I’m currently using BT as my ISP but they provide such low speeds in my area. I get about 125Kbps maximum when downloading files. Some of my friends who live 1-2 miles away from my house can then get 2-3Mbps, but they are on Virgin’s fibre optic service. The internet server for my area is in the middle of the town supposedly, so that is why I get slow speeds, because I live further away from the exchange.

Can someone enlighten me?

Generally, the closer you live to the exchange, then the faster the speed, apparently…

But it’s got more to do with the Contention Ratio really. BT are greedy bastards so will put as many folk as they can onto each ADSL thingummybob. Things are worse in densely populated areas.

If you have fibre optic service in your area, then it will probbly be faster, but if you don’t, you’re basically at the mercy of BT, as they own all the hardware. S’what happens when you put a private company in charge of infrastructure that was paid for by taxpayers. Renationalise now!

Ahem.

So basically, it’s Thatcher’s fault.

BT sell spare bandwidth off your wireless as bt openzone.

Get on the phone to them,I have just been through all this with them they came out done a load of tinkering and a spot of rewiring in the box.That worked but the speed fell again so i phoned them back they came out again and swapped me over at the box round the corner beside my local shop.I have phoned them so much i am on there special case now with a really freindly chap called Tebez in India who has been really helpfull turning up my B razz i think it is called speed back up. 🙂

Take off the faceplate from the master socket, plug into the exposed socket there. If it’s faster, you have an issue with your internal wiring (which we can look at). If it’s not faster, it’s a call to BT to see what they can do.

BT are nought but shysters. Make billions in profit, yet laid off what, 10,000 people last year?

Have had years to install fibre-optic cables, yet chose not to invest in the infrastructure they knew would be needed eventually. The French did this years ago, and get mega-brawdbaynd and telly and free calls ad everything. For far less than we pay over here.

That’s what happens when you privatise stuff, and the priority is pleasing shareholders rather than customers…

It is actually Thatcher’s fault. Seriously.

For a year we had a couple of meg, max about 5. Then from the 18th august we’ve had 5 engineers, god knows how many phone calls to india where half way through the call, they forget why you called. It keeps dropping down to 128k(despite numerous resets at their end) and is very unstable. They eventually agreed to change the homehub, no benefit, after the engineer confirmed no faults on the line. Still waiting for an improvement on the current 0.7meg…
We are on the older adsl network so 8meg would be max.

P20 > Could be contention. I’d seriously consider moving to an LLU provider if I were you.

I’m currently getting 21 Mps on BT.

It’s on their new Infinity service. I assume it will slow down as they sign more people up.

They offered it as a free upgrade a few months back.

over 5 years my 6-8 Mbit connection has fallen to 2 sometimes less, as more people have joined up. Drop outs are more common. Line is good and I can see the exchange at the end of the street.

When this contract is up I’m moving to virgin.

Had a prob lem with my BT broadband a month ago, I am susposed to be able to get 7Mb download but for weeks I started to get around 6Mb first thing in the morning (0500) and at all other times during the day and night it would go down to about 2-300 Kbps!!! which was pretty useless.

Phoned BT…a complete waste of my time (lots of my time), all they did was send out a new home hub (that is still in it’s box) and lots of new micr filters. Then they kept telling my that I had to keep waiting and that the service would get better (it never did).

Get on the BT broadband forum and ask for the email of one of the mods on there (they are tech guys who work for BT), post details of your problems and details from your Home Hub, you will have to post details of any speedtests you have done using BT’s broadband speed checker.

I finally got some response from a great guy at BT who helped a LOT with my problem. He identified almost straight away that it was a problem with my local exchange (that is quite close to me). They (don’t know who!) carried out some work there, then they went back and carried out some more work at the exchange to boast it’s capacity.

The mod from BT kept me informed the whole time via constant emails and checked up on the work that was being done all the time.

Now it’s sorted, finally, all thanks to the forum mod from BT no less, a great guy who’s service was amazing. I can now get speeds above 6Mb almost all day and night 😀