How fast is 3mb?

oxymore

Hi, I currently have Virgin Media for cable broadband, weekend calls and line rental. For this I pay £22/month and usually get 9mb speeds which is more than fast enough. I don't download much and only use internet for browsing and email. Plusnet seem to do a good deal on martin's page for £12.79/month which is a lot of saving! But estimated speed only 3mb (varying from 2-5mb apparently). Does anyone know how fast this would be and would it be ok for just surfing, email etc? I had normal broadband years ago and I don't remember it being that bad but it's hard to figure it out now!

Thanks

jb66

Fine for surfing and emails, it's things like I player that will be poor on the 3meg line

adamc260

Well it will be 1/3 of the speed you currently receive and you will average downloads about 375KB/Sec so an average 4mb Song will take about 10.5 seconds to download and about 3mins 30 seconds for an 80mb Video.

If you find that ok then yes should be fine

oxymore

Thanks thats really helpful. What about Skype video calls? Would it be sufficient?

notbritishgas

oxymore wrote: »

Hi, I currently have Virgin Media for cable broadband, weekend calls and line rental. For this I pay £22/month and usually get 9mb speeds which is more than fast enough. I don't download much and only use internet for browsing and email. Plusnet seem to do a good deal on martin's page for £12.79/month which is a lot of saving! But estimated speed only 3mb (varying from 2-5mb apparently). Does anyone know how fast this would be and would it be ok for just surfing, email etc? I had normal broadband years ago and I don't remember it being that bad but it's hard to figure it out now!

Thanks

A couple of things that you should have realised about that deal:
You have to sign up to line rental saver which means you pay a years rental in advance.

That price is only valid for the first year because they give you the first 6 months broadband free. After 6 months you pay the full broadband price of £6.49 per month.

OK 3 things. To get that price you must be in a Market 2 or 3 Telephone Exchange.

oxymore

I'm aware about the line rental that's no problem so overall the price works out over the 12 montha? however have not hear of market 2 or 3 exchange? Looked at samknows and i don't think it mentioned anything about this. Thanks

notbritishgas

oxymore wrote: »

I'm aware about the line rental that's no problem so overall the price works out over the 12 montha? however have not hear of market 2 or 3 exchange? Looked at samknows and i don't think it mentioned anything about this. Thanks

Yes the price works out at that for the first year but it will be more in the second year asthe broadband will be charged for all of the 12 months.

The cheap price is only available on Market 2 and 3 exchanges, those are the ones where ther are a lot of LLU providers.
Go onto Samknows and click on Exchange search, put in your phone number and it will show your exchange, click on it and somewhere down the bottom of the next page there will be the Ofcom rating of Market 1, 2 or 3.

oxymore

Hi, it does give me the message below so I guess that is compatible? Also, it's my impression that it is only a 12 month contract so I assume after 12 months of the cheaper overall price, I should be able to move without fee?

Market 3
Four or more 'principal' operators provide broadband services at this exchange. Service in this area has been deregulated!