full fibre

[iniltous]

As already mentioned, each Openreach FTTP PON can have upto 32 users sharing 2.4Gb download bandwidth  ( but depending on the area where it is and the take up of the service, some customers may have no one else on their PON,  others may have many other properties connected ) plus, some may have only a few neighbours on the PON but they are all intensive users, others may be on a PON with 20 or 30 others but they are all light users,  and put hardly any demand on it…if you want effectively a system that you don’t ‘share’ at all, it costs much , much , more than the residential service you have ( in the order of 10-20 times as much ) that is a fibre leased line.

You connect at whatever speed you pay for , the throughput is variable depending on what others on the same PON as you are doing , but also the wider  ‘internet’ also shares bandwidth ( not under your providers control )  depending on which sites you visit etc.

The bandwidth the speed tester site you use has available may not always be sufficient, at the time you run a particular test, so that can also vary the results ,  speed test results are at best an indicator,  that’s why you shouldn’t just use one tester site and treat its results as gospel.

Connection speed is under the control of your provider , throughput isn’t,  you may go to sites that have insufficient bandwidth…the ‘BT’ speed test downloads a file of known size and times how long it takes ( TBH , that’s the same with them all ) the difference is that it’s all under ‘BT’s control , not some third party.

You will be given a minimum speed guarantee, it’s only if your throughput speed regularly goes below that would anything be considered wrong.

What is it you cannot do with the speed you have ?, in the real world , 300,400,500Mb you would not notice any difference unless you were timing a download,  plus you seem to be getting results that are in excess of your connection speed, that cannot possibly be correct.

Did you get FTTP just to run speed tests, or have you got a real world performance issue ?, it sometimes seems to me that some get FTTP just to run speed tests and that is the only time they need the bandwidth they have bought , in day to day use the bandwidth available is way more than they need , but they complain because the speed tester says 350 when they ‘pay’ for 500

[Starwire]

Quote

‘Did you get FTTP just to run speed tests’.

I’ve lost count how many times I’ve had to ask that very same question.

[FTTPtoNoWhere]

I'm on an FTTC connection with 55mbps here. 15 devices connected, xbox + netflix + whatever the 3 kids are doing online. Runs perfectly fine.

I think many need to educate themselves on how many of these services only require a small amount of bandwidth. Many also don't release hardware used to test may not be able to handle the throughput and the bottlenecks elsewhere.

I'm only upgrading/trying to upgrade to FTTP to stop REIN issues as this has been advice given as I can confirm it's not coming from my or next doors property.

*Proceeds to speed test his 1Gbps connection on his iPhone 6 using the Ookla app from the furthest point away from router*

[garethlevans]

I think the point here is that people do get fed up with being sold a service for it to only fall below what they pay. Especially in these times when you are sold a connection with a minimum guaranteed speed, not an "up to" speed. Therefore testing to ensure they are receiving their "Guaranteed Speed"  for the money they pay is fully understandable, rather than a paranoid delusional craze. However, the reality is that speed test sites have become a new way of monitoring what they pay for. They may not need it, but they are paying for it and it should be available to them on a consistent basis and on demand. It is the only way that a check can be performed at a given time to feel satisfied and keep ISPs in check. When people find that it falls below this, it creates a sense of distrust which in turn makes the need to regularly perform speed tests. For this reason is why people keep mentioning the term..

I am on a 900Mbps connection with a "Guaranteed speed" of 700Mbps. At first the sites i used to test my speed would always be in the 900Mbps range, and at peak times would hit around 800Mbps with odd occasions of it hitting 720Mbps. For me this was acceptable because i was hitting high speeds that i was paying for regularly (which fell within their average speed indication and did not drop below the "Guaranteed Speed". That said, when i was originally connected, i was the only person connected to my cabinet. The reason i know this is because  the power source had been turned back off after Openreach or associated contractor initially updated the device on my telephone mast.

Since time has gone by (~6 months) i have seen internet speeds drop consistent below 600Mbps and for me  for the same sites that provided a regular and consistent speed test for me. are now regularly within the 450Mbps - 550Mbps. This are tests both over wireless and Ethernet with sufficient Gigabit Ethernet cabling.  I have also seen a lot more Openreach engineers down my road and within the surrounding area installing this service to other homes.

Now, any person with good reasonable knowledge or experience of using the Internet would understand that speeds can vary during a number of different times and sites in which they connect to. Speeds are not guaranteed due to a number of factors, such as where you are downloading, what you are downloading, and how many concurrent connections you have from your home. As long as you test over a wired connection and during a time in which other users inside your home are not also consuming resource, then you at least limit any contention from your end (which I always do)

Also, these sites that people test on Fast.com & Speedtest.Net each have multiple servers which load balance, ensuring that the test people perform are connecting to the least congested server, so overhead externally on the testing sites should be relatively reliable too, although granted can be congested at times, but not consistently as both myself and it would appear others are referring to.

Therefore as others are suggesting, and is the same in my case,  speeds were achievable but overtime contention from the infrastructure does occur. However, whilst residential customers are not signed up for a dedicated lines, they do sign up to a package that "Guarantees" a minimum service, which in itself has the same concept of a dedicated line (or as such as package that has a limit in which it shares with) - Why should people pay for a higher speed package, but then later fall within the speed bracket of the lower priced package most of the time. You could argue to simply downgrade you package, although you WILL seem the same thing occur. So a huge amount still does come down to the infrastructure or potential traffic management that ISPs deploy.

I don't use BT's rubbish HomeHub simply because it has been proven that it cannot handle Gigabit speeds reliably. Most likely something to do with the spec of the router. I say this with experience from the very first day of having it installed. The HomeHub would not get speeds above 450Mbps. I purchased an Asus RTX880U and bang, immediately i was hitting the consistent speeds, again up until the point i have made above after around 6 months when it started to drop. The problem you have though is that BT will continuously say that if you don't use the HomeHub they will not support you, despite telling their customer service staff (Sorry I refuse to call them technical support since they read from a script), about the known issues they have with the device.

So my point is that i do believe a lot of customers are being miss-sold at the basic level, there is contention that grows and for that reason they cannot guarantee the speed they advertise and therefore should not sell services with varying speed options available, because they cant. And i refer to the "Guaranteed Speed", not the "Up To Speed"

The challenge people will face however is that if you hit (as in my case 700Mbps) just once within a 30 day period, their contractual obligations are met and you lose rights for the compensation they suggest they will provide or the right to cancel your contract. Furthermore the £20 they offer is a buffer the company accepts they will have to pay a certain number of people. Taking into consideration the point i made  just before this is not going to happen a lot, unless they have actual physical infrastructure issues which requires an engineer to come out to fix, in which that £20 per customer bucket they have assigned pays for, although has already been allocated to the price you pay per month.

I have considered changing to the 500Mbps package, but i know if i do i will start hitting speeds around 300-400Mbps because the resource allocation will be exactly the same within that bracket.

Finally, for those that say "Why do you need these speeds" - This is not the point. People pay for what they want and if they dont get it they have every right to complain. People use speed test sites (as mentioned) to ensure they are getting a consistent and reliable connection for what they are paying for, and i fully support that). You will find that every time you call any ISP provider, the first thing they do is ask you to run a speed test.

Also - Every time you run a speediest, ensure you clear your browser cache. You will see a big difference because of caching. If you dont, running speed tests concurrently will make it look as if you are getting higher improved speeds, when reality part of the download is being serviced by cache (and therefore not actually being downloaded which will make it look like you internet speed is faster).

I will continuously complain to BT but i know i wont get very far and neither will millions of customers i'm afraid.

Note: I refer to Openreach as the infrastructure provider that provides to lots of ISPs (in my case BT).

[Starwire]

Old post you’re replying to but it was a really cool reply so be sure to stick around yeah. 👌