[ Date Index ] [ Thread Index ] [ <= Previous by date / thread ] [ Next by date / thread => ]
On Sun, 10 Apr 2011, Kai Hendry wrote:
On 10 April 2011 12:35, Gordon Henderson <gordon+dcglug@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:You've got over 5Mb/sec there. That's more than OK for most stuff. You could double your upload if you went to a business package, but might not be worth the cost...How can one double the upload? Annex M you mean? "Business" packages AFAIK offer nothing over a regular line, except compensation and supposedly higher priority service (BS imo) when things go wrong.
One of these days I'll put this in a blog posting...I'm refering to the Internet provision and not the copper line provision, so when I say "business package", I mean a business grade Internet connection from the ISP (via BT Wholesale) - not the copper provider. And yes, there are differences - they don't just take more money for little offerings...
So... BT Wholesale run a national network and in conjunction with BT openreach, provide a wholesale network from the end-user to the ISP. There are many ISPs who use this network - e.g. BT Retail, Entanet, Zen, Plusnet, and so on. Some of these ISPs offer a reseller package - which is what I use with Entanet to provision ADSL lines for my customers, and Neil presumably uses the reseller side of Utility Warehouse - who use both the BT Wholesale network and the Tiscali LLU network for their provision.
BT Wholesale have 2 offerings to retail ISPs - and they always have, although they now call them "standard" and "elevated" services. Standard is what used to be referred to as 50:1 and elevated is what used to be 20:1. The service is still contended (as all DSL services are) they just use different metrics with minimum speed guarantees over a period of time.
Additionally, the elevated service comes with a higher traffic priority over the BT Wholesale network and on 20CN exchanges (those limited to 8Mb), the max. upload speed goes from 422Kb/sec to 832Kb/sec. (Obviously line distance dependant). On 21cn exchanges the upload speed is as fast as it will go, (to about 1.2Mb/sec) although the ISP often has the option to limit it. (And sometimes I do this as it makes the line more stable)
So when I sell an ADSL line to a customer, I have the option of putting them on a "family" or "business" package - the business ones using the elevated services that BTW provide, and benefiting from a higher priority inside the ISPs own network.
From my own ADSL modem:
ADSL Status Mode State Up Speed Down Speed SNR Margin Loop Att.
G.DMT SHOWTIME 832000 8128000 14 25
I've got just over a mile of copper between me & the exchange, and sort of
on the limits for the full 8Mb service. I'd probably get about 12Mb with
an ADSL2+ service - if it ever comes to my exchange, and I have Enta's
"Business 45" package - 45GB cap at peak time (8am to 8pm) and uncounted
outside that time (but potentially subject to traffic shaping) I pay
£25.95 +VAT a month for that. (Plus the £13 or so that goes to BT every
month) Most of my customers are on that package or the lower one of a 15GB
cap - which is what I use when a line is provisioned for VoIP only.
(that's £19.95 a month +VAT) I do have a couple of customers on the 90GB
package - a couple of busy web design companies, but for your average
small/medium business 15 to 45GB is usually more than enough.
Additionally, (hopefully), ISPs offering the elevated service should prioritise your traffic over their own internal networks before it gets to the 'edge' where they peer with other ISPs/the global Internet. I'm not convinced that they all do though. (apart from probably AAISP - but then you're paying the real cost of it all)
Not all ISPs offer this though, and those that do charge a premium for it - e.g. AAISP charge an additional £10 or so per month for it. (BTW charge the ISPs a premium for it, so the ISPs just pass it on)
But do watch out - some ISPs offer "business" packages to mean that you get more GB per month and not that you're on the elevated services that BTW provide to them! E.g. Eclipse, as a customer of mine found out to their dismay recently. Some entry-level business packages start on the standard services and move up to the elevated services as you pay more. E.g. PlusNet do this. Their entry-level, and even 2nd level business packages still use the standard traffic weightings and 448Kb/sec uploads.
Annexe M is available on 21CN exchanges and can give you up to (I think) up to 2.5Mb/sec. (But you'll pay more for it again)
Of-course all this changes with an LLU ISP, or an ISP who can resell the LLU services of a wholesaler. Who knows what goes on then. Not many LLU exchanges in Devon & Cornwall though.
The one down-side of the gigaset range is their crappy web interface - it's soooo sloooooowwwwwww.... And the handsets are slow too - the take take half a second to actually hang-up a call.Eww, that sounds crappy. I don't quite understand what you mean by the "web interface". The device's UI is web based?!
Like most consumer gadgets you connect to your LAN, (e.g. router, Wi-Fi access point, printer, etc.) you use a web interface to almost all VoIP phones to program in their username/password and SIP registrar details. The Gigaset ones are slow. I think they have crappy javascript, so I use Chrome rather than firefox.
You use them like ordinary phones - dial a number, push the green button. (or add on a # code to select which account to use - they can have up to 6 SIP accounts as well as the landline)
Hm. Three reckon they've got coverage there - certainly good coverage down the A39, but the checkers are never that accurate...Hmph, I've tested with VF, though I guess I should try get some other PAYG SIMs to be sure. Nonetheless 3G/GPRS backup is probably over kill.I know that HSBC offer IP based card swipe machines - they were used in theOther than the tangles, did they work well? Where they noticeably better than the dialup based PDQs? How much are HSBC fees?
They seemed to work OK - I think HSBC supplied them for free as it was a charity fund raiser - they put the best part of £16,000 through them in a 24-hour period and about 550 calls, so 550 transactions. They each came with a little power over Ethernet unit, so only one cable going to the unit. (Which in this case increased the spagetti on the desk, but it could be tidied away in a retail environment)
NatWest quoted my wife a £125 setup fee then £25 a month running fees - plus I presume a per transaction fee, but I don't know what that might have been.
Gordon
-- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/listfaq