1.6Gbps BB - Is it overkill?

hans gruber

hans gruber

hans gruber

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After a long time waiting FTTP is coming my way. I've had a look around and see that EE offer 1.6Gbps. I previously had Virgin 350Mbs a few years back and doubt I took full advantage, apart from a couple of console game downloads.

Under what circumstance would a 1.6Gbps connection (more likely 1.3Gbps) be useful? Even the PS5 hard wired to the router would presumably max out at 1Gbps, and also be limited by server speed when downloading games. I'm guessing wi-fi devices wouldn't even touch the sides.

And if a 1.6Gbps is way over the top, what would be reasonable speed?
 
Personally, get whatever download speed which gives you the upload speed you require.

Ie, on Openreach FTTP 500 Mbps will get you 70 Mbps upload speed. If that's enough, unless you are a chronic downloader, day to day there will be next to no difference between 500 Mbps and 1.6 Gbps.
 
Depends on the number of people you have in the house and what they get up to.

Personally, I intend to decrease the speed on my connection to 100mbps next time I need to renew it. I just don't do anything that requires more, and I am one of the few people who thinks that BB is over-priced!
 
Context is everything, I can saturate my 1.2/1 connection 24/7 if I really want to, but you reach a point where diminishing returns kick in quite hard, plus the potential cost to store whatever you are downloading and power/cool that storage start to ramp up. Realistically most people - eg the majority of users of broadband in the UK - wouldn't notice the difference between 500mbit and 1Gbit unless they're downloading large files regularly, in which case they're not the majority. For example today, I woke up to find my set-up had grabbed 8GB over night, I don't care how quickly that was grabbed, just that I didn't wake up to a massive download queue that then impacts my day and the usability of my connection, i'd happily pay for 500/500 given the option, but the lowest package my provider now offers is 1.2/1.
 
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Thanks everyone. That's a good point re: upload speed. The upload for the 1.6Gbps is 115Mbps and the 900 is 110.

Compared to when I had the Virgin connection my kids are now older and use consoles more. My wife works from home with lots of teams calls. We stream more 4k.

We are not doing too badly with a 4g+ connection that at last speed test was 24.7 down and 5.8 up. This connection is costing me £6pm on a three business unlimited data sim. I do struggle streaming some 4K content though and I use remote desktop a lot, which doesn't always work that well. And of course console game downloads take forever.

I can put whatever I go for through as a business expense (my own business so I still pay just minus the tax), but don't want to go crazy unless there will be some benefit.

I think the 900 looks the best value but need to see what smart wifi plus and wifi enhancer are? However if I go 900 I can choose any provider as it appears only EE offer 1.6. In that case would Zen or another provider be better and and provide better equipment?

One thing I need is a wifi extender I can plug my PC into. With sky I had a booster and linked my PC over Ethernet to that (even though Sky said it shouldn't work). I currently have my own TP link 4G+ router and an extender.

Also does anyone know if EE give discount for having mobile with them? I think I read 20% somewhere.
 
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I've been able to saturate my 500Mbps connection with things like Steam, but I'm sceptical that I'd see much real world value from doubling or tripling it.

If a game takes 40 minutes to download, sure it would be nice if it took 15 minutes, but it's not as if it's something happening daily or really holds me back from doing something I want to.

Going from ~70 to 500 was a huge change, firstly because it was far more consistent and secondly because it meant that we no longer had competition for bandwidth - so someone could download a file without it impacting my video call for work.
 
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hans gruber said:
use consoles more. My wife works from home with lots of teams calls. We stream more 4k.
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None of that requires >1 Gbps. I would just go with 500/70, I feel like that's a great middle ground for most households. You get decent upload for online backups etc, the download is fast enough for the larger game downloads etc.
 
hans gruber said:
Thanks everyone. That's a good point re: upload speed. The upload for the 1.6Gbps is 115Mbps and the 900 is 110.

Compared to when I had the Virgin connection my kids are now older and use consoles more. My wife works from home with lots of teams calls. We stream more 4k.

We are not doing too badly with a 4g+ connection that at last speed test was 24.7 down and 5.8 up. This connection is costing me £6pm on a three business unlimited data sim. I do struggle streaming some 4K content though and I use remote desktop a lot, which doesn't always work that well. And of course console game downloads take forever.

I can put whatever I go for through as a business expense (my own business so I still pay just minus the tax), but don't want to go crazy unless there will be some benefit.

I think the 900 looks the best value but need to see what smart wifi plus and wifi enhancer are? However if I go 900 I can choose any provider as it appears only EE offer 1.6. In that case would Zen or another provider be better and and provide better equipment?

One thing I need is a wifi extender I can plug my PC into. With sky I had a booster and linked my PC over Ethernet to that (even though Sky said it shouldn't work). I currently have my own TP link 4G+ router and an extender.

Also does anyone know if EE give discount for having mobile with them? I think I read 20% somewhere.
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I wouldn't pay extra for 1.66 Down with only 115Mbps up. Especially considering you wont get 1.66 to a single client without investing into 10Gbit ethernet or some pretty juicy wireless.

I get a 1Gbit line but its mostly becuase of the 1Gbit up also. I'd happily live with 500/500 but the packages available to me are basic 250 or 500 Down with low upload or full on 1Gbit Up and Down.
 
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hans gruber said:
Under what circumstance would a 1.6Gbps connection (more likely 1.3Gbps) be useful? Even the PS5 hard wired to the router would presumably max out at 1Gbps, and also be limited by server speed when downloading games. I'm guessing wi-fi devices wouldn't even touch the sides.
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The benefit is that whilst your PS5 is downloading at gigabit speeds, you still have 600mbps of bandwidth available to other devices....

People are too obsessed with trying to match their internet connection speed to their device's network speed, which all that does is create latency and "bufferbloat" for other devices on your network.
 
Thanks again. It appears 900 or 500 is the way to go.

Can anyone recommend an ISP? I've looked at BT, Zen, EE, AAISP, Sky, Plusnet etc. I have a Vodafone mobile and know they do discount on BB, but for some reason FTTP options are not showing up with Vodafone. My wife has mobile with EE and reading some more I think 10% discount can be had, but will have to confirm.

I'm not really bothered about getting my own router, but would like a decent one that can be managed. EE say you can set bed times for certain devices with theirs, which would be useful to me. I also want an extender I can plug my PC into. A guest network option would be useful.
 
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Armageus said:
The benefit is that whilst your PS5 is downloading at gigabit speeds, you still have 600mbps of bandwidth available to other devices....

People are too obsessed with trying to match their internet connection speed to their device's network speed, which all that does is create latency and "bufferbloat" for other devices on your network.
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Yes.

I remember when I was in university halls, they had set all of the switches to 10Mbps. So, though the connection itself was probably screaming fast (I got solid 10 down 10 up at all times of day), it meant that no-one could saturate the network.
 
Armageus said:
The benefit is that whilst your PS5 is downloading at gigabit speeds, you still have 600mbps of bandwidth available to other devices....

People are too obsessed with trying to match their internet connection speed to their device's network speed, which all that does is create latency and "bufferbloat" for other devices on your network.
Click to expand...

Even if hard wired would a PS5 download at max ethernet speed? When I had an xbox hard wired to virgin it was very fast, but I don't think it ever saturated the claimed virgin speed. I guessed the limiting factor was how fast the download was being served. Saying that I guess things will have improved as this was several years back.
 
I've been on 1gb symmetrical for more than a year now and I still "struggle" to saturate it. Every time I download something either the file is too small to properly see max speeds or the server couldn't keep up. Upload has been more useful to me as I have been making extra backup copies of my files on the cloud.

hans gruber said:
Even if hard wired would a PS5 download at max ethernet speed? When I had an xbox hard wired to virgin it was very fast, but I don't think it ever saturated the claimed virgin speed. I guessed the limiting factor was how fast the download was being served. Saying that I guess things will have improved as this was several years back.
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I have yet to see my PS5 to take advantage of the whole 1gb, even though it's on ethernet. Depending on what you're downloading Sony's servers can't keep up.
 
The point of fast broadband is burst capacity, median usage of a home internet connection is probably around 2Mbps but nobody would argue that's sufficient.

1Gbps broadband lets you download 100GB in 15 minutes, 1.6Gbps would do it in under 10. If it's your job then those savings could well be worth the relatively small uplift in price.
 
TheVoice said:
Mine does. I get 80-100MB/sec from Steam, slightly less on Epic and downloading PC Game Pass games fluctuates wildly from 40-80MB/sec, MS' servers are definitely the least consistent of the lot.
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What processor do you have? At higher download speeds your processors ability to keep up with decompression (where compression is used on the delivery) can be a limiting factor at these speeds.
 
SonicSW20 said:
What processor do you have? At higher download speeds your processors ability to keep up with decompression (where compression is used on the delivery) can be a limiting factor at these speeds.
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i7 8700K. On Steam it does get a bit of a workout while decrypting/decompressing but with Game Pass games it's clearly their servers. Just tried downloading a 3.3GB game, it didn't go higher than 70MB/sec and that was only briefly.
 
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