Shouldn't it be left up to customers to decide when they want to download stuff?
When I was with Newnet ADSL I had a 60g monthly allowance for a similar sort of price as Virgin XL. The only reason I left them was that I could only get about 1.5Mb speed at best due to the distance to the BT exchange. But at least that 1.5Mb was consistent, with no daft changes in speed in the evening apart from the usual decrease you would expect from heavy network traffic.
I chose to go back to Virgin because I had always had a very reliable and consistent internet service at a previous address with NTL.
But now, the evening speeds are such a joke, it makes it almost unusable. (I'm not talking a 50% cut - more like 95%+).
The fact that the speeds shoot up to almost what they should be at 5 minutes after midnight can only be explained by traffic shaping, in my book. Why the hell are they booking engineers to check modems when they bloody well know exactly why the speeds are down. Why not tell their customers the truth? If I'm downloading too much - tell me - and tell everybody else in your adverts who may be attracted by your claims of "no download limits" and the capacity to "download movies"
I've even got a sneaky suspicion that they don't do any traffic shaping in your 30-day money back period - just to try and lock you into a service they won't provide you with, but charge you for.
I'm glad I held on to that ADSL modem at theback of the cupboard, now. It may be pressed back into service if Virgin don't get their act together.
Shouldn't it be left up to customers to decide when they want to download stuff?
When I was with Newnet ADSL I had a 60g monthly allowance for a similar sort of price as Virgin XL. The only reason I left them was that I could only get about 1.5Mb speed at best due to the distance to the BT exchange. But at least that 1.5Mb was consistent, with no daft changes in speed in the evening apart from the usual decrease you would expect from heavy network traffic.
I chose to go back to Virgin because I had always had a very reliable and consistent internet service at a previous address with NTL.
But now, the evening speeds are such a joke, it makes it almost unusable. (I'm not talking a 50% cut - more like 95%+).
The fact that the speeds shoot up to almost what they should be at 5 minutes after midnight can only be explained by traffic shaping, in my book. Why the hell are they booking engineers to check modems when they bloody well know exactly why the speeds are down. Why not tell their customers the truth? If I'm downloading too much - tell me - and tell everybody else in your adverts who may be attracted by your claims of "no download limits" and the capacity to "download movies"
I've even got a sneaky suspicion that they don't do any traffic shaping in your 30-day money back period - just to try and lock you into a service they won't provide you with, but charge you for.
I'm glad I held on to that ADSL modem at theback of the cupboard, now. It may be pressed back into service if Virgin don't get their act together.
It is left up to customers to decide when they want to download, it is just that you will not get your full speed during the peak hours.. If you are a 4Mb/s customer the service does not stop when shaping kicks in it just halves.. You can still download a fair amount over 8 hours at 2Mb/s.
If your service degrades more than 50% in the peak then there is a congestion issue that needs fixing regardless of traffic shaping.
I don't know of a single ISP around that does not impose some sort of limit/traffic shaping during the peak period.
That 700Meg is just within the 4PM - Midnight peak period so that is around 90Meg per hour. Outside of this period you can download as much as you like.. Seems quite fair to me.
As mossy says it has been worked out on the tier and amount of data that can be downloaded at full pelt over a defined time period.
You consider 90 meg an hour as fair, are you on drugs Zenith? or do you work for Virgin??
Comments
When I was with Newnet ADSL I had a 60g monthly allowance for a similar sort of price as Virgin XL. The only reason I left them was that I could only get about 1.5Mb speed at best due to the distance to the BT exchange. But at least that 1.5Mb was consistent, with no daft changes in speed in the evening apart from the usual decrease you would expect from heavy network traffic.
I chose to go back to Virgin because I had always had a very reliable and consistent internet service at a previous address with NTL.
But now, the evening speeds are such a joke, it makes it almost unusable. (I'm not talking a 50% cut - more like 95%+).
The fact that the speeds shoot up to almost what they should be at 5 minutes after midnight can only be explained by traffic shaping, in my book. Why the hell are they booking engineers to check modems when they bloody well know exactly why the speeds are down. Why not tell their customers the truth? If I'm downloading too much - tell me - and tell everybody else in your adverts who may be attracted by your claims of "no download limits" and the capacity to "download movies"
I've even got a sneaky suspicion that they don't do any traffic shaping in your 30-day money back period - just to try and lock you into a service they won't provide you with, but charge you for.
I'm glad I held on to that ADSL modem at theback of the cupboard, now. It may be pressed back into service if Virgin don't get their act together.
It is left up to customers to decide when they want to download, it is just that you will not get your full speed during the peak hours.. If you are a 4Mb/s customer the service does not stop when shaping kicks in it just halves.. You can still download a fair amount over 8 hours at 2Mb/s.
If your service degrades more than 50% in the peak then there is a congestion issue that needs fixing regardless of traffic shaping.
I don't know of a single ISP around that does not impose some sort of limit/traffic shaping during the peak period.
You consider 90 meg an hour as fair, are you on drugs Zenith? or do you work for Virgin??