Superhub : Business cable modem firmware and STM policy

[APS]

Has anyone heard if and when the Superhub provided for Business users will be getting an upgrade to match R36 domestic users are getting. This was discussed a few months ago and someone was even asked to trial a beta but I don't think an upgrade was pushed out.

Also has anyone ever seen the exact STM policy for business users in written form. I cannot find one anywhere on their site only reference to them now having one.

[Rob]

Business Superhub uses a different firmware configuration to residential services, so the R36 debate is irrelevant.

Regarding traffic management: http://www.virginmediabusiness.co.uk...ess-Broadband/

Like most broadband providers, we manage traffic on our network to keep things fast (and fair) for everyone but this only applies to our Business Broadband bundles after 6pm. So our trigger threshold is set so less than 5% of business users will typically be affected.

No traffic management applies during a normal business week (before 6pm daily). As its purpose is to specifically support business users, our bundles offer a higher trigger threshold than some consumer broadband products even when traffic management does apply.

---------- Post added at 16:13 ---------- Previous post was at 16:07 ----------

If you take up this package http://store.virginmedia.com/broadba...s/the_biz.html it would appear you get the standard, residential STM stuff applying.

[APS]

Originally Posted by Rob

Business Superhub uses a different firmware configuration to residential services, so the R36 debate is irrelevant.

Yes it does have different firmware but has the same core code and shares some of the same bugs. Previously there was some discussion they would wait until the R36 release was out the way before a formal business release in case anything else relevant was found.

Regarding traffic management: http://www.virginmediabusiness.co.uk...ess-Broadband/

Unless I missed a link of that page that only gives enough detail to show it is not the same as domestic customers, i.e.

"Like most broadband providers, we manage traffic on our network to keep things fast (and fair) for everyone but this only applies to our Business Broadband bundles after 6pm. So our trigger threshold is set so less than 5% of business users will typically be affected.No traffic management applies during a normal business week (before 6pm daily). As its purpose is to specifically support business users, our bundles offer a higher trigger threshold than some consumer broadband products even when traffic management does apply."

If you take up this package http://store.virginmedia.com/broadba...s/the_biz.html it would appear you get the standard, residential STM stuff applying.

That is an interesting new product that seems to be selling the domestic service to very small businesses/home offices. I am guessing it is a normal Superhub running the domestic firmware and the service is provided with no SLA etc, etc. It is not the same as the service offered by Virginmedia Business we have.

[qasdfdsaq]

The Biz is basically the domestic service with a 24/7 helpline.

[sollp]

Originally Posted by qasdfdsaq

The Biz is basically the domestic service with a 24/7 helpline.

Nope

[qasdfdsaq]

What other differences are there?

[APS]

FYI I got details of the STM for Business (not Biz) cable modems. The monitoring period is only from 18:00 to 23:00. On the top (50/5 Mbps) tier you are allowed 12.5/6.5 GB (Down/Up) before it cuts in. When it does speeds are cut by 75% for 5 hours.

[AbyssUnderground]

It's disgusting that the business one has STM at all. What about those people who do out of hours off-site backups etc?

[Kymmy]

The state of the business packages is why I recently left and came back to residential..

All the plus points which set it above residential slowly vanished apart from the fixed IPs

[qasdfdsaq]

Even the fixed IPs vanished from several tariffs for a period of time

[APS]

In respect of offsite backups, this is the reason I asked for the STM details from VM. Clearly the STM time window is set to avoid business users clogging up the domestic service in the evening. However, it seems we can start the backup after 11 pm without fear of being managed.

[ccarmock]

There has been an update to the business superhub firmware. I was on the trial for that. However that trial was complete - it should now be on all business superhubs and is V5.5.2R04T15-BU.

It was specifically to fix L2TP tunnel drops and fragmentation problems that cause emails to MS Exchange server to suffer long delays. I had also hoped it would fix the occasional hang of the GUI on login, but it didn't. The first two problems were fixed.

As has been said the core of the business softare is the same as residential, it just has more of the original Netgear features enabled.

Having spoken to Business sales, they still have new sale of the 50/5 and 30/3 business service suspended due to the original firmware issues. As soon a they are happy there are no further problems it will resume, with a speculated 100/10 being added.

[APS]

Yes that is the firmware we have, but we still have issues with the GUI becoming inaccessible occasionally and some of the promised features for the GUI did not materialist yet. Generally apart from those niggles the connection is quite stable and fast though.

[ccarmock]

Yup I still get the GUI freeze issue. I find if you leave it it will time out after say 5 mins and you can then login, but it's very annoying for sure.

I am hoping there is a revised business superhub firmware to bring some of the fixes seen on the residential version to the business version.

regards
Clive

[General Maximus]

Originally Posted by AbyssUnderground

It's disgusting that the business one has STM at all. What about those people who do out of hours off-site backups etc?

sitting there thinking "excellent, backup is 95% complete, I can go home in 10 mins" then stm kicks in and time remaining shoots up to 3 hours