Why is my internet speed drastically reduced?

Leodogger

I am with Virgin and am supposed to be getting 30mb download speeds and I have done a speed check and according to Uswitch Broadband test this is correct, so why is my internet running at about 2mb download speed ? For a number of days during the last week I am having real problems accessing web sites, then other days it is working perfectly fine.

Am I getting my speed or not ? Someone told me it could be to do with too many people trying to use the internet in my area, but surely if my speed test says it is performing at 30mb download, I should be having no problems surfing the net ?

Anyone else having this problem ?

bebewoo

Yes I am having the same problem. West London.
The speeds are all over the place, sometimes great, sometimes as low as 0.2Mb. I'm gonna quit Virgin once this year is up, it's so unreliable.

Blackpool_Saver

is that wireless or ethernet?

viv0147

This happened to me I rang Virgin and I was told I was on the naughty step for downloading to much so for 24 hours my speed was reduced to a crawl lol

Leodogger

Blackpool_Saver wrote: »

is that wireless or ethernet?

It is wireless and I agree that Virgin is crap. I feel like cancelling the whole package. I have complained before and they did nothing and even had the nerve to send me a customer satisfaction survey so I answered it with nil points on every question ! I recently said I would switch my Broadband to BT and what would they charge me for just the TV as my phone is on a BT 12 month contract. They said that the discount I was getting on both services would cease and the discount I was getting on my broadband would be added to the rental on my TV, so I would be paying £21.50 for regurgitated crap basically, as everything is a repeat of a repeat of a repeat ! Absolutely useless. What rubbish the TV is these days on subscription services. I am thinking of just going to Freeview, at least you are not paying for repeats !

visidigi

Been downloading or streaming lots?

Buzby

Afraid Virgin is not responsible for your wireless issues. WiFi as the sole means of connection is a false economy, as competing wifi routers on the same channel will reduce the data thruput. As for the TV being carp, ditch it.

By all means switch to BT's ADSL kludge, it costs more and you get less speed and higher contention rates. You'll just be shooting yourself in the foot!

Leodogger

visidigi wrote: »

Been downloading or streaming lots?

I only use my internet for shopping, banking, message forums, and surfing for consumer info. I may watch one TV programme of 1 hr once a week and that is it, apart from emailing. If I used it for downloading games or music I could understand it, but I do not. As for Wifi being a waste of time, how come I can go months without a problem and then at this time of year mainly I cannot access web sites in under 2 or 3 minutes waiting time while it hangs !

As for switching to another provider, as I said I believe all subscription services are a bit of a waste of money, so I will probably go to Freeview. As for Broadband, well I may as well have the cheapest if I am going to get a crap service at times like Christmas, and it is a patchy service at best.

Leodogger

It is now taking me 10 minutes to download a single web page !!

visidigi

have you CALLED them? What have they said? Have you rebooted your equipment etc etc

yangptangkipperbang

JWhite wrote: »

I only use my internet for shopping, banking, message forums, and surfing for consumer info. I may watch one TV programme of 1 hr once a week and that is it, apart from emailing.

JWhite wrote: »

It is now taking me 10 minutes to download a single web page !!

Unfortunately you are being "punished" for the sins of others !

You may not be downloading much but plenty of others are. The telephone/internet infrastructure is only capable of handling a certain amount of traffic. Once that limit is reached it slows to a crawl - and everyone suffers. Exactly like a motorway in the rush hour.
The ISPs are fully aware of this but the solution is generally out of their hands. This is why you don't tend to get much help from their laughingly called "help lines". If you move to another ISP there is probably not going to be much improvement - unless they are using a different infrastructure.
My 16mbs service from O2 was superb for about 3 years then it collapsed to being almost unusable at evenings/weeekends. I have now shifted to BT Infinity, which is giving me almost 75mbs - this is great until everyone else moves to this and clogs up the nice new lengths of fibre and I am back where I was !!