Does your exchange suffer from a capacity problem?

'cos mine does )-:

I'd checked it via Sam Knows prior to ordering ADSL (the exchange
was enabled in July, an upgrade schedulled by the start of September,
I ordered mid September)

Anyway, ADSL ordered and installed. Sync at 2Mb and it's rock solid. Noise
and attenuation figures good enough to get 18Mb/sec if I wanted. (I'm
about half a mile from the exchange)

But bandwidth pathetically low. Down to under 200Kb/sec at times. Lowest
I seen was 161Kb/sec. (Yes, K bits/sec not bytes!)

Open a ticket with my ISP (Zen) and went through the mill of testing,
connecting to the bt_speedtest system and the bt_test system, had a BT
bod out to check my line, etc. I even graphed bandwidth for a couple of
days. Rubbish.

Eventually, some 2 weeks later, I get a phone call from a woman in BT who
advised me that my problems were due to a ATM line capacity problem at
the exchange. Nothing wrong with my line, nothing wrong with the card
in the DSLAM or the DSLAM itself, simply not enough bandwidth in/out of
the exchange.

Ye gods! Why didn't they (BT) check this first?!? Zen had originally asked
BT this and BT had replied that there were no contention issues at the
exchange but it's obvious that there are ): The BT woman pointed me at
the Sam Knows site too, and gave me a list of local addresses who would
also be suffering from the same problem so I could canvass them and get
them to complain to their ISPs to complain to BT to urge them to get the
exchange upgraded! (I suspect this was a bit naughty on her part, however)

So mow I'm stuck with a next-to-useless ADSL service with my local
WiFi broadband service about to have it's plug pulled.

According to Sam Knows, there are 133 exchanges with capacity problems
like mine. (Mine is:

http://www.samknows.com/broadband/ex...p?ecode=WWBFAS

FWIW)

Bloody BT. Aargh!

Gordon

On Tue, 18 Oct 2005 08:26:59 +0000 (UTC), (E-Mail Removed)
(Gordon Henderson) wrote:

>Bloody BT

use cable or LLU then, or Datastream.

What happened to the wireless ?

Phil
--
Tiscali - dialup speeds at Broadband prices, see
http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/postlist...&Board=tiscali

AOL - the unlimited ISP of choice for heavy downloaders.

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
Phil Thompson <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>On Tue, 18 Oct 2005 08:26:59 +0000 (UTC), (E-Mail Removed)
>(Gordon Henderson) wrote:
>
>>Bloody BT
>
>use cable or LLU then, or Datastream.

I live in a town on the edge of Dartmoor. Don't have cable. Don't have
LLU. Very unlikely that I ever will have.

As for Datastream .. Hmm.. Is there a list of what ISPs are using what?

>What happened to the wireless ?

Very long story, but no-one wanted to pay the £1K a month it costs to
run it.

Gordon

Your problems are due to the incompetence of your service provider's
installation and maintenance staff. One service provider is, on the
average, no better than another.

As a solitary customer there's nothing you can do about it.

If you wait long enough things might improve by themselves.

Good luck!

=====================================

On Tue, 18 Oct 2005 13:09:58 +0000 (UTC), (E-Mail Removed)
(Gordon Henderson) wrote:

>As for Datastream .. Hmm.. Is there a list of what ISPs are using what?

not really. Nildram and Demon will do you a low contention datastream
link at a suitably large price.

NTL provide Tesco and Virgin over datastream. In general you will find
they load the circuits more heavily than BT.

Tiscali are another datastream "pile it high sell it cheap" operator,
with resellers like Toucan.

A grand a month for the wireless, divide by 50 users = £20 each ? not
enough users I guess.

Phil
--
Tiscali - dialup speeds at Broadband prices, see
http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/postlist...&Board=tiscali

AOL - the unlimited ISP of choice for heavy downloaders.

In article <dj32ua$q4p$(E-Mail Removed)>,
Reg Edwards <g4fgq,regp@ZZZbtinternet,com> wrote:
>Your problems are due to the incompetence of your service provider's
>installation and maintenance staff. One service provider is, on the
>average, no better than another.

I'm not convinced that true - if by that you mean my ISP rather than
BT. My ISP, Zen, has been very helpful in this matter, it's been BT that
have been running rings round me and them. (And several other ADSL
customers in my area who are all suffering from the same problem)

I've no doubt I'd have had this problem no matter which ISP I went
with. LLU isn't an option and probably never will be, (I live in the
backwaters of beyond) there's no cable and the WiFi operator (me!) is
about to pull the plug on the netework, because I can't afford to run
it anymore.

>As a solitary customer there's nothing you can do about it.

Probably true.

>If you wait long enough things might improve by themselves.

I'm sure they will improve, but only when BT runs more fibre into
the exchange )-:

>Good luck!

I probably need it.

Gordon

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
Phil Thompson <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:
>On Tue, 18 Oct 2005 13:09:58 +0000 (UTC), (E-Mail Removed)
>(Gordon Henderson) wrote:
>
>>As for Datastream .. Hmm.. Is there a list of what ISPs are using what?
>
>not really. Nildram and Demon will do you a low contention datastream
>link at a suitably large price.
>
>NTL provide Tesco and Virgin over datastream. In general you will find
>they load the circuits more heavily than BT.
>
>Tiscali are another datastream "pile it high sell it cheap" operator,
>with resellers like Toucan.

Most names I'd rather not be associated with, alas!!! (And if the
problem is really that the bandwidth into/outof the exchange is where
the bottleneck is, would a Datastream ISP be any better?)

>A grand a month for the wireless, divide by 50 users = £20 each ? not
>enough users I guess.

The histroy of broadband in Buckfastleigh is long and tortuous! Maybe one
day I'll write a book on it...

I'm convinced that a WiFi solution can never be profitable in a small
rural community. Half the problems we faced with the commercial venture
was (a) punters refusing to pay (we had enough, half of them refused
to pay, and the other half abused the network with p2p, etc.), and (b)
BT telling us they were going to enable the exchange tomorow ...

So BT eventually got round to enabling the exchange - July, some 20 months
after the WiFi went live, but sort of forgot to upgrade the skinny pipe
into the exchange )-:

Actually, the performance I'm seeing via ADSL is worse than what I'd
get out of the WiFi system at times! We have a single 2Mb pipe into
the system - it feels like thats all BT have out of the exchange now!

Nice one BT. Kill the WiFi network and leave punters stuffed.

Gordon

On Tue, 18 Oct 2005 17:33:12 +0000 (UTC), (E-Mail Removed)
(Gordon Henderson) wrote:

>Most names I'd rather not be associated with, alas!!!

and you chose BT Broadband !!!!!!!!!! Sorry. cough.

> (And if the
>problem is really that the bandwidth into/outof the exchange is where
>the bottleneck is, would a Datastream ISP be any better?)

its unlikely to be the physical bandwidth that's the problem , just
how much of it is being used or allocated to particular services.
Fairly standard stuff especially on new exchanges when they
underestimate demand.

A Demon 2M 1:1 contention link would be giving you 2M and not be
affected by the RED status of the IPStream VPs as its a "ring fenced"
section of the bandwidth.

>I'm convinced that a WiFi solution can never be profitable in a small
>rural community.

Interesting, shame really. Faster uploads and all that.

>Actually, the performance I'm seeing via ADSL is worse than what I'd
>get out of the WiFi system at times! We have a single 2Mb pipe into
>the system - it feels like thats all BT have out of the exchange now!

if the p2p freaks migrated to ADSL they could easily take out the
capacity.

Phil
--
Tiscali - dialup speeds at Broadband prices, see
http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/postlist...&Board=tiscali

AOL - the unlimited ISP of choice for heavy downloaders.

In article <dj2bkj$p4a$(E-Mail Removed)>, Gordon Henderson says...
>
> 'cos mine does )-:
>
yep, line checked twice now by BT and the problem is in lack of backhaul
from the exchange. All these upgrades and BT don't have the fibre in
place to manage them.

Bunch of crooks, charging ISPs through the nose and not providing the
capacity to carry the traffic they are paying BT for.

FR

On Tue, 18 Oct 2005 23:25:21 +0100, Flying Rat <(E-Mail Removed)>
wrote:

>Bunch of crooks, charging ISPs through the nose and not providing the
>capacity to carry the traffic they are paying BT for.

is it operating outside their planning guidelines ie less than 20% of
rated speed ?

Metronet's checker had it as Red in August but OK now.
http://www.metronet.co.uk/adsl/exchangeChecker

Plusnet also have it as Green
<http://usertools.plus.net/exchanges/?exchange=Buckfastleigh&exact=3910&plugin=vp>

Phil
--
Tiscali - dialup speeds at Broadband prices, see
http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/postlist...&Board=tiscali

AOL - the unlimited ISP of choice for heavy downloaders.