PlusNet (sorry!)

I am moving from a Cable area and having to get ADSL at home for the first
time.

We use PlusNet at work for several ADSL lines and have superb speed and
quality (Business Premier I think it is).

If I go with a PlusNet Premier Home account will it be the same as the
Business accounts or do they screw the home users?

Thanks

On Sat, 24 Sep 2005 22:57:01 GMT, "K" <@.> wrote:

>If I go with a PlusNet Premier Home account will it be the same as the
>Business accounts or do they screw the home users?

Yes! See http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/postlist...&Board=plusnet
and make up your own mind; shouldn't take long <g>.

--
Cheers,

Guy

** Stress - the condition brought about by having to
** resist the temptation to beat the living daylights
** out of someone who richly deserves it.

In article <(E-Mail Removed)>,
(E-Mail Removed) says...
> On Sat, 24 Sep 2005 22:57:01 GMT, "K" <@.> wrote:
>
> >If I go with a PlusNet Premier Home account will it be the same as the
> >Business accounts or do they screw the home users?
>
> Yes! See http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/postlist...&Board=plusnet
> and make up your own mind; shouldn't take long <g>.

I'm not entirely sure the vipers nest of vicious personal attacks helps
very much really.

The answer is relatively straight forward. Since PlusNet upgraded their
userbase to the maximum line speeds available there's been a shortage of
BT central bandwidth at peak times, and traffic prioritisation has been
taking place to save them having to invest too much in more segments of
their 622 centrals.

This is more obvious on home accounts which have more throttling,
otherwise known as shaping, applied to Peer-to-Peer and USENET downloads
only, and comes into play at peak times. The net result is a slowdown of
anything up to 10% on the Home premier accounts during peak hours, for
P2P and Usenet (although Usenet from the PN server is slower than this
because it can't cope).

I also wouldn't recommend it if you download above 100GB per month -
most people don't, so it's not a great concern.

For the money it's the best value 2Mbit product available from an
IPStream provider IMO, even with the reservations I have about the
customer support.

Alex

"Alex Crosby" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
>
> I'm not entirely sure the vipers nest of vicious personal attacks helps
> very much really.
>
> The answer is relatively straight forward. Since PlusNet upgraded their
> userbase to the maximum line speeds available there's been a shortage of
> BT central bandwidth at peak times, and traffic prioritisation has been
> taking place to save them having to invest too much in more segments of
> their 622 centrals.
>
> This is more obvious on home accounts which have more throttling,
> otherwise known as shaping, applied to Peer-to-Peer and USENET downloads
> only, and comes into play at peak times. The net result is a slowdown of
> anything up to 10% on the Home premier accounts during peak hours, for
> P2P and Usenet (although Usenet from the PN server is slower than this
> because it can't cope).
>
> I also wouldn't recommend it if you download above 100GB per month -
> most people don't, so it's not a great concern.
>
> For the money it's the best value 2Mbit product available from an
> IPStream provider IMO, even with the reservations I have about the
> customer support.
>
> Alex

I heard support has got better since you left Alex.....

On 24-Sep-2005, "K" <@.> wrote:

> I am moving from a Cable area and having to get ADSL at home for the first
>
> time.
>
> We use PlusNet at work for several ADSL lines and have superb speed and
> quality (Business Premier I think it is).
>
> If I go with a PlusNet Premier Home account will it be the same as the
> Business accounts or do they screw the home users?
>
> Thanks

Take a look at PlusNet's advertising for their Home accounts and see if they
mention "Prioritising" anywhere.
Once you become a customer you will have a nasty shock if you wanted to use
P2P or Usenet because PlusNet now regard that as a "Bronze" category usage.
This means P2P & Usenet are throttled when the network is busy.

I've jsut seen a message suggesting that the spped drop is around 10%, but
in fact it's much more than that.
I tested my Usnet connection last week and kept an eye on the DU Meter
readings to see the speeds involved.
At 2.40 pm last Thurs I downloaded an 18 MB file from NewsHosting news
server at a steady 122 kbs over my 1 meg connection. This was the sort of
speed I always got before PN started "Prioritising"
At 8.45 pm the same day I downloaded a 16 MB file from the same news server
but this time the connection speed jumped around between 4 and 49 kbs.

I've been a PlusNet customer for 13 months and when I first joined they were
very good, however their service has declined seriously during 2005 and I
wouldn't recommend them as an ISP. They have been constantly fiddling with
accounts either by changing the T&Cs or attempting to introduce capping and
modifying their FUP. When I get my MAC I'm off to Zen for some peace &
quiet.

--
Not Available

>I am moving from a Cable area and having to get ADSL at home for the first
>time.
>
> We use PlusNet at work for several ADSL lines and have superb speed and
> quality (Business Premier I think it is).
>
> If I go with a PlusNet Premier Home account will it be the same as the
> Business accounts or do they screw the home users?


The only users that get screwed are those who expect to download huge
amounts of data and pay peanuts. Any normal use is fine. If you want a
referral that will save me a few pence please email me.

Peter Crosland

In article <1RkZe.115144$(E-Mail Removed)> , "K" <@.>
wrote:

> I am moving from a Cable area and having to get ADSL at home for the first
> time.
>
> We use PlusNet at work for several ADSL lines and have superb speed and
> quality (Business Premier I think it is).
>
> If I go with a PlusNet Premier Home account will it be the same as the
> Business accounts or do they screw the home users?

Be aware of their recent "Sustainable Usage Policy", it's not made at
all clear when you signup IMHO but it equates to a usage cap.

http://portal.plus.net/support/featu...ge_guide.shtml

In all fairness, for email and web browsing I suspect Plusnet are still
a good ISP for most people, but I do think they leave a lot to be
desired in the "fair play" category.

You might want to consider Metronet, Freedom2Surf, Zen, Eclipse, maybe
Pipex.

cheers,
Paul
--
(E-Mail Removed)

On 25 Sep 2005 00:35, Alex Crosby <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

> The net result is a slowdown of anything up to 10% on the Home premier
> accounts during peak hours, for P2P and Usenet (although Usenet from
> the PN server is slower than this because it can't cope).

But some people have been (calmly) explaining they have seen speed drops
of up to 80% on even remote Usenet services, not just the PN servers, so
something seems amiss. For Broadband Plus the speed reduction is upward
of 75% at all times, not just in "peak hours" which are from 0800->0100.

--

UK ADSL <http://tinyurl.com/5jpa4> - Happy to save cash with Plus.Net!!

On 25 Sep 2005 10:48, "Peter Crosland" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>The only users that get screwed are those who expect to download huge
>amounts of data and pay peanuts.

Not necessarily. I pay "peanuts" (on a 14.99 Broadband Plus account) and last
month downloaded at least 42 GB (because of video and audio streaming, rather
than Usenet or peer-to-peer, which are sluggish to the point of being nearly
unusable - though I don't use peer-to-peer anyway). Peter M.

--

UK ADSL <http://tinyurl.com/5jpa4> - Happy to save cash with Plus.Net!!

On 24 Sep 2005 22:57 GMT, "K" <@.> wrote:

>If I go with a PlusNet Premier Home account will it be the same as the
>Business accounts or do they screw the home users?

They certainly have limits on traffic, and certain types of traffic will be
"calmed" at least during peak hours. What does the business pay ? If you
want the same service, you could pay the same for a business account, but I
somehow doubt that's actually an option you'd be happy with. Depends what
you want from the internet, as well, and how much your office connection
gets used... of course you could always download complete binaries off
some machine at the office... FTP is not slow by any stretch... just the
use of Usenet and peer-to-peer (more so on the cheapo 14.99 a/c I use).

--

UK ADSL <http://tinyurl.com/5jpa4> - Happy to save cash with Plus.Net!!