shawnb

Thought I was getting dizzy!!!

Hi Voltageman The stumbling block could well be those horrible little words "up to" as it looks like a lot of ISP's use these to avoid any comeback! What I found when I was looking to change from Tiscali (who by the way couldn't manage a simple upgrade to their Max service in 3 and a half months even after assuring me it had been escalated and was in the hands of engineers who were doing something somewhere to ensure that I would get the service sorted etc.) was that the majority of the ISP's all said I should be able to recieve their Max service with an average connection of 6.5-7.5mb. It was only after double checking this claim that I switched to Virgin Media and found out after several on-line help sessions and phonecalls that they don't know what is wrong and insist I am stuck with 1.9mb as it exceeds the BT fault threshold. I have also discovered that my parents have the same issue with Tiscali trying to upgrade from the 512k to the 2mb package. They are on the same street as me serviced by the same exchange etc. yet Tiscali calm the exchange can't handle it or their line is faulty or a thousand other excuses! WHAT IS GOING ON WITH CUSTOMER SERVICE THESE DAYS????????

I've contacted ofcom and been advised to write a letter of complaint, which I hae done. The next step is wait and see what the ISP response is to this AND then ofcom are very interested in this as a case of misselling and misleading customers with those two little words 'up to'. Found aother case where the ASA ruled that 'up to' suggested to many customers that they could expect speeds close to the advertised/estimated. In this instance the ASA reckoned 6mb was reasonable and anything below that wasn't. Shall wait and see what response I get. The speed is no longer the issue as 1.9mb, so long as it is consistent and reliable, is OK for what I use the internet for. What I have a problem with is being misled by ISP's who offer a service that they know they can not provide. Shall keep you all up dated if you are interested.

I have an issue with my ISP not providing the speeds they indicated I would get before I signed up to them. I have contacted regarding this and they have planted the blame on BT capping the local exchange to 2mb. I spoke briefly to BT helpdesk and they deny capping exchanges and insist it is the ISP's who purchase certain packages etc who dictate the speed that is supplied. If this is the case who is telling me the truth? Or neither of them? It's frustrating as all the estimates from the ISP's on line all came back saying I should not have a problem getting upwards of 6mb as I am located 800metres from the exchange, my line attenuation is good enough to recieve the speeds, the exchange was uprgraded March 2006 to ADSL Max etc. but I have never topped 1.9mb.

My computer is a Medion laptop (about 3 years old now) running windows xp with service pack 2 and regular updates. This runs with the mobile AMD Athlon XP-M2200+ 788MHz, 448 mb of ram I tend to run it wireless using a Linksys Wireless G ADSL gateway kit (WGKPC354G-UK) but I do have a ethernet wired connection that gets used occassionally. My kids also access this router wireless via their new Acer laptop that also runs XP. Any other info you technical minded people need, just ask. ( I tend to be more suited to fixing Beetles that are not technically advanced )

Hello every one, my brother pointed me in this forum's direction after using the sped test thingy (sorry not very technically minded). Any way I recently switched ISP from Tiscali to Virgin after attempting for 3-4 months to upgrade my package from Tiscali to their Max 8mb package. To cut a long story short they never did manage to complete the upgrade in all that time. After looking around Virgin seemed to offer the package I was looking for, anytime phone calls, unlimited access and they said about 7mbps after the 10 days settling in period. Needless to say I have not reached anywhere near the speed they first suggested, never topped 1.9mbps. Anyway, I have tried to find out why they said I could get a speed that after the settling period doesn't materialize. They have tried to blame external wiring faults and told me to contact BT Wholesale, this I tried only to be told that the number Virgin supplied was incorrect and one they shouldn't have given out. I have told them that I may have had the filters set wrong in my home during this period and have subsequently replaced the extension and socket that runs my phone and router with a combined phone/adsl box. Would this make any difference? The BT speed test site says my line is has an IP set at 2000kbps, I'm assuming this is equivalent to 2mb? and shows my connection at 1835ish. Does this mean I am now stuck at this speed or will it go up? Should I do anything within my setup at home to help this go up or should it be automatic? My Linksys router status is as follows DSL Status: Up DSL Modulation Mode: GDMT DSL Path Mode: INTERLEAVED Downstream Rate: 7616 Kbps Upstream Rate: 448 Kbps Downstream Margin: 9 db Upstream Margin: 24 db Downstream Line Attenuation: 21 Upstream Line Attenuation: 13 Downstream Transmit Power: 0 Upstream Transmit Power: 0 This means little to me but can anyone shed some light on these figures for me, do they say my line quality? Why is the downstream rate over 3x my actual connection speed? Sorry for the questions BUT I'm just 100% sure of the way things should work therefore am I being fobbed of or do I have the right to winge about a slower connection speed than I was first offered? A big thank you in advance to anyone who is prepared to shed some light on this for me