BT says it's slow

Andrewj

Hi - I'm a volunteer with a charity and went to assist an aged 'client' with her new HP laptop. She was pretty switched on. Her internet speed was very slow. The best I could get was 1.7Mbps. Checked online for the estimated speed for her phone number - BT is her ISP. BT website said the max speed was 2Mbps.
She's only 2 miles from the Epsom (01372) exchange.

Why (and how) can BT only provide 2Mbps?
How do I get BT to improve things?

Grateful for your thoughts!

JJ_Egan

Fibre available ??

Neighbours speeds may give an indication if they are all slow then its probably the 2 miles of poor cable .

Andrewj

Yes, fibre is available. But if she could get an 'average' of (say) 7Mbps she's be quite happy. Said she'd resent paying for fibre just because BT's copper wire is so terrible - over such a short distance.

She said she's ask her neighbours - but BT's on 'line-checker' says 2Mbps is the max speed.

How can a short piece of copper wire be so terrible?

mac.d

It might be worth checking on the Sam Knows broadband availability checker to see if there are any LLU services available to her, and if so, contact them with a query.

Its a while ago now but I was with BT on their up to 12MB service and got anything from 4-7MB, but I changed to Be on their LLU service because they could offer an up to 18MB connection and I got 13-15MB with Be, and a crucially for me, a much more reliable connection despite it still being the same copper wire from the exchange to my house.

Also, consider how much she pays for for her broadband, I'd image she won't use much bandwidth so could probably go for the cheaper fibre options with monthly usage limits and not pay much more. For example, Sky's 25GB fibre service is currently available for £20 per month, or BT's 30GB is £25.

littleboo

Andrewj wrote: »

Yes, fibre is available. But if she could get an 'average' of (say) 7Mbps she's be quite happy. Said she'd resent paying for fibre just because BT's copper wire is so terrible - over such a short distance.

She said she's ask her neighbours - but BT's on 'line-checker' says 2Mbps is the max speed.

How can a short piece of copper wire be so terrible?

It may not be short, cable runs can sometimes take tortuous routes
it may not be copper, it may be aluminium

onomatopoeia99

Andrewj wrote: »

Checked online for the estimated speed for her phone number - BT is her ISP. BT website said the max speed was 2Mbps.
She's only 2 miles from the Epsom (01372) exchange.

Why (and how) can BT only provide 2Mbps?
How do I get BT to improve things?

2Mbps on ADSL over 2 miles (we'll assume the line takes an absolutely straight path between the exchange and her hourse) is not massively far away from what it should be. She certainly won't get 7Mbps at that distance, from memory (as I no longer retain the relevant data) about 3-4Mbps is the best that can be expected on ADSL at that distance

It's not a short line, it's a relatively long one. Unless there is a fault, BT won't be able to improve it and even if they can, it won't be by very much, because of physics. Physics is the overriding reason why xDSL slows as line length increases. Fibre to the cabinet would likely improve things, but you should do some research on expected throughput before taking that option any further.

I'm a bit under 2 miles from my exchange and was getting 3.5Mbps on ADSL. I now get 72Mbps on FTTC as the box is at the end of my street, about 100 yards away.