Will the speed increase make any difference

[jagsman]

When Virgin double the speed of their broadband, will it make any difference to what speed you get during times of high usage?

For example, I have a 10m connection, but I only get 2-3m whenever the network is "busy". Will I still get the 2-3m when my connection is upped to 20m, or will my "busy" speed go up aswell?

If the network is unable to give me 10m at all times, then how is it going to cope with everyone getting their speed doubled?

[Sephiroth]

It depends on the STM policy they apply to the upgraded tier.

But if, for example, you bought a 50 meg service and your 2.5 meg now is down to a 75% P2P throttle, then your speed will rise to 25% of 50 meg.

In those circumstances if your 2.5 meg was due to STM, then the 50 meg tier isn't managed like that and you won't be throttled. But you will be at the mercy of congestion, if any.

If the 2.5 meg you see now is due to congeston, then you'll in any case move to a different network which may be less or more congested. I don't know but you can search this forum for your area and see if it comes up with lots of complaints.

As I said, I don't know the STM policy for the upgraded lower tier.

[kwikbreaks]

Faster download speed together with a hopefully doubled pipe size (ie 8 channels daown and two up) will make a massive difference so long as folks don't actually download/upload more.

If the doubled upstream just leads to more unrestricted torrent seeding through VPNs then you'll be no better off at all.

The only thing that really benefits from high speeds is bulk downloading and if people take advantage of the higher speeds to download more then VM end up chasing their tail again. What will really make a difference is the planned doubling of local pipe bandwidth but that's too techy to put across so they coupled it with an eyecatching speed doubling.

[Chrysalis]

the real difference will be on any capacity upgrades taking place (5-8 channels) and probably especially on any US channel increases which I havent seen any off yet. If extra US channels are on 2.7 3.5 and 4.5 ranges then those are existing channels.

Its logical to assume people will download more with higher speeds, it has happened consistently with broadband. Also STM limits are been doubled as well.

[boroboi]

the real difference will be on any capacity upgrades taking place (5-8 channels) and probably especially on any US channel increases which I havent seen any off yet. If extra US channels are on 2.7 3.5 and 4.5 ranges then those are existing channels.

Its logical to assume people will download more with higher speeds, it has happened consistently with broadband. Also STM limits are been doubled as well.

Indeed, people moving up from the lower bandwidth tiers will no doubt download more because they can or previously weren't able, like i did when i went from 10 to 50.

People who were used to higher speed and have a set pattern of things they download (30/50/100) im sure won't really download more than they already do.

[Hugh]

Quite a few of us don't download/upload (or if we do, it is stuff like pictures/iTunes) and use our bandwidth for browsing, email, and stuff like BBC iPlayer - so not sure if it logical to assume the majority are freetards, IMHO.

[broadbandking]

Quite a few of us don't download/upload (or if we do, it is stuff like pictures/iTunes) and use our bandwidth for browsing, email, and stuff like BBC iPlayer - so not sure if it logical to assume the majority are freetards, IMHO.

Like most familys then

[General Maximus]

i think it will make a lot of difference as long as the caoacity is there. As an example, when I was on 50mbit it wasnt worth trying to download any torrents or newsgroups in the evening or any time over the weekend because I could never got over 700k. Buuuuut, even since I upgraded to 100mbit I have no probs getting at least 4mb/sec down on torrents and yesterday afternoon/evening I was uploading at my full 1mb/sec, I was well impressed. P2P traffic is supposed to be flagged as low priority so there must be lots of free juice available for me to get the speed I do now. I am praying it will stay the same if they are adding even more capacity for the speed upgrades.

[Chrysalis]

Quite a few of us don't download/upload (or if we do, it is stuff like pictures/iTunes) and use our bandwidth for browsing, email, and stuff like BBC iPlayer - so not sure if it logical to assume the majority are freetards, IMHO.

maybe, but overall download/upload usage will increase across the shared platform. It doesnt need to be a majority.

What is a freetard? everyone pays for their VM connections, I dont know of anyone getting VM broadband for free.

---------- Post added at 09:32 ---------- Previous post was at 09:31 ----------

i think it will make a lot of difference as long as the caoacity is there. As an example, when I was on 50mbit it wasnt worth trying to download any torrents or newsgroups in the evening or any time over the weekend because I could never got over 700k. Buuuuut, even since I upgraded to 100mbit I have no probs getting at least 4mb/sec down on torrents and yesterday afternoon/evening I was uploading at my full 1mb/sec, I was well impressed. P2P traffic is supposed to be flagged as low priority so there must be lots of free juice available for me to get the speed I do now. I am praying it will stay the same if they are adding even more capacity for the speed upgrades.

I tried p2p 2 sundays ago and got about 0.6mbit/sec down, I guess a lot going on my area in utilisation and p2p usage.

[kwikbreaks]

maybe, but overall download/upload usage will increase across the shared platform. It doesnt need to be a majority.It certainly doesn't - a single 100Mbps unlimited connection can screw an entire area if abused.