Average UK Download Speeds = 2MBps February 22, 2007

What part of 'up to' do these people not understand?
Blame bad wiring, not DSL companies - if the line has too much noise, there is NOTHING they can do about it except ask the line owner (BT telephony in most cases) to fix it - which they won't if the phone is working.

I am on Virgin Media (Previously NTLWorld) 10Mbit line and I get the full speed :)

I'm not a marketing bot (or a number) but:
I am on Virgin Media (Previously Telewest BlueYonder) 4Mbit line and I get the full speed :)

Getting the message?
;-/

Small 'b', please in Mbps! If we were all getting 2MBps we'd be very happy.

I actually work as a tech for Virgin Media. We get a lot of calls claiming that people don't get the full whatevertheypayfor-Mbps. 98% are all proven wrong within 5 minutes. We simply direct them to a file within our network, ask them to download it, and tell us the readout from the downloader from internet explorer.

To claim average UK download speeds at 2Mbps is very believable. The majority of our customers have our 2Mbps connection. And don't forget that there are still dial-up users out there. Seriously. Lots. I'm glad I'm not one of them still.

Be avergaged 7,576 Kbps. Only one customer actually receives 21Mbit

@ Pete: wrong, if you were on the official Be forums, you'd see that a fair amount of people (given the UK's shocking POTS network, thanks BT) can get 24Mbps. Granted, they will be living close to the exchange, but it is possible. The recent BBC Tech article which mentioned the fastest user having 21Mbps was factually inaccurate.

I'm on Be in Brum, I get 10mbps. It's my crap phone line letting me down, as my uni coursemate who lives about half a mile up the road (and half a mile closer to the exchange) can get 17mbps easy.

The biggest mistake Ofcom made with BT is spinning off Openreach as a separate entity - they're without culpability, if you have problems with your line you HAVE to speak to your ISP, who'll then speak to Openreach - and Openreach just tell your ISP to bugger off. If you try to speak to Openreach they just flatly refuse, as they're a wholesaler and only deal with industry.

BT Retail don't give a toss either, because that's purely the voice service side of things - if you even mention data or Internet access to them they just switch off and stop caring.

It's taken me four days to get Openreach to change the tie pairs in the exchange to try and solve a line noise problem I've had - and it has made a bit of a difference, but nothing to write home about (about half a meg faster sync, and a little more stable connection). The line noise problems persist, and trying to get BT to do anything approaching real work to fix / change your line is like blood from a stone.

I will forever hate Thatcher for privatising BT.

I'm with virgin Media, i'm meant to get 10MbPs but instead i get 1mbps if i'm very lucky...

I work for Virgin Media and am a BT broadband customer at home (only because I live in a non-cabled area), and trust me, you are much better off being with a cable provider for your internet than you are with BT...I live around 400 yards from a BT phone exchange with a 4MB connection and I'm lucky to get 1/2 MB (by the way, to the guy who said small b's only...mbps is megaBITS per second, and mBps is megaBYTES per second...do you see the difference there?)

Just came across these posts, I am curently having a lot of hassle with pipex/homecall. One company for all braodband & phone. They are cr***, My modem reports 8 Mbps but speed tests show I'm lucky o key as much as 300Kbps , fasle advertising! They say it is a server problem and will be resolved! NOT!

just signed up to virgin media what a load of crxp, we are supposed to be on broadband up to 8 meg. we live 150 meters away from the exchange our modem says 7.6 mbps when i do a speed test it comes up 107kbps 300kbps.
try to speak to someone from virgin at 50p per minute and get nowhere what a con.

Virgin = a cable teleco - go with them if ur in a cable area duh...

Go with a SPECIFIC BT teleco if ur not ina cable area- as this is where they gotta make their money from.

YES your modem might sync at 8mbps Mike, but it depends where you do your speed test. do this one..

http://217.35.209.142/

this cuts out your ISP

if this is slow its a phoneline problem, if its fine CHANGE ISP

BT got voted best in UK for the last 12 months, unfortunately in this industry you definately get what you pay for.

I have just about had it with Virgin media, they will try to "show" you how fast your connection really is by asking you to download 3 files from their network and give them the average speed, this allows for a low QOS (quality of service, the actual consistency of speed) so what looks like a good connection is actually a very bad one.the averaging takes away the constant drops in speed of each of the 3 files.you may be getting a good average, but when it comes down to per second, as in Mbps (thats what you pay for, you don't pay for an average of Mbps over a year, you pay per second), its rubbish. they dont like you using so called speed tests, as they dont allow enough time to give a good "average", and someone who has studied statistics knows, average is a good way of hiding the facts. and worst of all, virgin media does not have a complaints procedure, ok you can ring India at 25p per min if you want and shout at them, but you will get nowhere. basically what they want is that all the complaining customers to leave, you are going to be a complaining customer if you know anything about the internet and pc's. so in the end they are left with customers who know nothing about the problem , and will just pay whatever for their slow connection, and who will be happy with a rubbish answer to a complex problem.....

Virgin media ADSL is a joke! Poor response times, they love capping/limiting your downloads the people that work for their support lines are uncaring morons. Tech support are seriously misinformed and blinded by their corporations lies. I'm getting 200ms latency and 50kBs downloads when i use to get full speed when they were virgin.net (7-8mbs).

To the poster above who 'works' for virginmedia (Adam) - Why are you not with virginmedia ADSL? and with BT broadband instead? is it because Virginmedia ADSL stinks (makes me wonder!).