VM are only getting the software from TiVo, the box is being made by Cisco to VM's spec.
That's a pity, left to their own devices I have yet to see any STB that when released was not only capable of flinging it's GUI around with no restraint but had the overhead to cope with a few years of upgrades.
I would have hoped TIVO would have some influence to make sure the STB could cope because at the end of the day the GUI is their bread and butter having created the uber user friendly status.
As to paying for it, VM just sold Sky a load of tv channels and are on the brink of selling their share of UK tv.
That is several million quid right there, enougth anyway to cover the cost of replacing all the box's with VHD or PVR box's.
That's not what I mean and anyway having to pay a certain amount up front for a box helps with the initial purchasing of wholesale hardware.
TIVO make their money from per unit subscriptions so for every TIVO box deployed a couple of quid goes to TIVO every month, you could easily see VM with a £100 million per year bill IF the roll out and/or take up goes well and it becomes the standard for VM.
When Murdoch ran DirecTV he baulked at paying $2 per TIVO unit which led to favouring the non-TIVO PVR which has ended up dominating the US market, I just wonder how much VM can absorb or allow to be charged to balance product lineup against costs against price.
VM have proved they can absorb the cost of services/products to allow certain subscribers to get a "no-cost addition" as with the defunct Setanta deal and now to a lesser extent ESPN and HD.
However the business model relies on limited takeup, the more popular this sort of service gets the harder it is to balance costs/revenues so will TIVO remain a niche premium product or will we see 4 or 5 million units in a few years with everyone paying a premium or will market growth/profits allow them to cover the costs.
It's far from a simple matter of buying a few million units wholesale when you take on third party licensed services so it'll be interesting to see how it pans out for VM's bottom line when TV is the bottom of the barrel in terms of profitability for them.
You seem to struggle understanding? - it's because Sky has a great many more channels, VM presumably can't support that number with their single feed?.
Sky needs a cable for each tuner because each tuner needs to be able to select one of four entirely different feeds.
What a load of rubbish
You could say that every VM VOD program and film is another channel in terms that each requires bandwidth.
ThatThat would mean VM have hundreds of channel to choose from.....
:pSky could have one feed of 4 channels and thats more than the box can handle, but that still doen't answer why Sky are squeezing in HD channels and droping quality if they have so much more bandwidth but VM plan 80 HD channels plus 100 meg BB and VOD all at the same time as well as currently testing 200 and 400 meg BB for future rollout.
VM always claimed that the reason for them not providing HD for a long time was lack of bandwidth - that's what four separate feeds gives you, lot's more bandwidth.
I'm not aware that Virgin have any issues with bandwidth at all - they wouldn't be in the process of doubling their broadband speed to 100meg and trialing 200meg if bandwidth was a problem. And of course TiVo will come with it's own dedicated 10meg connection, and as Big Ted pointed out no extra cables will be needed.
At the moment Virgin provide fibre to the cabinet, with the connection to the house being made BT coaxial cable - which is already vastly superior to BT's twisted copper cable. It isn't impossible that Virgin will eventually provide its services through fibre to the home, and that will provide truly massive amounts of bandwidth!
That's a pity, left to their own devices I have yet to see any STB that when released was not only capable of flinging it's GUI around with no restraint but had the overhead to cope with a few years of upgrades. I would have hoped TIVO would have some influence to make sure the STB could cope because at the end of the day the GUI is their bread and butter having created the uber user friendly status.
That's not what I mean and anyway having to pay a certain amount up front for a box helps with the initial purchasing of wholesale hardware.
TIVO make their money from per unit subscriptions so for every TIVO box deployed a couple of quid goes to TIVO every month, you could easily see VM with a £100 million per year bill IF the roll out and/or take up goes well and it becomes the standard for VM.
When Murdoch ran DirecTV he baulked at paying $2 per TIVO unit which led to favouring the non-TIVO PVR which has ended up dominating the US market, I just wonder how much VM can absorb or allow to be charged to balance product lineup against costs against price.
VM have proved they can absorb the cost of services/products to allow certain subscribers to get a "no-cost addition" as with the defunct Setanta deal and now to a lesser extent ESPN and HD.
However the business model relies on limited takeup, the more popular this sort of service gets the harder it is to balance costs/revenues so will TIVO remain a niche premium product or will we see 4 or 5 million units in a few years with everyone paying a premium or will market growth/profits allow them to cover the costs.
It's far from a simple matter of buying a few million units wholesale when you take on third party licensed services so it'll be interesting to see how it pans out for VM's bottom line when TV is the bottom of the barrel in terms of profitability for them.
The box is spec'd for TiVo software but VM spec is for 3 tuners etc.
TiVo are just redoing their software to work on this and the VOD system that VM use.
Don't forget that Cisco are supplying all the headend kit for VM tv services so the box is built to work with that and run TiVo.
As to upgrades as TiVo use flash for most of the UI and a lot of the functions such as search by actor etc can be done at VM end then the box will be fine for years to come.
After all its built to be able to run aps (100 by year end) such as youtube, games and facebook it must be pretty well spec'd
Oh and VM are charging £3 a month for full TiVo functions on top of XL tv package. A bit like Sky charging £10.25 for HD to function fully.
That's a pity, left to their own devices I have yet to see any STB that when released was not only capable of flinging it's GUI around with no restraint but had the overhead to cope with a few years of upgrades.
I would have hoped TIVO would have some influence to make sure the STB could cope because at the end of the day the GUI is their bread and butter having created the uber user friendly status.
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Just to clarify. When VM announced the cisco box they said it was based on the tivo Premiere box. I would assume that tivo would have a major input into the box design anyway.
I'm not aware that Virgin have any issues with bandwidth at all - they wouldn't be in the process of doubling their broadband speed to 100meg and trialing 200meg if bandwidth was a problem.
It depends what the bandwidth is used for.
VM's problem is that a cable has a finite bandwidth and it is shared by many houses. It's an ideal setup for broadcasting but for Internet or VoD it's actually quite poor. In that respect BT's version of FTTC is better. That might only give 40Mb/s max but at least each line has uncontended access back to the exchange(*). What it amounts to is that VM's network has an additional potential for congestion that simply doesn't exist with ADSL or FTTC.
It'll be very interesting to see how their network develops as they roll out higher speeds. Providing 200Mb/s to one or two customers in a neighbourhood is one thing but if the service takes off they could soon become a victim of their own success.
(*)Last I read BT claimed that although all users of a cabinet share the link back to the exchange they ensure there's sufficient bandwidth to avoid contention.
Just to clarify. When VM announced the cisco box they said it was based on the tivo Premiere box. I would assume that tivo would have a major input into the box design anyway.
Nice, that's what I would hope, the rep of TIVO is their major marketing tool so they wouldn't want to be hamstrung by an underpowered STB.
Oh and VM are charging £3 a month for full TiVo functions on top of XL tv package. A bit like Sky charging £10.25 for HD to function fully.
Well that makes good business sense, the cost of TIVO should come from TIVO users and not the VM customers who may be telco/isp only but that makes TIVO being in every VM STB unlikely.
Well that makes good business sense, the cost of TIVO should come from TIVO users and not the VM customers who may be telco/isp only but that makes TIVO being in every VM STB unlikely.
Virgin Media’s director of digital entertainment Cindy Rose said: “We’re initially positioning this as a high-end product as a tier on top of TV XL - £3 more expensive than the standard TV XL subscription. However, we intend to migrate our entire television customer base over to TiVo as our standard product within a matter of years, and not many years. That means, undoubtedly, we will course-correct, refine and review packaging and pricing decisions as we go to make that happen.”
Other TiVo deals such as those with Direct TV (both pre- and post-Murdoch), Suddenlink, RCN etc. do not exclusively rely on TiVo DVRs and set tops so are in no way comparable to the Virgin Media deal. There will be initial minimum guarantees but also a cap on how much is paid upon full roll out to all 5m+ boxes. As such, Virgin claim the deal will cost them no more than they currently pay for the Liberate middleware.
VM's problem is that a cable has a finite bandwidth and it is shared by many houses. It's an ideal setup for broadcasting but for Internet or VoD it's actually quite poor. In that respect BT's version of FTTC is better. That might only give 40Mb/s max but at least each line has uncontended access back to the exchange(*). What it amounts to is that VM's network has an additional potential for congestion that simply doesn't exist with ADSL or FTTC.
Can't say I agree with this at all. Cable is excellent for VOD but its forte is definitely Internet. There is a reason that Virgin offer by far the fastest broadband available and will for many years, and that is because their fibre optic network is ideally suited to it.
BT's ADSL and developing FTTC network are plagued by contention ratio issues every bit as much as Virgin. But the major disadvantage with ADSL is that the service degrades the further away from the exchange you are. Which is why ADSL services rarely deliver even 50% of their potential "up to" speeds.
We can debate about the varying merits of Sky HD, Virgin HD and the upcoming TiVo, but there is no doubt that Virgin offer an Internet and VOD service that is far superior to anything else available.
Well that makes good business sense, the cost of TIVO should come from TIVO users and not the VM customers who may be telco/isp only but that makes TIVO being in every VM STB unlikely.
It's one of the major reasons why TiVo are a small player in the US market. Excellent software but cable providers don't want to pay money to TiVo or pass charges on to their subscribers - the same happened with DirecTV as mentioned upthread. The big cable operators in the US have gone the same way as Sky and developed their own PVR software (if you think Virgin and Sky EPGs are bad, try using Time Warner for a while!) to keep costs and revenue in-house.
The original TiVo S1 boxes in the UK cost £10 a month for Tribune to supply daily EPG data, or a 'lifetime' deal of £199. That monthly charge has only just been dropped, probably because of the switch to VM. Paying £3 a month for "TiVo services" on top of normal subscriptions may not make a lot of sense to many of Virgin's subscribers.
Can't say I agree with this at all. Cable is excellent for VOD but its forte is definitely Internet. There is a reason that Virgin offer by far the fastest broadband available and will for many years, and that is because their fibre optic network is ideally suited to it.
Rubbish. You've been reading their hype. There's about as much fibre in VM's network as there is in BT's. Even ADSL is 99% fibre and with FTTC BT have pretty much caught up with VM as far as fibre in the local loop is concerned.
BT's ADSL and developing FTTC network are plagued by contention ratio issues every bit as much as Virgin.
Not in the sense I meant. Both networks have the same contention issues from the exchange back to and across the core networks. VM has additional contention between the cabinet and premises. That simply doesn't exist in anything BT offer. Everyone using BT's network currently has an uncontended connection back to the exchange.
But the major disadvantage with ADSL is that the service degrades the further away from the exchange you are. Which is why ADSL services rarely deliver even 50% of their potential "up to" speeds.
Of course but that has nothing to do with contention.
We can debate about the varying merits of Sky HD, Virgin HD and the upcoming TiVo, but there is no doubt that Virgin offer an Internet and VOD service that is far superior to anything else available.
Hmmm. Possibly on the topmost tier although I thought they'd started to talk about traffic shaping even there. Anyway hardly any of their customers are using that at the moment so it's sort of a moot point.
I use BT's network (up to the exchange at any rate) and I have a 14Mb/s connection that I can run 24/7 without my ISP batting an eyelid. I get the same speed no matter the time of day:
But my response wasn't an attempt to critique VM. I was merely correcting a misunderstanding and pointing out that VM's network has its flaws. At the moment it seems to be working well but mass take-up of high speed services could be an issue. It has in the past particularly with upstream capacity. Cable used to be notorious for that - downstream throttled because the ACK packets kept colliding.
The ideal for internet/VOD is FTTP - and only BT have offered that to anyone - albeit shared path. Hopefully VM can avoid the local loop issue but it depends how many houses each cable is shared by. Fewer houses means less of a problem but greater initial cost. Knowing how cable developed in the UK I'd be more inclined to think each cable serves a lot of premises.
Rubbish. You've been reading their hype. There's about as much fibre in VM's network as there is in BT's. Even ADSL is 99% fibre and with FTTC BT have pretty much caught up with VM as far as fibre in the local loop is concerned.
Not in the sense I meant. Both networks have the same contention issues from the exchange back to and across the core networks. VM has additional contention between the cabinet and premises. That simply doesn't exist in anything BT offer. Everyone using BT's network currently has an uncontended connection back to the exchange.
Of course but that has nothing to do with contention.
Hmmm. Possibly on the topmost tier although I thought they'd started to talk about traffic shaping even there. Anyway hardly any of their customers are using that at the moment so it's sort of a moot point.
I use BT's network (up to the exchange at any rate) and I have a 14Mb/s connection that I can run 24/7 without my ISP batting an eyelid. I get the same speed no matter the time of day:
But my response wasn't an attempt to critique VM. I was merely correcting a misunderstanding and pointing out that VM's network has its flaws. At the moment it seems to be working well but mass take-up of high speed services could be an issue. It has in the past particularly with upstream capacity. Cable used to be notorious for that - downstream throttled because the ACK packets kept colliding.
The ideal for internet/VOD is FTTP - and only BT have offered that to anyone - albeit shared path. Hopefully VM can avoid the local loop issue but it depends how many houses each cable is shared by. Fewer houses means less of a problem but greater initial cost. Knowing how cable developed in the UK I'd be more inclined to think each cable serves a lot of premises.
While British Telecom have been struggling to get broadband speeds to an average 5.8Mbps, Virgin have been quietly getting on with the job. In towns where their cable network stretches, speeds of over 50Mbps are easily achieved with subscribers sending data up the line, faster than BT can often send down. Virgin will be offering 100Mbps services across much of the UK in 2011 and are already looking at 400Mbps services.
Back in the slow lane, BT has their Infinity Service which hardly anyone can get and then often at only 2Mbps. Most ADSL users will also tell you, even a ADSL2+ line is unlikely to receive at more than 5 or 6 Mbps with a miserly less-than 1Mps up. BT even hope we will be prepared to pay an annual surcharge on our telephone lines to develop the infrastructure. As someone who has just been charged nearly thirty quid to leave it, this does not hang well.
To be fair, BT is hampered by antiquated networks, unable to compete with fibre optic’s bandwidth. They also have to share their network, with private companies allowed to install proprietary circuitry into BT exchanges. The proposed BT fibre optic network by 2015 will also have to be shared with competitors. This is the price BT pay for government subsidies and protection.
Meanwhile Virgin are looking into non-wired broadband and considering challenging BT’s Openzone network. Which, much to BT’s embarrassment, runs faster than many of its wired customers can achieve. Virgin is hoping to get a 5Mbps service running in response, to tap the enormous demand created by Apple’s iPhones and their wannabees.
Rubbish. You've been reading their hype. There's about as much fibre in VM's network as there is in BT's. Even ADSL is 99% fibre and with FTTC BT have pretty much caught up with VM as far as fibre in the local loop is concerned.
Not in the sense I meant. Both networks have the same contention issues from the exchange back to and across the core networks. VM has additional contention between the cabinet and premises. That simply doesn't exist in anything BT offer. Everyone using BT's network currently has an uncontended connection back to the exchange.
Of course but that has nothing to do with contention.
Hmmm. Possibly on the topmost tier although I thought they'd started to talk about traffic shaping even there. Anyway hardly any of their customers are using that at the moment so it's sort of a moot point.
I use BT's network (up to the exchange at any rate) and I have a 14Mb/s connection that I can run 24/7 without my ISP batting an eyelid. I get the same speed no matter the time of day:
But my response wasn't an attempt to critique VM. I was merely correcting a misunderstanding and pointing out that VM's network has its flaws. At the moment it seems to be working well but mass take-up of high speed services could be an issue. It has in the past particularly with upstream capacity. Cable used to be notorious for that - downstream throttled because the ACK packets kept colliding.
The ideal for internet/VOD is FTTP - and only BT have offered that to anyone - albeit shared path. Hopefully VM can avoid the local loop issue but it depends how many houses each cable is shared by. Fewer houses means less of a problem but greater initial cost. Knowing how cable developed in the UK I'd be more inclined to think each cable serves a lot of premises.
What a load of grade one excrement! I haven't read VM's hype, I've enjoyed their excellent broadband service since the original 512kb service was introduced at £50 a month. BT's infrastructure is NOT 99% fibre optic, it's still mostly old fashioned twisted copper wire and the whole network is creaking at the seams. They have only just started to roll out their FTTC network, and they can only achieve this with huge Government grants. Even when complete it will only offer 40meg, which is hardly revolutionary. And BT will have to open their infrastructure for all sorts of third parties to mess round with.
Forgive me for being less than impressed by your paltry Internet speeds, which I would find an embarrassment if it was in my house. I rarely achieve less than 47meg download and 4.66 upload, and both these speeds will double in the next few months. For this I pay £25 a month, which meg for meg is MUCH better value than your £18 a month.
To me the ONLY disadvantage with cable is that half the country can't get it. What does amuse me is that some people who can't even get cable see fit to criticise VM's service, which makes me wonder what they base their opinion on. I've got loads of friends who moan about their slow ADSL speeds, but I've never heard of anyone enjoying the 50meg VM service - the fastest available - say they want to go back to crappy ADSL.
So tell which bits are wrong then instead of spouting off. Let's try each point in turn:
1.VM's local loop has about the same amount of fibre length per customer as BT's FTTC.
2.Taking the link from customer to the ISP as a whole even ADSL only has a relatively small amount of fibre in it.
3.The final part of VM's local loop is coax and each cable (and its bandwidth) is shared by several houses.
What does amuse me is that some people who can't even get cable see fit to criticise VM's service, which makes me wonder what they base their opinion on.
Who would that be then? I've not criticised their service. In fact while discussing their TV service I made it clear that I have no experience of their service so can't comment on it. Nothing in my replies in this thread is a criticism of VM.
At no point in this thread have I ever been critical of their service. I have merely pointed out a well known limitation of their ring topography networks. I even described it as a potential problem rather than an actual problem.
DOCSIS 3 vastly improved the situation and hopefully they will continue to move with the times. Nonetheless my original reply remains accurate. Cable does not provide unlimited bandwidth and is not ideally suited to internet or VoD. It's not bad at it but it does have a potential flaw.
I think it's sad that both you and the other poster feel the need to defend VM. My overall impression is that aside from their customer service they are pretty good. I even quite admire their traffic shaping. At least they are honest and up front about it.
So get off your high horses and stop bleating. I don't have a beef with VM. I don't even have a beef with cable. I just like to correct misinformation and help to educate people.
So tell which bits are wrong then instead of spouting off. Let's try each point in turn:
1.VM's local loop has about the same amount of fibre length per customer as BT's FTTC.
2.Taking the link from customer to the ISP as a whole even ADSL only has a relatively small amount of fibre in it.
3.The final part of VM's local loop is coax and each cable (and its bandwidth) is shared by several houses.
Who would that be then? I've not criticised their service. In fact while discussing their TV service I made it clear that I have no experience of their service so can't comment on it. Nothing in my replies in this thread is a criticism of VM.
At no point in this thread have I ever been critical of their service. I have merely pointed out a well known limitation of their ring topography networks. I even described it as a potential problem rather than an actual problem.
DOCSIS 3 vastly improved the situation and hopefully they will continue to move with the times. Nonetheless my original reply remains accurate. Cable does not provide unlimited bandwidth and is not ideally suited to internet or VoD. It's not bad at it but it does have a potential flaw.
I think it's sad that both you and the other poster feel the need to defend VM. My overall impression is that aside from their customer service they are pretty good. I even quite admire their traffic shaping. At least they are honest and up front about it.
So get off your high horses and stop bleating. I don't have a beef with VM. I don't even have a beef with cable. I just like to correct misinformation and help to educate people.
The 2 networks are inpossible to compare as they are totally different.
BT have copper to the home that we all know drops speed with distance.
Even with fttc they have an exchange that has other companies kit in, then tey use a network with large amounts of..........yes.............old wires like coax on large parts.
What do you think they have already replaced everything from the exchange back to fiber already ?
VM however have coax that carries large amounts of data to the cabinet and then everything is fiber on their own network that doesn't have others kit messing it up.
VM unlike BT have a network that can already do much higher speeds and don't have to wait years for upgrade to be complete.
By that time 4G or LTE could be rolling out and that will be faster than even BT infinity with up to 100meg possible.
BT are chasing VM on BB and VM are already pulling farther away with 100 rolling out and 200 and 400 being tested.
Add to that VM fiber over telephone pole to the home and BT are not so hot.
So tell which bits are wrong then instead of spouting off. Let's try each point in turn:
1.VM's local loop has about the same amount of fibre length per customer as BT's FTTC.
2.Taking the link from customer to the ISP as a whole even ADSL only has a relatively small amount of fibre in it.
3.The final part of VM's local loop is coax and each cable (and its bandwidth) is shared by several houses.
Who would that be then? I've not criticised their service. In fact while discussing their TV service I made it clear that I have no experience of their service so can't comment on it. Nothing in my replies in this thread is a criticism of VM.
At no point in this thread have I ever been critical of their service. I have merely pointed out a well known limitation of their ring topography networks. I even described it as a potential problem rather than an actual problem.
DOCSIS 3 vastly improved the situation and hopefully they will continue to move with the times. Nonetheless my original reply remains accurate. Cable does not provide unlimited bandwidth and is not ideally suited to internet or VoD. It's not bad at it but it does have a potential flaw.
I think it's sad that both you and the other poster feel the need to defend VM. My overall impression is that aside from their customer service they are pretty good. I even quite admire their traffic shaping. At least they are honest and up front about it.
So get off your high horses and stop bleating. I don't have a beef with VM. I don't even have a beef with cable. I just like to correct misinformation and help to educate people.
I have no self interest in promoting VM and I'm certainly not defending them - indeed I am quite critical of certain aspects of their service.
As things stand at the moment I think Sky offer a better HD TV service, which is why I have a full package with them with all the bells and whistles. This my change with the introduction of TiVo. Virgin have a far superior VOD service, but as I rarely use VOD this is pretty much irrelevant to me.
But I think it's impossible to argue that VM's internet service is in a different league to anything else available. This will not change much even after BT have rolled out their FTTC technology. When they are connecting the last of their customers up to a 40meg service in 2015 VM customers will be enjoying 200 or even 400 meg downloads.
So I'm glad that I have a choice and can choose the best from both companies. I don't believe I'm on a high horse, but I am very happy to admit to feeling rather smug that I'm currently enjoying the best internet service available. Cruising in the internet fast lane is pretty good - it's a real shame that loads of people have no choice but to dawdle in the slow lane!
The 2 networks are inpossible to compare as they are totally different. Even with fttc they have an exchange that has other companies kit in
BT's backhaul and core is so good that they can rent it to other companies. It's possible (though unlikely) that VM might even use some bits of it. Possibly a mutual sharing agreement. One of the UK's best ISPs (Be) have pretty much built their network using BT's BES/WES service.
, then tey use a network with large amounts of..........yes.............old wires like coax on large parts.
Who? If you mean BT then no, you're wrong. BT exchanges have short runs of copper between the frames but that's about it. 21CN might even be replacing those.
What do you think they have already replaced everything from the exchange back to fiber already ?
Yes, of course they have. They started in the 1980s and pretty much finished it within a couple of decades. A few very small and remote exchanges were left on microwave for a while but the vast majority were fibre from the exchange back by the end of the 1990s.
VM however have coax that carries large amounts of data to the cabinet and then everything is fiber on their own network
True.
that doesn't have others kit messing it up.
Nor does BT.
VM unlike BT have a network that can already do much higher speeds and don't have to wait years for upgrade to be complete.
True - but irrelevant to what I posted.
By that time 4G or LTE could be rolling out and that will be faster than even BT infinity with up to 100meg possible.
You need to do more research. Those are headline speeds. As with all mobile connections they are optimistic. At 3 in the morning if you're standing underneath the mast then perhaps you might get those kind of speeds. But if anyone else is using the cell or you're half a mile from the mast or indoors the speeds will be a lot lower.
BT are chasing VM on BB and VM are already pulling farther away with 100 rolling out and 200 and 400 being tested.
True - but also not relevant to what I posted.
Add to that VM fiber over telephone pole to the home and BT are not so hot.
Yet more drivel that has no relation to what I posted. You are being ridiculously defensive. Pretty much making up some imagined hate campaign all by yourself.
All I ever posted was that VM's network has a potential issue with contention in the local loop. That is a well known drawback of cable networks. That's why DOCSIS 3.0 was such a big improvement. At no point have I ever suggested that it is currently an issue. I have certainly never posted anything negative about VM.
But I think it's impossible to argue that VM's internet service is in a different league to anything else available.
Is that a typo? I'm not sure I'd agree. I think I'd say they were different in a lot of respects and each has strong and weak points. Once you get to the exchange you're onto a very advanced fibre based network with BT. It's a lot more complex than VM's (something 21CN was supposed to be addressing, lol) but overall it does a bloody good job. It's the local loop where BT are struggling.
This will not change much even after BT have rolled out their FTTC technology. When they are connecting the last of their customers up to a 40meg service in 2015 VM customers will be enjoying 200 or even 400 meg downloads.
Well some of them will be. Not much interest in it at the moment and I wonder how much traffic management will impact it if/when it becomes more popular.
I don't believe I'm on a high horse
And yet you leapt to the defence of VM without anyone even attacking them. For someone who's happy with their service you seem to be very sensitive about it.
Cable contention has always been a concern with ring topographies. Same as attenuation has always been a concern for xDSL. DOCSIS 3 has temporarily pushed it into the background but there's still only so many channels carrying so much data available on the cable. Current improvements by VM are allowing more of them to be bonded and improving upstream efficiency - but they are not increasing cable capacity. Even coax has its limits.
Like I said - that's just the nature of the beast. It's up to VM to deal with it as best they can.
What we really need is FTTP but I doubt we'll see a significant roll-out of that for a decade. It might have happened sooner if Ofcom had bashed BT and VM's respective heads together. BT in particular ought to be being lambasted for rolling out FTTC in areas already served by VM. I understand the economics of that but it's still short sighted. FTTC is going to be a huge and expensive undertaking. Ofcom ought to be helping that but instead it's either standing on the sidelines or strangling BT in a vain attempt to encourage competitors to do what they have no interest in doing.
Is that a typo? I'm not sure I'd agree. I think I'd say they were different in a lot of respects and each has strong and weak points. Once you get to the exchange you're onto a very advanced fibre based network with BT. It's a lot more complex than VM's (something 21CN was supposed to be addressing, lol) but overall it does a bloody good job. It's the local loop where BT are struggling.
Well some of them will be. Not much interest in it at the moment and I wonder how much traffic management will impact it if/when it becomes more popular.
And yet you leapt to the defence of VM without anyone even attacking them. For someone who's happy with their service you seem to be very sensitive about it.
Cable contention has always been a concern with ring topographies. Same as attenuation has always been a concern for xDSL. DOCSIS 3 has temporarily pushed it into the background but there's still only so many channels carrying so much data available on the cable. Current improvements by VM are allowing more of them to be bonded and improving upstream efficiency - but they are not increasing cable capacity. Even coax has its limits.
Like I said - that's just the nature of the beast. It's up to VM to deal with it as best they can.
What we really need is FTTP but I doubt we'll see a significant roll-out of that for a decade. It might have happened sooner if Ofcom had bashed BT and VM's respective heads together. BT in particular ought to be being lambasted for rolling out FTTC in areas already served by VM. I understand the economics of that but it's still short sighted. FTTC is going to be a huge and expensive undertaking. Ofcom ought to be helping that but instead it's either standing on the sidelines or strangling BT in a vain attempt to encourage competitors to do what they have no interest in doing.
And so in a nutshell what you are saying is that BT are upgrading their network to try to have what VM already have, fiver everywhere up to the cabinet.
They then rely on poorer connection to the house over copper.
As to VM over telephone poles, VM have been testing it successfully for months. They also have a trial over electricity poles going on. That's fiver to th home.......
They are doing this to be able to roll out to areas BT will not cover.
Lastly many smaller companies would love to do the same but can't due to BT and VM getting preferential rates and not being able to supply to business's directly.
From most of your posts you seem to be trying to defend BT and it's network yet knock VM as old fashioned and limited. Where is BT better than VM in any part of the network. It's all relevant so please don't discount what you don't want to confided just because it's inconvenient
After all why would the company I work for have switched to cable connections rather than BT if they weren't better. That includes dedicated international links. We even have problems from BT with the local exchanges struggling to cope with a small part of our usage.
As to VM over telephone poles, VM have been testing it successfully for months. They also have a trial over electricity poles going on. That's fiver to th home.......
They are doing this to be able to roll out to areas BT will not cover.
I'll believe it when I see it - even fibre (not fiver ) over telephone poles is expensive, although much cheaper than underground.
If either BT or VM would care to bring me decent BB, I'd swap in a flash - but I don't expect to live to see it.
And bears not the slightest resemblance to a modern TiVo
The only UK TiVo's were analogue single channel recorders, a simple replacement for a VCR, not even a real PVR (as the term has come to mean).
Exactly - but the high costs probably tip it back, paying big money to rent a box (which you don't own), then £3 a month to use it, are big minus points.
If VM would care to come and provide me cable I'd happily swap, simply for decent broadband, but I'd be looking at V+, not TiVo.
Do you think VM TiVo boxes are going to be anymore resilient than existing V+ or Sky+ boxes?.
Correct - single analogue tuner only, but incorrect - it is a pvr (the first) many others only record one channel even if they have 2 tuners.
Paying to rent a box and £3 pm to use it is not much different to paying to buy a sky+ then paying a minimum of £10pm to be able to use it's features.
As for the new Tivo box being as reliable as the original tivo - who knows only time will tell
I had a TIVO connected to my standard sky box back in (approx 2000 / 2001). I seem to remember the sky+ box had just been introduced, but seemed a bit crap in comparison (it couldn't dual record at the time.).
The TIVO was excellent, the search function was far better than even today's sky+, as it would search on a key word, actors name etc. The series link was more intelligent that sky's current system, it was generally more refined.
Personally, I will be looking at the TIVO on virgin when my current sky sub ends in May..
From most of your posts you seem to be trying to defend BT and it's network yet knock VM as old fashioned and limited.
I have never described VM's network as old fashioned. Where BT is concerned I have corrected some invalid statements.
As for VM being limited - of course it is. All networks are limited. If they weren't we wouldn't have usage limits or traffic shaping. Or do you think VM do that because they hate their customers?
Here's another description of the problem I referred to:
Search for text starting "However, theoretical and practical limits for the network are approaching".
Yet another cable operator concerned about local loop capacity.
It's just the way it is. There's no use getting worked up about it much as there's no use getting worked up over attenuation for xDSL based local loops. I'm sure VM will continue to invest and improve their network but trying to pretend there are no limits is going to lead to disappointment.
I think VM do a reasonably good job of managing their network. They are clearly investing in newer technologies. Unfortunately like all CPs they are quoting raw headline speeds that I feel are unlikely to be available across the board. 200Mb/s sounds good on face value but if it can't be maintained when more then two or three people in a neighbourhood are using it then it's less clever. But it's not just VM playing that trick. They all do. The whole 'up to XXX' thing is marketing hype. It's a game CPs like to play I just dislike seeing the paying customer fall for it.
Is that a typo? I'm not sure I'd agree. I think I'd say they were different in a lot of respects and each has strong and weak points. Once you get to the exchange you're onto a very advanced fibre based network with BT. It's a lot more complex than VM's (something 21CN was supposed to be addressing, lol) but overall it does a bloody good job. It's the local loop where BT are struggling.
Well some of them will be. Not much interest in it at the moment and I wonder how much traffic management will impact it if/when it becomes more popular.
And yet you leapt to the defence of VM without anyone even attacking them. For someone who's happy with their service you seem to be very sensitive about it.
Cable contention has always been a concern with ring topographies. Same as attenuation has always been a concern for xDSL. DOCSIS 3 has temporarily pushed it into the background but there's still only so many channels carrying so much data available on the cable. Current improvements by VM are allowing more of them to be bonded and improving upstream efficiency - but they are not increasing cable capacity. Even coax has its limits.
Like I said - that's just the nature of the beast. It's up to VM to deal with it as best they can.
What we really need is FTTP but I doubt we'll see a significant roll-out of that for a decade. It might have happened sooner if Ofcom had bashed BT and VM's respective heads together. BT in particular ought to be being lambasted for rolling out FTTC in areas already served by VM. I understand the economics of that but it's still short sighted. FTTC is going to be a huge and expensive undertaking. Ofcom ought to be helping that but instead it's either standing on the sidelines or strangling BT in a vain attempt to encourage competitors to do what they have no interest in doing.
Happy New Year!!
You don't seem to be able to distinguish the difference between being defensive and giving praise. VM don't need me to defend them - their excellent service speaks for itself. I am, though, happy to compliment them for the fact that I've enjoyed the fastest broadband available for many years.
It's possible to discuss the merits of local loops, 21CN, DOCSIS 3.0 and ring topographies until you're blue in the face, but frankly that is only of interest to the average geek and is of no interest whatever to the punter on the ground. What they want is an internet connection that is fast, reliable and good value for money, and it wouldn't bother them if their broadband was delivered through a hosepipe by their local water company as long as it did what it was supposed to.
Which is why VM offer a far superior service at the present time. According to Ofcom in July 2010 not one of the major broadband companies using ADSL managed to deliver an average of even 50% of their claimed "up to" speeds, and some struggled to provide even 20%. Not only do Virgin offer much higher headline speeds, but they also manage to deliver at least 80% and sometimes well over 90% of their "up to" speeds.
You said that you thought £18pcm was good value for your average 11.3meg download and 1.1meg upload, but I'd say it's a rip-off. I pay £25 for for an averagte 47meg download and 4.6meg upload. On a pro-rata basis you would be paying about £70 for the same service. Good value? I think not.
And nothing will change fast. Whatever the differing merits of the two companies the fact is that VM will be offering significantly higher speeds for the forseeable future. BT are just beginning to roll out their FTTC network to give customers a 40meg connection, while VM are already offering a 100meg connection. And the TiVo, of course, will come with it's own dedicated 10meg connection, which is faster than the majority of people can get on any ADSL service.
Obviously there's little interest in 200 and 400meg connections right now because they aren't out yet, but it's nice to see that VM are being pro-active and preparing for the future. If the bandwidth is there then services will be developed that will make use of it.
In 2015 BT should just about to be in a position to offer what VM have already been providing for some time, and by then VM will have moved on. I know which company I'll stick with.
Comments
That's a pity, left to their own devices I have yet to see any STB that when released was not only capable of flinging it's GUI around with no restraint but had the overhead to cope with a few years of upgrades.
I would have hoped TIVO would have some influence to make sure the STB could cope because at the end of the day the GUI is their bread and butter having created the uber user friendly status.
That's not what I mean and anyway having to pay a certain amount up front for a box helps with the initial purchasing of wholesale hardware.
TIVO make their money from per unit subscriptions so for every TIVO box deployed a couple of quid goes to TIVO every month, you could easily see VM with a £100 million per year bill IF the roll out and/or take up goes well and it becomes the standard for VM.
When Murdoch ran DirecTV he baulked at paying $2 per TIVO unit which led to favouring the non-TIVO PVR which has ended up dominating the US market, I just wonder how much VM can absorb or allow to be charged to balance product lineup against costs against price.
VM have proved they can absorb the cost of services/products to allow certain subscribers to get a "no-cost addition" as with the defunct Setanta deal and now to a lesser extent ESPN and HD.
However the business model relies on limited takeup, the more popular this sort of service gets the harder it is to balance costs/revenues so will TIVO remain a niche premium product or will we see 4 or 5 million units in a few years with everyone paying a premium or will market growth/profits allow them to cover the costs.
It's far from a simple matter of buying a few million units wholesale when you take on third party licensed services so it'll be interesting to see how it pans out for VM's bottom line when TV is the bottom of the barrel in terms of profitability for them.
What a load of rubbish
You could say that every VM VOD program and film is another channel in terms that each requires bandwidth.
ThatThat would mean VM have hundreds of channel to choose from.....
:pSky could have one feed of 4 channels and thats more than the box can handle, but that still doen't answer why Sky are squeezing in HD channels and droping quality if they have so much more bandwidth but VM plan 80 HD channels plus 100 meg BB and VOD all at the same time as well as currently testing 200 and 400 meg BB for future rollout.
I'm not aware that Virgin have any issues with bandwidth at all - they wouldn't be in the process of doubling their broadband speed to 100meg and trialing 200meg if bandwidth was a problem. And of course TiVo will come with it's own dedicated 10meg connection, and as Big Ted pointed out no extra cables will be needed.
At the moment Virgin provide fibre to the cabinet, with the connection to the house being made BT coaxial cable - which is already vastly superior to BT's twisted copper cable. It isn't impossible that Virgin will eventually provide its services through fibre to the home, and that will provide truly massive amounts of bandwidth!
No, bandwidth isn't a problem for Virgin
The box is spec'd for TiVo software but VM spec is for 3 tuners etc.
TiVo are just redoing their software to work on this and the VOD system that VM use.
Don't forget that Cisco are supplying all the headend kit for VM tv services so the box is built to work with that and run TiVo.
As to upgrades as TiVo use flash for most of the UI and a lot of the functions such as search by actor etc can be done at VM end then the box will be fine for years to come.
After all its built to be able to run aps (100 by year end) such as youtube, games and facebook it must be pretty well spec'd
Oh and VM are charging £3 a month for full TiVo functions on top of XL tv package. A bit like Sky charging £10.25 for HD to function fully.
Just to clarify. When VM announced the cisco box they said it was based on the tivo Premiere box. I would assume that tivo would have a major input into the box design anyway.
VM's problem is that a cable has a finite bandwidth and it is shared by many houses. It's an ideal setup for broadcasting but for Internet or VoD it's actually quite poor. In that respect BT's version of FTTC is better. That might only give 40Mb/s max but at least each line has uncontended access back to the exchange(*). What it amounts to is that VM's network has an additional potential for congestion that simply doesn't exist with ADSL or FTTC.
It'll be very interesting to see how their network develops as they roll out higher speeds. Providing 200Mb/s to one or two customers in a neighbourhood is one thing but if the service takes off they could soon become a victim of their own success.
(*)Last I read BT claimed that although all users of a cabinet share the link back to the exchange they ensure there's sufficient bandwidth to avoid contention.
Nice, that's what I would hope, the rep of TIVO is their major marketing tool so they wouldn't want to be hamstrung by an underpowered STB.
Well that makes good business sense, the cost of TIVO should come from TIVO users and not the VM customers who may be telco/isp only but that makes TIVO being in every VM STB unlikely.
Other TiVo deals such as those with Direct TV (both pre- and post-Murdoch), Suddenlink, RCN etc. do not exclusively rely on TiVo DVRs and set tops so are in no way comparable to the Virgin Media deal. There will be initial minimum guarantees but also a cap on how much is paid upon full roll out to all 5m+ boxes. As such, Virgin claim the deal will cost them no more than they currently pay for the Liberate middleware.
The original TiVo S1 boxes in the UK cost £10 a month for Tribune to supply daily EPG data, or a 'lifetime' deal of £199. That monthly charge has only just been dropped, probably because of the switch to VM. Paying £3 a month for "TiVo services" on top of normal subscriptions may not make a lot of sense to many of Virgin's subscribers.
Not in the sense I meant. Both networks have the same contention issues from the exchange back to and across the core networks. VM has additional contention between the cabinet and premises. That simply doesn't exist in anything BT offer. Everyone using BT's network currently has an uncontended connection back to the exchange. Of course but that has nothing to do with contention. Hmmm. Possibly on the topmost tier although I thought they'd started to talk about traffic shaping even there. Anyway hardly any of their customers are using that at the moment so it's sort of a moot point.
I use BT's network (up to the exchange at any rate) and I have a 14Mb/s connection that I can run 24/7 without my ISP batting an eyelid. I get the same speed no matter the time of day:
Peak:
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/results/id/129366008335158919538.html
Off peak:
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/results/id/129266031851338218454.html
Pretty good for £18pcm.
But my response wasn't an attempt to critique VM. I was merely correcting a misunderstanding and pointing out that VM's network has its flaws. At the moment it seems to be working well but mass take-up of high speed services could be an issue. It has in the past particularly with upstream capacity. Cable used to be notorious for that - downstream throttled because the ACK packets kept colliding.
The ideal for internet/VOD is FTTP - and only BT have offered that to anyone - albeit shared path. Hopefully VM can avoid the local loop issue but it depends how many houses each cable is shared by. Fewer houses means less of a problem but greater initial cost. Knowing how cable developed in the UK I'd be more inclined to think each cable serves a lot of premises.
Just to clarify, quoted from IT PRO.
What a load of grade one excrement! I haven't read VM's hype, I've enjoyed their excellent broadband service since the original 512kb service was introduced at £50 a month. BT's infrastructure is NOT 99% fibre optic, it's still mostly old fashioned twisted copper wire and the whole network is creaking at the seams. They have only just started to roll out their FTTC network, and they can only achieve this with huge Government grants. Even when complete it will only offer 40meg, which is hardly revolutionary. And BT will have to open their infrastructure for all sorts of third parties to mess round with.
Forgive me for being less than impressed by your paltry Internet speeds, which I would find an embarrassment if it was in my house. I rarely achieve less than 47meg download and 4.66 upload, and both these speeds will double in the next few months. For this I pay £25 a month, which meg for meg is MUCH better value than your £18 a month.
To me the ONLY disadvantage with cable is that half the country can't get it. What does amuse me is that some people who can't even get cable see fit to criticise VM's service, which makes me wonder what they base their opinion on. I've got loads of friends who moan about their slow ADSL speeds, but I've never heard of anyone enjoying the 50meg VM service - the fastest available - say they want to go back to crappy ADSL.
1.VM's local loop has about the same amount of fibre length per customer as BT's FTTC.
2.Taking the link from customer to the ISP as a whole even ADSL only has a relatively small amount of fibre in it.
3.The final part of VM's local loop is coax and each cable (and its bandwidth) is shared by several houses. Who would that be then? I've not criticised their service. In fact while discussing their TV service I made it clear that I have no experience of their service so can't comment on it. Nothing in my replies in this thread is a criticism of VM.
At no point in this thread have I ever been critical of their service. I have merely pointed out a well known limitation of their ring topography networks. I even described it as a potential problem rather than an actual problem.
DOCSIS 3 vastly improved the situation and hopefully they will continue to move with the times. Nonetheless my original reply remains accurate. Cable does not provide unlimited bandwidth and is not ideally suited to internet or VoD. It's not bad at it but it does have a potential flaw.
I think it's sad that both you and the other poster feel the need to defend VM. My overall impression is that aside from their customer service they are pretty good. I even quite admire their traffic shaping. At least they are honest and up front about it.
So get off your high horses and stop bleating. I don't have a beef with VM. I don't even have a beef with cable. I just like to correct misinformation and help to educate people.
The 2 networks are inpossible to compare as they are totally different.
BT have copper to the home that we all know drops speed with distance.
Even with fttc they have an exchange that has other companies kit in, then tey use a network with large amounts of..........yes.............old wires like coax on large parts.
What do you think they have already replaced everything from the exchange back to fiber already ?
VM however have coax that carries large amounts of data to the cabinet and then everything is fiber on their own network that doesn't have others kit messing it up.
VM unlike BT have a network that can already do much higher speeds and don't have to wait years for upgrade to be complete.
By that time 4G or LTE could be rolling out and that will be faster than even BT infinity with up to 100meg possible.
BT are chasing VM on BB and VM are already pulling farther away with 100 rolling out and 200 and 400 being tested.
Add to that VM fiber over telephone pole to the home and BT are not so hot.
I have no self interest in promoting VM and I'm certainly not defending them - indeed I am quite critical of certain aspects of their service.
As things stand at the moment I think Sky offer a better HD TV service, which is why I have a full package with them with all the bells and whistles. This my change with the introduction of TiVo. Virgin have a far superior VOD service, but as I rarely use VOD this is pretty much irrelevant to me.
But I think it's impossible to argue that VM's internet service is in a different league to anything else available. This will not change much even after BT have rolled out their FTTC technology. When they are connecting the last of their customers up to a 40meg service in 2015 VM customers will be enjoying 200 or even 400 meg downloads.
So I'm glad that I have a choice and can choose the best from both companies. I don't believe I'm on a high horse, but I am very happy to admit to feeling rather smug that I'm currently enjoying the best internet service available. Cruising in the internet fast lane is pretty good - it's a real shame that loads of people have no choice but to dawdle in the slow lane!
All I ever posted was that VM's network has a potential issue with contention in the local loop. That is a well known drawback of cable networks. That's why DOCSIS 3.0 was such a big improvement. At no point have I ever suggested that it is currently an issue. I have certainly never posted anything negative about VM.
Well some of them will be. Not much interest in it at the moment and I wonder how much traffic management will impact it if/when it becomes more popular. And yet you leapt to the defence of VM without anyone even attacking them. For someone who's happy with their service you seem to be very sensitive about it.
Cable contention has always been a concern with ring topographies. Same as attenuation has always been a concern for xDSL. DOCSIS 3 has temporarily pushed it into the background but there's still only so many channels carrying so much data available on the cable. Current improvements by VM are allowing more of them to be bonded and improving upstream efficiency - but they are not increasing cable capacity. Even coax has its limits.
Edit:A discussion on the subject here:
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/remark,22352299
and here:
http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/12/33663541-50mbit-question-on-ubr-capacity-jitter.html
Like I said - that's just the nature of the beast. It's up to VM to deal with it as best they can.
What we really need is FTTP but I doubt we'll see a significant roll-out of that for a decade. It might have happened sooner if Ofcom had bashed BT and VM's respective heads together. BT in particular ought to be being lambasted for rolling out FTTC in areas already served by VM. I understand the economics of that but it's still short sighted. FTTC is going to be a huge and expensive undertaking. Ofcom ought to be helping that but instead it's either standing on the sidelines or strangling BT in a vain attempt to encourage competitors to do what they have no interest in doing.
And so in a nutshell what you are saying is that BT are upgrading their network to try to have what VM already have, fiver everywhere up to the cabinet.
They then rely on poorer connection to the house over copper.
As to VM over telephone poles, VM have been testing it successfully for months. They also have a trial over electricity poles going on. That's fiver to th home.......
They are doing this to be able to roll out to areas BT will not cover.
Lastly many smaller companies would love to do the same but can't due to BT and VM getting preferential rates and not being able to supply to business's directly.
From most of your posts you seem to be trying to defend BT and it's network yet knock VM as old fashioned and limited. Where is BT better than VM in any part of the network. It's all relevant so please don't discount what you don't want to confided just because it's inconvenient
After all why would the company I work for have switched to cable connections rather than BT if they weren't better. That includes dedicated international links. We even have problems from BT with the local exchanges struggling to cope with a small part of our usage.
I'll believe it when I see it - even fibre (not fiver
If either BT or VM would care to bring me decent BB, I'd swap in a flash - but I don't expect to live to see it.
Correct - single analogue tuner only, but incorrect - it is a pvr (the first) many others only record one channel even if they have 2 tuners.
Paying to rent a box and £3 pm to use it is not much different to paying to buy a sky+ then paying a minimum of £10pm to be able to use it's features.
As for the new Tivo box being as reliable as the original tivo - who knows only time will tell
The TIVO was excellent, the search function was far better than even today's sky+, as it would search on a key word, actors name etc. The series link was more intelligent that sky's current system, it was generally more refined.
Personally, I will be looking at the TIVO on virgin when my current sky sub ends in May..
As for VM being limited - of course it is. All networks are limited. If they weren't we wouldn't have usage limits or traffic shaping. Or do you think VM do that because they hate their customers?
Here's another description of the problem I referred to:
http://www.tiaonline.org/gov_affairs/fcc_filings/documents/Cable_Architecture_Declaration_01.14.10.pdf
Search for text starting "However, theoretical and practical limits for the network are approaching".
Yet another cable operator concerned about local loop capacity.
It's just the way it is. There's no use getting worked up about it much as there's no use getting worked up over attenuation for xDSL based local loops. I'm sure VM will continue to invest and improve their network but trying to pretend there are no limits is going to lead to disappointment.
I think VM do a reasonably good job of managing their network. They are clearly investing in newer technologies. Unfortunately like all CPs they are quoting raw headline speeds that I feel are unlikely to be available across the board. 200Mb/s sounds good on face value but if it can't be maintained when more then two or three people in a neighbourhood are using it then it's less clever. But it's not just VM playing that trick. They all do. The whole 'up to XXX' thing is marketing hype. It's a game CPs like to play I just dislike seeing the paying customer fall for it.
Happy New Year!!
You don't seem to be able to distinguish the difference between being defensive and giving praise. VM don't need me to defend them - their excellent service speaks for itself. I am, though, happy to compliment them for the fact that I've enjoyed the fastest broadband available for many years.
It's possible to discuss the merits of local loops, 21CN, DOCSIS 3.0 and ring topographies until you're blue in the face, but frankly that is only of interest to the average geek and is of no interest whatever to the punter on the ground. What they want is an internet connection that is fast, reliable and good value for money, and it wouldn't bother them if their broadband was delivered through a hosepipe by their local water company as long as it did what it was supposed to.
Which is why VM offer a far superior service at the present time. According to Ofcom in July 2010 not one of the major broadband companies using ADSL managed to deliver an average of even 50% of their claimed "up to" speeds, and some struggled to provide even 20%. Not only do Virgin offer much higher headline speeds, but they also manage to deliver at least 80% and sometimes well over 90% of their "up to" speeds.
You said that you thought £18pcm was good value for your average 11.3meg download and 1.1meg upload, but I'd say it's a rip-off. I pay £25 for for an averagte 47meg download and 4.6meg upload. On a pro-rata basis you would be paying about £70 for the same service. Good value? I think not.
And nothing will change fast. Whatever the differing merits of the two companies the fact is that VM will be offering significantly higher speeds for the forseeable future. BT are just beginning to roll out their FTTC network to give customers a 40meg connection, while VM are already offering a 100meg connection. And the TiVo, of course, will come with it's own dedicated 10meg connection, which is faster than the majority of people can get on any ADSL service.
Obviously there's little interest in 200 and 400meg connections right now because they aren't out yet, but it's nice to see that VM are being pro-active and preparing for the future. If the bandwidth is there then services will be developed that will make use of it.
In 2015 BT should just about to be in a position to offer what VM have already been providing for some time, and by then VM will have moved on. I know which company I'll stick with.