous as I've signed an 18 month contract. I'm pretty clued up with this kind of stuff though so I'm hoping they are experiencing a poor connection due to their equipment.

 

[road2ruin]

I signed up to Infinity last week, engineer comes out to us next Friday to install it all. As I'm a big gamer I'm really excited about having a quick connection...will also be great for downloading various things....or so I thought. My wife was cutting a clients hair the other day and somehow they got onto the topic of broadband. She lives down the road from us and has Infinity....she reckons it's crap and that it keeps dropping out! Needless to say, my excitement has dwindled somewhat and I'm now a little nervous as I've signed an 18 month contract. I'm pretty clued up with this kind of stuff though so I'm hoping they are experiencing a poor connection due to their equipment.

I moved into a new property which didn't have Virgin in the area (had 100mb previously) and Sky was already installed so went with that. Managed to get up to the heady speeds of 0.5mb internet which was a struggle for all bar the most basic of internet surfing.....forget gaming and downloading!!

Having spent 3 weeks persevering and being told that speeds would improve once it settled down I gave up. BT was really the only option as they did have fibre optics in our street. Anyway, had it installed 4 weeks ago and so far I am really impressed. They quoted speeds of 30-50mb in our area and I'm getting a pretty consistent 36mb which is plenty quick enough. Service has been pretty stable so all in all pretty happy.

 

[Phil2511]

I signed up to Infinity last week, engineer comes out to us next Friday to install it all. As I'm a big gamer I'm really excited about having a quick connection...will also be great for downloading various things....or so I thought. My wife was cutting a clients hair the other day and somehow they got onto the topic of broadband. She lives down the road from us and has Infinity....she reckons it's crap and that it keeps dropping out! Needless to say, my excitement has dwindled somewhat and I'm now a little nervous as I've signed an 18 month contract. I'm pretty clued up with this kind of stuff though so I'm hoping they are experiencing a poor connection due to their equipment.

Mine was dropping out a couple weeks ago. Phoned them Friday, engineer came out Monday lunchtime, replaced equipment, job done.

#Bozza, its possible you could get better with Infinity as its FTTC, Fibre to the cabinet, then just down your line. A mate was only getting 1.2Mb on old line and now gets 6-7Mb on Infinity.

But depending on your mobile phone speeds and comparative costs might still not be good.