What happens if BT Regrade not Increase Speed?

Frank_Rizzo · 5 Oct 2006 at 20:19

Earlier this year I applied for a regrade but the BT test showed that I would not see a change in speed (had 512k for 5 years, BT test said I could only get 512k Max)

Today I notice the BT test showing that I could get upto 7mb on my line with no definite mention that I am stuck on 512k.

So I follow the Upgrade instructions...

The first thing to notice that this 'free upgrade' is not free at all as there is a price increase :confused:

Currently I'm paying £21.99+vat for their single 500 business service.

But the upgraded single 500 business is £29.99+vat !

Now if I can get a decent speed upgrade I won't mind paying the extra £9.40 a month. But what happens if the Upgrade keeps me on 512K? Will I be able to get my old £21.99+vat rate?

daven1986 · 5 Oct 2006 at 20:41

i assume you would be able to go back, but with big companies now-a-days who knows. you could try ringing BT see what they have to say, or take the plunge!

Phemo · 5 Oct 2006 at 21:05

Well one way of finding out whether you're going to gain anything at all would be to check out the line stats your router/modem is reporting. If your SNR is around 15db on fixed rate 512k then I would guess that'd be good enough for at least 1mbit under Max. If your SNR is rather low, like already around 6db, then you're clearly going to gain very little.

Everyone's line is different, but at my parents' house, the line has a 58db attenuation. When on 512k, the SNR was around 25db. It's now at around 3mbit speeds with an SNR of 7db.

$anch3z · 5 Oct 2006 at 22:15

Goto either samknows or dslzone and find out how far you are from your local exchange, as others have stated your speed will also be dependent on how noisey your line is. If you can get 7mb you'll need to be within 1km of your local exchange and have an snr under 25db. Another thing worth mentioning is that although some may think they are close to their exchange the copper lines hardly ever travel as the crow flies and the noise level will give an indication as to the quality of that copper.

tolien · 5 Oct 2006 at 23:53

The advice that's already been given by Phemo is the best - find attenuation/SNR margin/transmit power (since at a low sync rate this might be reduced)/sync rate (there's no guarantee you're actually on 512kbps even if that's all the IP throughput you get) on your modem, or swap the modem for one that does give you those stats (if you can't extract them, you're in for a world of hell on an "up to 7Mbps" product).

Samknows' estimates are worthless - they're simply estimations of the straight line distance between the exchange and you. The connection with either the length of the pair between you and the exchange, or the ability of that pair to support a given speed, is tenuous at best.

$anch3z said:
have an snr under 25db.

Presumably you mean attenuation - a lower SNR margin is a bad thing, and an SNR margin of 25dB at 576kbps would assure a hell of a lot more than 1Mbps.

the noise level will give an indication as to the quality of that copper.

Not quite. The "noise level" (presumably you mean SNR margin here) gives an indication of the ratio of noise to received signal - a poor quality line could readily support a given SNR.

Frank_Rizzo · 6 Oct 2006 at 14:24

Sure, I can post the SNR and samknows data but as the title says....

What if the regrade does not increase speed?

This is what concerns me. I was on £21.99 + vat but in order to take advantage of the 'free upgrade' I had to agree a new contract for £29.99 + vat.

But if I am on exactly the same speed then as I am now then all I've done is stupidly increased my costs for nowt!

Frank_Rizzo · 6 Oct 2006 at 14:25

Samknows:

You are connected to the XYZ telephone exchange.

ADSL is available in your area
Your exchange is also enabled for ADSL Max services

According to BT Wholesale, your line should be able to support a 7Mbps or greater ADSL connection via ADSL Max.

Standard ADSL RAG results:
[BT ADSL Code: GEGEGEC] You can receive 2Mbps ADSL
[BT ADSL Code: GEGEGEC] You can receive 1Mbps ADSL
[BT ADSL Code: GEGEGEC] You can receive 512Kbps ADSL
[BT ADSL Code: GEGEGEC] You can receive 256Kbps ADSL

You are approximately 2.07km from the exchange (straight line distance).

There appears to a compatibility issue with your phone line. This could be caused by an existing DSL connection, ISDN, a DACS unit, TPON, a pending ADSL order or many other common issues. This will need to be resolved before ADSL can be supplied to your line.

tolien · 6 Oct 2006 at 14:37

Frank_Rizzo said:
Sure, I can post the SNR and samknows data but as the title says....

What if the regrade does not increase speed?

And as the second post says...

you could try ringing BT see what they have to say

Presumably you'd be stuck, but the only person that can tell you is BT...

Frank_Rizzo · 6 Oct 2006 at 14:44

No problem. I'll give them a call. But just wonder if I'm not the only person in the country to have 'upgraded for free' for nowt!

BTW, I'm currently using a Speedtouch 330 USB. Would this need to be upgraded?

Here's the stats:

DSLUptime= 1732
ErrorredSeconds= 1
LossOfFraming= 1
LossOfLink= 0
LossOfSignal= 1
PhysicalLinkStatus= Up
ReceiveAttenuation_dB= 45
ReceiveMargin_dB= 31
RxOutputPower_dBm= 0
SendAttenuation_dB= 24
SendMargin_dB= 29
TotalBytesReceived= 48462405
TotalBytesSent= 4944211
TotalPacketsReceived= 27468
TotalPacketsSent= 27468
TxOutputPower_dBm= 0
Uptime= 1732
ChannelMode= Fast
Layer1DownstreamMaxBitRate= 576000
Layer1UpstreamMaxBitRate= 288000
WANAccessType= DSL

tolien · 6 Oct 2006 at 14:47

Ideally yes, you should replace the USB modem for a router.

Assuming those are accurate, you'd almost certainly get more than 2Mbps. Yet another good illustration of how straight line distance is worthless though.

Frank_Rizzo · 12 Oct 2006 at 10:33

I got upgraded!

Switched on this morning and the connection icon shows speed: 6.3Mb

I have now no need to test BT's customer service in asking for a refund

Speed testing

I have run some speed tests and they are different to the stated connection speed.

Various ADSL speedtesters: 3.0Mb D/L, 0.38 U/L

BT's Speedtester service:

Test1 comprises of Best Effort Test:
IP profile for your line is - 5500 kbps
DSL connection rate: 448 kbps(UP-STREAM) 6336 kbps(DOWN-STREAM)
Actual IP throughput achieved during the test was - 3687 kbps

I'm quite content with 3Mb having been on 512k for 5 years now but should I be getting more?

Here's the stats from DRSpeedtouch:

TransportService= WANDevice.WANConnectionDevice.0.WANPPPTransport.0
DownstreamMaxBitRate= 6336000
ConnectionType= IP_Routed
ExternalDefaultGateway= xxxxx
ExternalIPAddress= xxxxx
ExternalIPMask= 255.255.255.255
NATEnabled= 0
Name= SpeedTouch USB ADSL PPP
RSIPAvailable= 0
PPPAuthenticationProtocol= PAP
PPPMRU= 1500
PPPMTU= 1500
UpstreamMaxBitRate= 448000
ConnectionStatus= Connected
LastConnectionError= ERROR NONE
Uptime= 2488
TotalPPPBytesReceived= 29042459
TotalPPPBytesSent= 2733450
TotalPPPSDUReceived= 22329
TotalPPPSDUSent= 16942

DSLUptime= 2600
ErrorredSeconds= 1
LossOfFraming= 1
LossOfLink= 0
LossOfSignal= 1
PhysicalLinkStatus= Up
ReceiveAttenuation_dB= 45
ReceiveMargin_dB= 6
RxOutputPower_dBm= 0
SendAttenuation_dB= 24
SendMargin_dB= 24
TotalBytesReceived= 32870017
TotalBytesSent= 3909916
TotalPacketsReceived= 16942
TotalPacketsSent= 16942
TxOutputPower_dBm= 0
Uptime= 2600
ChannelMode= Interleaved
Layer1DownstreamMaxBitRate= 6336000
Layer1UpstreamMaxBitRate= 448000
WANAccessType= DSL

Is it the case that this thing needs to bed down for a few days?

Is there really a need to upgrade the router?

Currently using the 330Usb but if it can connect at a max of 6.6Mb as shown in the stats then it should run at 6.6Mb?

The BT test shows the IP profile of the line as 5.5Mb. Is this what they think the max speed should be?

Many thanks for all who helped with this.

errata · 12 Oct 2006 at 12:59

Typically the line will adapt to its final reliable speed over the next 10 days or so. keep testing

$anch3z · 13 Oct 2006 at 00:29

Frank_Rizzo said:
Is there really a need to upgrade the router?

Currently using the 330Usb but if it can connect at a max of 6.6Mb as shown in the stats then it should run at 6.6Mb?

The BT test shows the IP profile of the line as 5.5Mb. Is this what they think the max speed should be?

Many thanks for all who helped with this.

Well a lot of people like the alcatel/speedtouch routers at the moment and are getting good results with them, probably due to most of the equipment in exchanges being made by the same company.

5.5mb could be due to taking into account 30% off your maximum stabe rate...or what they call your fault threshold. Anyway i'd say its looking quite good at those speeds.

ps. my bad earlier i did mean attenuation

Phemo · 13 Oct 2006 at 00:56

A 6336Kbps sync rate is indeed a 5.5Mbit IP rate. The ADSL sync rate can't be directly compared to IP rate. If you remember, when you were on 512k your downstream sync was 576Kbps and upstream sync was 288Kbps. The reason for this is to allow for overheads on the ATM network, so the IP throughput afterwards was 512/256.

Having a sync rate of 6336Kbps means you fall into the 5.5Mbit IP profile - you need a sync rate of 6240 or higher to get this. To get 6Mbit of IP throughput, you need a sync rate of 6816Kbps.

The way that ISPs market MaxDSL is a bit misleading since they market it as "up to 8Mbit" which is strictly speaking, not true. Even a full 8128Kbps sync rate will equate to 7.15Mbit of IP throughput.

If you want to find out what sync rates you need for each IP profile, Google "bras profiles" and you should see an ADSL Guide article.