Virgin Media

Riiya

Riiya

Riiya

Permabanned
Joined
8 Jul 2006
Posts
751
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Hey, So I'm fed up with being throttled and was wondering if there is any other ISP worth trying in the UK, midlands area.


They throttle 75% of your connection between 4 and 9pm. I was just trying to join a TF2 game after a friend sent me a message on MSN saying he wanted me to. I say, ok I haven't got it installed because I did a reformat the other day but I'm on L Virgin media (1.2Mbps download) so I can probably get it downloaded in 1.5 Hrs so I will join you then.

45 mins later my Speed drops from 1.2 to exactly 299 Kbps in Steam.... great ... 75% throttled. So now I can't realistically join my friend for another few hours and this inconvenience is completely unnaceptable considering their higher services also throttle after 3gbs downloaded during 4-9pm.

Well, anyone know any other ISPs? Hopefully there are some that don't throttle, but I'm not holding my breath.

Regards.
 
is thsi virgin cable?

if so you could upgrade to a larger package,


If not you need to see what your bt line can give you. check the BT website for speed estimates.

As far as I know o2 and sky do not throttle.
 
They throttle it only if you hit the download limits with those tims.

On a 10mb line between 9-3pm you get 3Gb and 4-9pm is 1.5Gb.

If you're hitting those limits playing games then you're doing something very wrong,...
 
You dont know what you've got until it's gone.

I left virgin and my old 20mb connection when i moved house last summer into a non cable area, my BT line only does 6mb and it's pathetic.

I'd take 20mb and a throttle to 5mb between 5-9 anyday as for gaming it was immense! :D
 
Gah you're right there is no other good ISP that doesn't throttle :/

Oh and before telling me I'm doing something wrong hitting download caps, read the thread.

Regards.
 
If you download many GB and get slowed down, it is not the end of the world. It is only for 5 hours. Unless you download lots every day it will realy not make a difference. And if you do download lots every single day, then you deserve to be throttled.

Also its a little silly to complain when the throttling is based on your service. If you upgrade your service the extra breating room will mean you will not hit the cap as often, or at all. If you get 50Mb then you wont get any sort of cap.
 
if your on the 10Mb package then thats meant for basic browsing/downloads, 20Mb is more for online gaming usage, 50Mb is more for watching HD streaming/heavy downloading.
 
Gypo said:
You dont know what you've got until it's gone.

I left virgin and my old 20mb connection when i moved house last summer into a non cable area, my BT line only does 6mb and it's pathetic.

I'd take 20mb and a throttle to 5mb between 5-9 anyday as for gaming it was immense! :D
Click to expand...

Precisely. At my old place I was on ADSL and was only getting 5Mb due to long distance from the exchange. At my new place I have cable, and 10Mb *is* 10Mb. And the higher speeds e.g. 20Mb are there if I need them - which I don't currently
 
I went from a 20Mb cable connection which was oversubscribed to a 8Mb BE value ADSL connection - the ADSL connection is much quicker and no STM.

Even if they finally sort out the aging Preston cable network, I still wouldn't go back.
 
One thing about Virgin Media is 10mb is 10mb, 20mb is 20mb and 50mb is...a bit buggy.

Seriously though the 10mb is really an entry level package and the caps are quite harsh. Use your negotiating skills (see my thread in GD about getting a good deal from VM) to get upgraded to 20mb.

There's still caps but they are reasonable and big downloads should be done overnight anyway!
 
The limits are pretty clear and are shown here: http://www.virginmedia.com/help/traffic-management.php

So it is easy to stay within them and there are no download limits between 15:00 and 16:00 as well as 21:00 to 10:00. It's not ideal, but it's better than most. At least with Virgin you almost always get the speeds advertised, no problems with distance from exchange etc.

The main problem with changing ISPs from Virgin is it's likely that you have a Virgin telephone line with your package and you'll need a BT line for pretty much anything else which is the problem we had, especially with the ridiculous fee BT charge for reconnection unless you tie yourself in to a 12 or 18 month contract. Although if you have a BT line and are near the exchange, it might pay to change to one of the other ISPs. If you have a Virgin line, do as previously suggested, give them a call, threaten to cancel and hold your ground, you should get a pretty cheap upgrade to 20mb.
 
Speed said:
The main problem with changing ISPs from Virgin is it's likely that you have a Virgin telephone line with your package and you'll need a BT line for pretty much anything else which is the problem we had, especially with the ridiculous fee BT charge for reconnection unless you tie yourself in to a 12 or 18 month contract.
Click to expand...

Yes - although when Sky talked to me after I'd moved house and dropped them and went with Virgin cable at the new place, I told them that the £140 or so BT wanted to connect a line was the main reason. They said I needn't have worried about that, it was covered by them as part of the moving package.
 
Do virgin charge you another re-conection fee when you move house?

Moving this Saturday, need to phone them tomorrow.
 
Since I moved form AOL to Virgin my pings have halved in game. As long as I don't hit the limit to get throttled the connection is perfect. Service has been great in my opinion.
 
Speed said:
. If you have a Virgin line, do as previously suggested, give them a call, threaten to cancel and hold your ground, you should get a pretty cheap upgrade to 20mb.
Click to expand...

You don't need to threaten them with anything. Just call them up (go through to retentions) and then say: "What's the best price you can give me for x) and when they come back with a price tell them they can do better than that!

Threatening starts you off on the wrong foot IMHO.

Anyway apart from the odd time my son has tripped the restirctions I've never had a problem with VM and as others have said you get the speeds advertised and great pings too!
 
Camalot said:
Do virgin charge you another re-conection fee when you move house?

Moving this Saturday, need to phone them tomorrow.
Click to expand...

I always thought you notify them about 30 days before you're due to move, that way you can state when you want your current connection to stop and when you want your new one to start.

I moved house back in Jan but I did all my stuff online. I said I wanted my old connection to cease on 28th Jan and the new one to be installed by Sat 31st Jan. There was a slight problem with the times so it got moved back to Tues.

So yeah if you can do it online, go for it. Saved me a lot of hassle :D
 
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