This topic

Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Wed, 30 Mar 2022 23:57:51 GMT

I've got bt arriving next Friday to fit the 1 gig after my 500mb Internet connection with virgin started playing up (occasional lag) basically I'm curious as to how reliable and how fast the 1 gig connection is. I've got a friend who is on WiFi with the bt 1 gig but only gets 200mb down on his ps4 but he does live out of the way and is a good distance from the router. My set up is that I have 2 ps5s hooked up via a cat 6 Ethernet not both are always in use infant only the one is generally as my partner rarely gets on hers across the room. Then I have 6 or 7 devices I use WiFi on such as a Google tablet, mobile phones, Google doorbell. For the sake of 5 quid I thought I'd upgrade from virgin 500mb to bts fibre to the premises 900mb connection. Is it worth it?

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

gosforth — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 11:36:18 GMT

Assuming, you will be at Full Fibre area, whilst talking about 1 Gig package, and you mean in fact Full Fibre 900 package to be activated for you from BT:

Any such services are in principle CONTENDED and real performance will be really dependant on concrete environment and network as round yourself. But this is something, what you really know, isn’t it?

BT do not provide guaranteed speed in term, as your speed will be 900 Mbps/110 Mbps all the time, it’s almost impossible guarantee that.

What wifi will guarantee to yourself is connection between Exchange and your ONT/BT Super Hub 2.

This guarantee will be either 450 Mbps or 700 Mbps Download and 10 Mbps upload.

Yes, you read right, upload speed is absolute non guaranteed at all.

But before you start panic, my real world experience on my own FF900 is as I have most of the time 900+ Mbps (with occasional 1.1-1.2 Gbps) download and very stable 110-117 Mbps upload.

In very rare occasions, my download dropping down to 700+ Mbps and upload to 90+ Mbps.

To be fair, at previous building, which is only few meters away, I had much more fluctuation on speed end, whilst network was really on capacity on PON. But even like that, never dropped under 500 Mbps down and 90 Mbps up.

At a moment, PON, on which I am connected has a spare ports, and is not fully loaded, but less then 20 users. And even that results to some contended competition about bandwidth.

However, it’s not speed so much, what you looking for, and again, You probably know it.

My unloaded ping is in terms of 3 ms to 8 ms and loaded from 12 to 55 ms on Fast.com test.

On Speedtest by Ookla, all way down from NE to London 11.6 ms, and to Amsterdam about 15 ms.

Not tested game servers and respective pings, and jitters, but might imagine, as there will be similar results, due asymmetric nature of OpenReach / BT Fibre network.

Previously I had another provider at different area of city, with symmetrical 200/200 Mbps speed and ping 2-3 ms, but that’s something I can’t have here, whilst they do not cover private residential buildings. Even CF is not at our building on their own infrastructure, even less then 200 yards from us lying their optical network.

Unfortunately nature of leased lines, which OpenReach see as good money miner, means, as residential / SME customers will stay a long time on asymmetric network and with all that problems with that.

When talking about problems, you as gamer might had a little more expectations, then typical, even heavy user like myself, and find little problems quite big for yourself. Still, you have chance cancel contract in 14 days, then let’s see, how it will play for yourself.

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NigelB72 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 12:08:05 GMT

I'm taking it that your friend has a newer PS4 then cos the WiFi card in the original ones was a bit poor. Mine max'd out at 45mbps over WiFi on 160mbps connection. Still only got 100mbps on ethernet and the router was in the same room as the console

My PS5 will quite happily max out out our WiFi at 140mbps in the current house.

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 13:17:12 GMT

That doesn't fill me with much confidence if that's the only speed you are getting.

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 13:23:32 GMT

That worries me slightly I was told over the phone I'm guaranteed no less than 700 down and 110 up I was hoping I'd be getting close to 900 down all the time considering the router and console will be next to each other connected via a cat 6. Basically the answer I'm looking for are to these questions.

I'm paying 45 pounds for virgin 500mb 40 up this will increase to 70 in May as I'm out of contract. should I notice better performance in terms of downloads etc?

How reliable are BT in peoples experience?. I'm having problems with occasional lag now but for two years virgin have been good for me very rarely going down and I do get around 520 down consistently.

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 13:29:52 GMT

Something you mention that worries me is the contending for bandwidth

In my house the Internet at its busiest will look like this

Google nest doorbell attached to the Internet all the time.

Both me and my partner using a ps5 each attached via cat 6

Google nest hub attached to it all the time.

2 mobile phones attached via WiFi

Smart TV attached to it via WiFi all the time.

Now at the moment on virgin from my understanding there's no issues with a 500mb connection that isn't fibre to the premises battling for bandwidth so surely I shouldn't have an issue with this 900 mb fibre to the premises package

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

gosforth — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 13:41:01 GMT

I sorted "Internal" competition in simple way:

- less hungry / legacy devices are allowed only on 2.4 GHz

- standard devices connects to SSID on lower 5 GHz band (channel 64 / 80 MHz bandwidth)

- hungry devices has own designated higher 5 GHz Wifi band (channel 124 / 80 MHz bandwidth)

and usually has now on lower 5 GHz download around 450 Mbps

, and on higher band 500+ Mbps,

Plus PC connected hard wired (full up to 1.2 Gbps)

Not possible on standard BT Super Hub 2, you will need aftermarket WiFi AP, my choice was 3 band AC router (not enough devices to sacrifice AX and WiFi 6)

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 13:52:09 GMT

So in short should I not go ahead with this broadband considering I don't wish to buy any additional routers etc?

I don't really understand the technical speak you are using.

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 14:08:46 GMT

Here's what I plan to do.

Have two ps5s which are in the same room connected via a cat 6 ethernet.

WiFi devices connected will be

2 mobile phones

1 google nest home tablet.

1 google doorbell

Then I have plans to get more smart devices such as smart blinds and bulbs.

Will this be possible without buying more equipment and the speed/performance won't be affected either will it?

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

gosforth — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 15:29:37 GMT

Be fair, many smart bulbs and Newer Nest equipment from Google is speed enough to not really sow you down...

Only if you have very very legacy (old, more then 3-5+ years) equipment like Chinese led strips, or so, then it's good idea to "isolate them" on 2.4 GHz, but in general they will probably not able to do anything else then 2.4 anyway

Aftermarket router could potentially enhance things, but it's always about personal decisions and planning...

With SH2 from BT you will be able have on WiFi end reasonable speed 200-350 Mbps eventually, and most hungry devices are always (when possible) better to chain over the Lan cables hard wires...

Only if you will feels, it's bit enough, then coming question: what will help?

And only at this point will become real question: which router it's good for me, and will I be able to use it in full, or not?

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

gosforth — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 15:31:03 GMT

Other words, at some point you will wants more, because end of the day you paying for 900 Mbps and you wants maximum possible....

At some point of this year (maybe) will arrive Super Hub 3, which will really "speed up the game"

It might be your "next step" when SH2 becomes bottleneck 🙂

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 15:38:36 GMT

But surely 900mb will be enough my virgin 500 runs those devices perfectly fine. You've cast serious doubt into my mind now. You mention bottle neck but I don't have that problem on a 500mb down 40 up but bt have told me I'll have guaranteed 700 down 110 up on a FTTP connection where as my virgin hasn't got that.

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 20:13:15 GMT

Gosforth no disrespect intended but im seriously struggling to understand what you are saying. Alot of the sentences you have written to me don't make sense either on a technical level or just grammatically. I've simply explained my set up and explained what package I'll be moving on from once I have left virgin media. I've also explained how my set up is and how I intend to add additional smart technology to my set up. This is a very stressful time for me and it's a big decision as I'm about to enter a new contract with another big corporation and leave another. On one of your posts you seriously cast doubt into my mind about joining BT. For reference it was the post you broke down the bandwidth and what router channels certain devices latch onto. I just need answers to the questions which you and other users can see below please....

Is BT broadband reliable In your experience?

I've been promised 700mb down. Generally speaking does it stay up towards the 900mb and over or drop to the minimum promised speed?

I have 6/7 devices on WiFi and two on ethernet. Surely the BT 900MB will be able to handle it considering my virgin 500download and 40 upload can? The last thing I want to have is my partner and I playing our games at the same time over ethernet and experience lag.

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

JamesBand5 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 20:18:22 GMT

It is personal preference of course. But I would say it's worth it. The 900Mbps/Gigabit speed is the line speed into the property. When it comes to Wifi, that's going to vary on factors (walls, distance, interference) which includes equipment. Some routers, or distribution systems like Powerline (usually limited to about 150Mbps via electrical wiring of a house), or Extenders themselves may not necessarily have the bandwidth to transfer the whole 900Mbps. This is rarely noticed, or important, if the line speed is slower than the capability of the Home Network. But once you start getting faster "internet speeds", then you notice it. Another factor is the receiving device has to actually also have the antenna capability to receive such high speeds as well. Generally speaking, that would be Wifi 6 devices more so than Wifi 5 devices. You would notice for instance (all other things being equal) that two Tablets (e.g. iPads) of two different generations (one being Wifi 5 and the other Wifi 6) might get different speeds at the same location on the same network.

Wired connections are generally speaking the best and only way to get the full speed to the other side of the house. In the example you mentioned of your friend with BT 1 Gig and the PS4, if you're worried about something similar happening (or perhaps what he/she could do), you could either use some internal Ethernet like you mentioned. Or else, certain Mesh systems like the Netgear Orbi AX6000, Asus Zen XT12, Amplifi Alien etc, or BT's Whole Home Wifi 6, might be able to better get a lot of that 900Mbps line speed around the home. You could then wire in to the satellite unit to get a faster speed closer to the main Router speed (which is near the ONT). Those aforementioned systems use a dedicated band (well except for the Alien, but it looks cool) purely for communication between the internal network. It all depends on personal preference and convenience whether the homeowner can run internal, or external cables, or prefers wireless solutions etc.

I would say yes for £5 it's worth it. Now reading your post again, in terms of lag, I guess wired is the way. But at least wiring into a satellite would give you as good as possible a connection versus totally wireless.

As for the line speeds, whilst theoretically there is contention on the national network as a whole if multiple households were all gaming, or downloading video all at once, I do think the FTTP speeds in general are pretty consistent. Pretty solid full 900 here. At the moment, I think you have to go for your own Mesh system/wired solution though as the current (as of writing) Routers and Wifi offerings from the ISPs are not really designed for the 900Mbps packages. The fastest the home network can go will always depend on the slowest link in the chain between the ONT and your device.

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NickWba20 — Fri, 01 Apr 2022 20:54:42 GMT

I don't care about speed to the WiFi devices along as they don't interfere with my ps5 which will be on ethernet. I'm basically asking will those devices take to much bandwidth from the ps5 which will be hooked up via a cat 6? Regarding the router should it be able to shoot out 800mb with jitter free packet loss free connection to my ps5 via ethernet ?

Re: Gaming with the 1gig package

NigelB72 — Sat, 02 Apr 2022 07:42:00 GMT

It's highly unlikely that you'll get those speeds over WiFi regardless of sync speed and router. Ethernet is definable the way to go .

With regards to other devices running, with a 900mbps connection, you'll have more than enough bandwidth available and WiFi devices shouldn't impact you.