Comments on: Virgin Media 200 Meg Broadband

By: Max

Max — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 18:37:00 +0000

I have had the virgin upto 50 meg broadband for 2months now and i have yet to get a speed below around 49.8 so they are pretty good with their estimations… upload speed is more like 1.5 which is fairly sh*t so i can see this 200 meg having like 5 for uploads.

By: Aadm

Aadm — Fri, 29 May 2009 17:33:13 +0000

I have used virgin medias 10 meg service and the local exchange was all of 20 miles away, yet i managed to get the full throughput at slightly less busy times.

You have to remember that your PC and the location you are connecting to (website) might not be as fast as required to get the full speed.

For example: we cannot connect to america at 200 megs as there are limits in place to prevent this. Some servers in the uk are capable of using the backbone in the uk for this 200 megs but alot of smaller hosts may not be able to cope with the top speed of many multiple users. Unlike DSL (your up to 8 megs or 16 or 24) cable works on the basis of traffic on the network rather than distance from the exchange. I would fully expect virgin to be able to live up to the “Up to 200 megs” service for the current limited user base. I also have found that virgin have some of the best customer service i have ever experienced. Connection speed upgrade within 3 hours of a phone call, uk call centre and no disconnection charge as i was kicked out of my flat.

I would highly recommend virgin to anyone if you can get it in your area.

By: Matthew

Matthew — Sat, 09 May 2009 07:57:19 +0000

I wonder what upstream is on the service. I’d imagine still below 10 meg.

By: Mark Northcott

Mark Northcott — Fri, 08 May 2009 22:22:16 +0000

the only specification that even matches 200mbps in wireless is the highest.. the n-series.

By: Mark Northcott

Mark Northcott — Fri, 08 May 2009 22:20:44 +0000

well that’s also one of my big stopping points, most ethernet connections are 100mbps and nothign more.. it’s an expensive add-on to get anything more than that, and the only other thing they offer is 1gbps network cards which are really designed for server-type desktops.

By: Matthew

Matthew — Thu, 07 May 2009 15:43:23 +0000

I agree with you. I think they should bill you for what you get too. If they promise 50Mbps for example but on average you experience 20Mbps then you should only pay for 20Mbps.

Another problem is hardware and if your router is up to the task of a 200Mbps throughput. Over wireless, not really a chance.

Also if 100 people are testing I wonder if they are working on realistic contention ratios. Are each of the users guaranteed 200 meg throughput or are then on a 8:1 or whatever the norm is for us regular users that potentially slows your connection down.

It’s good to see them testing though and hopefully some good will come from these tests.

By: Mark Northcott

Mark Northcott — Thu, 07 May 2009 15:29:58 +0000

we had BT 8Mbps service and it really only effectively gave us .25Mbps for months on end. I’d gladly pay for a connection that throttles the connection down to a level that you pay for rather than paying for a speed that likely can never be reached. I’d really like to know exactly how realistic the speed is when they say ‘up to 200Mbps.’