At certain parts of the day my broadband is getting very slow. Would this
be the fault of the broadband supplier (NTL) or the local BT exchange
Thanks

Johnnie Scott wrote:
> At certain parts of the day my broadband is getting very slow. Would
> this be the fault of the broadband supplier (NTL) or the local BT
> exchange Thanks

It's nobodies fault. You're probably on a 50:1 contention. If 50 people are
using the same pipe, you might actually see speeds lower than a dial up
modem.

Let's hope that the ISP's add more bandwidth quicker than people sign up to
the service...
--
huLLy
VOIP SIP Phone Number 4823176 on Global Village
Or +44 8703 408916 to my VOIP line
email g4sdw@aol.com (Loon reports welcome)
abuse@network-i.net with the IP of 212.21.118.235 in the header

On Sun, 6 Mar 2005 19:14:27 -0000, "huLLy" <g4sdw@aol.com> wrote:

>Johnnie Scott wrote:
>> At certain parts of the day my broadband is getting very slow. Would
>> this be the fault of the broadband supplier (NTL) or the local BT
>> exchange Thanks
>
>It's nobodies fault. You're probably on a 50:1 contention. If 50 people are
>using the same pipe, you might actually see speeds lower than a dial up
>modem.

That is not a correct understanding of how ADSL contention works I'm
afraid.
--
Andy Norman trout@norman.cx
http://www.norman.cx/
Replace the fish with my first name to reply

On Sun, 06 Mar 2005 19:11:44 GMT, "Johnnie Scott"
<john374999@.nospam.ntlworld.com> wrote:

>At certain parts of the day my broadband is getting very slow. Would this
>be the fault of the broadband supplier (NTL) or the local BT exchange

There could be a range of causes, including:

- you could have a fault on your phone line
- you could be filling the upstream side of your line, thus causing
the downstream side to bog down
- you could have contention taking effect at your exchange
- you could have contention taking effect on the "fat pipe" connecting
ntl to BT's network
- you could have contention taking effect on ntl's connection to the
Internet
- somewhere between ntl and the sites you are accessing could be slow

It is not always easy to tell which of these possibilities is causing
slowness.

If the speed is unacceptable have you tried contacting ntl ?

When the connection is slow have you tried using a selection of online
speed tests ? (two you could try are http://sod.ms/fast/ and
http://www.adslguide.org.uk/tools/speedtest.asp )

Have you tried the BT speed test ? This will tell you whether the
connection slow-down is somewhere within BT's network or further
afield. Details here http://usertools.plus.net/tutorials/id/27
--
Andy Norman trout@norman.cx
http://www.norman.cx/
Replace the fish with my first name to reply

"Andrew Norman" <trout@norman.cx> wrote in message
news:e6mm21lspgpvjdi0umhia0nu3r2p0hj06k@4ax.com...
> On Sun, 6 Mar 2005 19:14:27 -0000, "huLLy" <g4sdw@aol.com> wrote:
>
>>Johnnie Scott wrote:
>>> At certain parts of the day my broadband is getting very slow. Would
>>> this be the fault of the broadband supplier (NTL) or the local BT
>>> exchange Thanks
>>
>>It's nobodies fault. You're probably on a 50:1 contention. If 50 people
>>are
>>using the same pipe, you might actually see speeds lower than a dial up
>>modem.
>
> That is not a correct understanding of how ADSL contention works I'm
> afraid.

Would you care to explain what is the correct understanding of how
contention works? :-)

On Sun, 6 Mar 2005 20:30:07 -0000, "Beck"
<my_bulkmail@btopenworld.invalid> wrote:

>
>"Andrew Norman" <trout@norman.cx> wrote in message
>news:e6mm21lspgpvjdi0umhia0nu3r2p0hj06k@4ax.com.. .
>> On Sun, 6 Mar 2005 19:14:27 -0000, "huLLy" <g4sdw@aol.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Johnnie Scott wrote:
>>>> At certain parts of the day my broadband is getting very slow. Would
>>>> this be the fault of the broadband supplier (NTL) or the local BT
>>>> exchange Thanks
>>>
>>>It's nobodies fault. You're probably on a 50:1 contention. If 50 people
>>>are
>>>using the same pipe, you might actually see speeds lower than a dial up
>>>modem.
>>
>> That is not a correct understanding of how ADSL contention works I'm
>> afraid.
>
>Would you care to explain what is the correct understanding of how
>contention works? :-)

Not really, been there, done that, all too often...

I was about to post a series of links describing how contention works.
Disturbingly though most of the links returned at the top of a Google
"ADSL contention" search fall into the same trap. They say "you share
you bandwidth with 49 other people", which just isn't true.

I guess lots of people just don't understand the concept of ratios

A more correct description can be found here:

http://www.aaisp.net.uk/aa/infopack/contention.html
--
Andy Norman trout@norman.cx
http://www.norman.cx/
Replace the fish with my first name to reply

"Andrew Norman" <trout@norman.cx> wrote in message
news:e6mm21lspgpvjdi0umhia0nu3r2p0hj06k@4ax.com...
> That is not a correct understanding of how ADSL contention works I'm
> afraid.

Well he's not on ADSL, he's on cable, which is how it works.

See?

Andrew Norman wrote:
> On Sun, 6 Mar 2005 20:30:07 -0000, "Beck"
> <my_bulkmail@btopenworld.invalid> wrote:
>
>>
>> "Andrew Norman" <trout@norman.cx> wrote in message
>> news:e6mm21lspgpvjdi0umhia0nu3r2p0hj06k@4ax.com...
>>> On Sun, 6 Mar 2005 19:14:27 -0000, "huLLy" <g4sdw@aol.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Johnnie Scott wrote:
>>>>> At certain parts of the day my broadband is getting very slow.
>>>>> Would this be the fault of the broadband supplier (NTL) or the
>>>>> local BT exchange Thanks
>>>>
>>>> It's nobodies fault. You're probably on a 50:1 contention. If 50
>>>> people are
>>>> using the same pipe, you might actually see speeds lower than a
>>>> dial up modem.
>>>
>>> That is not a correct understanding of how ADSL contention works I'm
>>> afraid.
>>
>> Would you care to explain what is the correct understanding of how
>> contention works? :-)
>
> Not really, been there, done that, all too often...
>
> I was about to post a series of links describing how contention works.
> Disturbingly though most of the links returned at the top of a Google
> "ADSL contention" search fall into the same trap. They say "you share
> you bandwidth with 49 other people", which just isn't true.
>
> I guess lots of people just don't understand the concept of ratios
>
> A more correct description can be found here:
>
> http://www.aaisp.net.uk/aa/infopack/contention.html

Funny that it does state that if the 'pipe' is full then it will cause slow
downs (due to latency/lag & dropped packets) but never mind.....

On Sun, 6 Mar 2005 21:09:04 -0000, "kraftee" <kraftee@spamoff&
die.com> wrote:

>Andrew Norman wrote:
>
>> I was about to post a series of links describing how contention works.
>> Disturbingly though most of the links returned at the top of a Google
>> "ADSL contention" search fall into the same trap. They say "you share
>> you bandwidth with 49 other people", which just isn't true.
>>
>> I guess lots of people just don't understand the concept of ratios
>>
>> A more correct description can be found here:
>>
>> http://www.aaisp.net.uk/aa/infopack/contention.html
>
>Funny that it does state that if the 'pipe' is full then it will cause slow
>downs (due to latency/lag & dropped packets) but never mind.....

I don't understand the point you are making.
--
Andy Norman trout@norman.cx
http://www.norman.cx/
Replace the fish with my first name to reply

On Sun, 06 Mar 2005 21:10:27 GMT, "Goo Goo" <me@privacy.net> wrote:

>"Andrew Norman" <trout@norman.cx> wrote in message
>news:e6mm21lspgpvjdi0umhia0nu3r2p0hj06k@4ax.com.. .
>> That is not a correct understanding of how ADSL contention works I'm
>> afraid.
>
>Well he's not on ADSL, he's on cable, which is how it works.

Er, no I don't think he is on cable, unless the contents of his post
are incorrect.

He says:

"At certain parts of the day my broadband is getting very slow. Would
this be the fault of the broadband supplier (NTL) or the local BT
exchange"

From this we know that:

a) his ISP is ntl
b) he thinks he is connected to ntl via the local BT exchange

You are probably thinking "ntl only provide broadband via cable", but
I'm afraid you are wrong. If you go to http://www.ntlfreedom.com/ you
will find that ntl do indeed provide a broadband service that uses the
BT wholesale ADSL product.

So either the original poster was wrong in his understanding that he
is connected via BT, in which case he has cable OR he was right and he
has ADSL with ntl as an ISP.

And yes, contention on cable does occur in a different way to ADSL.
--
Andy Norman trout@norman.cx
http://www.norman.cx/
Replace the fish with my first name to reply