Fibre 900 - download speed only 250

[Silasophie]

Hi, I have recently upgraded to Fibre 900. The speed was definitely better than my old plan. But from my laptop, connecting by wifi, the download speed is usually only 200MBps, while upload about 100MBps.

I called up BT hotline (again waiting for almost an hour), the lady mentioned it is a known issue in the BT hub 2 whereby they are expecting to "upgrade" the firmware to fix the issue. And she explained that the current issue is that, it is "not" that you get your speed, but it is the hub2 where the problem is that hub2 sends out the wrong speed data, hence the speed test I run is not correct. 

Honestly, I am still very confused after back and forth conversation. Although she did confirm from BT end test that the incoming signal that she tested is 980MBps to the white box into the house, for whatever hub2 problem, i could only get 200MBps when I tested from my laptop with wifi connection. Isn't it the loss from transmission too big to be true?

I bet the hub2 must have some problems. So it is not really the speed test data misread whatever signal coming out from the hub2 to my laptop where I did the testing, it has to be some problems with hub2 not really distributing the speed of 900MBps.

So I took a refund for the month, hoping they are to "upgrade" the hub2 firmware by December. If BT is not really showing that hub2 is up running to provide the right speed for my 900 fibre package, I would simply downgrade or cancel my contract to somewhere else.

Is that what other users encounter the same problem?

Cheers

Michael

[SuperFlyGuy]

It's very doubtful that you will get close to 900Mbps over wifi with current wifi technology.

When I test using my phone, my speeds vary between 200 and 350Mbps.

Our 2 main computers are desktop machines connected directly to the Smarthub with Cat 7 cables and we always get 900Mbps on both of those computers (or within 10-15 Mbps).

I don't believe a firmware update will fix this issue.  BT should probably make sure that customers are aware that if you're only using wireless devices, then there's currently little point in signing up for the 900Mbps package.

If you have a spare ethernet cable, connect your laptop directly to the hub and see what speed you get.

[dclong]

I had the same problems and 'story' from BT  , also I found the SH2 to regularly drop connections -particularly to Apple devices / Sonos and Sky Q. With four of us WFH we couldnt tolerate this & wait for the promised firmware update so we changed the SH2 to an ASUS RT-AT86U which has so far provided fast  ( up to 500  Mbps) and stable wireless connections

[SuperFlyGuy]

Asus do make good routers. I've had 2 over the years, but I have to admit, I find the SH2 rock solid in terms of speed and connections.

I guess my point above was that if you're only going to be exclusively using wifi, then it makes little sense to opt for the 900Mbps package. the 300 or 500Mbps packages would be more suitable.

[Silasophie]

Thanks. But after some testing myself or by BT remotely, the BT hub itself only got 420Mbps despite white box signal in the house was 980Mbps. I called up BT again after reading the Community forum as some others got 500+. So hopefully BT engineer could figure out if it is to do with the hub2 problem. If it really cannot accommodate it, it is no point to stick to 900, probably downgrade to fibre 500 plan.

[Silasophie]

Thanks. I am more than happy if BT hub 2 could achieve 500Mbps+ speed. After a few tests myself and BT remotely, max I could get is 420Mbps, not far off though, but got to see if they could get the hub 2 up to speed. By the way, I am using Cat 6 cable connecting between the white box to the hub2. I tested with Cat5e and Cat6 cable though, not much a difference from speed perspective.

[Silasophie]

Thanks for the advice. BT engineer will be here to test if the hub2 may be faulty or max speed I could really get is 420Mbps to the hub 2 (despite they confirmed the incoming speed to the white box is 980Mbps). Again. if they could not get this up to speed, I would consider to downgrade to fibre500, provided that they can really give what the speed I should get for a fibre500 plan.

[OneManTagTeam]

I was always getting between 350-400 with SH2. Changed my router to the ASUS AX86U and get 800-850 on the Fibre 900 package through Wi-fi and about 920 through ethernet 

[Silasophie]

Thank. I should buy the same router. 

[ch]

It's worth pointing out that you'll only get those speeds on Wifi 6 compatible devices (i.e.devices that support AX - not just AC).

I have an AX router (the Orbi RBR850) and I only get about 480Mbps max on my non-AX iPhone.