Speed drop after moving to Plusnet from Sky

[#1]

the cabinet is about 200m away and serves aprox 120 houses.

[#2]

Speaking from ignorance 
That seems a very small number of houses fed from one cabinet and may well make the upgrade to fibre doubtful.

[#3]

That's because all of the estates surrounding us are fed from the nearest exchange and we get our service from one miles away. Unless the fibre upgrade is done within the next few months, I wont be able to get it any way. As I have mentioned earlier, I am in the military and due to move in 2 years. PN have me stuck in this contract and say I will have to start a new 18 month contract if I want to upgrade. I wont be here that long so will not be able to get fibre.

[#4]

From a commercial viewpoint, you're right and it is not really viable unless the aggregation node is very close to that cabinet already.
From the EU State Aid Funding viewpoint, it will meet all the criteria to get NGA - poor speeds already (no existing superfast broadband)/no commercial plans for superfast broadband in the next 3 years.

[#5]

Just hope it is done in time for me to be able to get it or PN change their policy and allow 12 month contracts. I've been campaigning and petitioning the council and our MP for 3 years now and they only start to put plans in place just before an election, coincidence?

[#6]

Followed the steps that Chris said to do and it has gotten worse.
ADSL Line Status
Connection Information
Line state: Connected
Connection time: 0 days, 00:00:46
Downstream: 2.43 Mbps
Upstream: 443.9 Kbps

ADSL Settings
VPI/VCI: 0/38
Type: PPPoA
Modulation: G.992.3 Annex A
Latency type: Fast
Noise margin (Down/Up): 6.3 dB / 13.9 dB
Line attenuation (Down/Up): 61.6 dB / 38.0 dB
Output power (Down/Up): 17.0 dBm / 12.6 dBm
FEC Events (Down/Up): 0 / 0
CRC Events (Down/Up): 0 / 53

[#7]

It seems quite unusual that such a long line has so few CRC errors and that's without interleaving enabled. I'm not sure if having interleaving switched on would allow a higher speed to be attained, but it could be something else to try after all other possibilities have been explored.

[#8]

You say so few errors, but bear in mind that the router had only been connected for 46 seconds when these stats were taken. These are the stats after just over an hour.
ADSL Line Status
Connection Information
Line state: Connected
Connection time: 0 days, 01:07:03
Downstream: 2.43 Mbps
Upstream: 443.9 Kbps

ADSL Settings
VPI/VCI: 0/38
Type: PPPoA
Modulation: G.992.3 Annex A
Latency type: Fast
Noise margin (Down/Up): 6.2 dB / 13.8 dB
Line attenuation (Down/Up): 61.6 dB / 38.0 dB
Output power (Down/Up): 17.0 dBm / 12.6 dBm
FEC Events (Down/Up): 0 / 0
CRC Events (Down/Up): 41 / 54

[#9]

One of the previous set of stats had 0 CRC errors over 2 days, then an increase of 24 CRC errors about an hour later. My own line had 1195 CRC errors over the past 24 hours, and also 11,441,979 FEC events over that time. That's over 11 million errors fixed by the interleaving process. I don't think I would have had 11 million CRC errors if I didn't have interleaving on. Instead, without interleaving, a lower speed would have been negotiated such that there wouldn't be so many errors.
Otherwise this could just be a case of Sky having their own slightly better equipment at the exchange, and "no compromise in service" was referring to the customer service from Plusnet's UK based call centre staff.

[#10]

If it does refer to the UK based customer service then they are wrong again I'm afraid. Sky's UK customer service were excellent, but PN are the worst I have ever encountered. The only helpful people I have met are on this forum, the call centres don't seem to know anything beyond switch it off and on again, I could have worked that out for myself.

[#11]

sky use g.inp on their adsl which is superior tech.

[#12]

Can I suggest that PN stop advertising no compromise in service if they know that the equipment that they use is inferior and could cause speed to drop. Also sort out customer services as they are useless. If it wasn't for the help I have had on this forum I would still be getting 1.5 to 2 Mbps. I am only just over 2 Mbps at the moment, not as good as the 3 Mbps I was getting with Sky, but it's a start. I would like to thank the people on the forum who have helped, but due to the speed drop and poor call centre staff, I believe I have a case to leave PN without any penalties. Unless there is a huge improvement in service to take it to the same level as Sky very soon, both in speed and customer support, I will speak to my solicitor to find out if I can leave without having to pay as they have clearly not delivered on the no compromise BS.

[#13]

Weren't you given a speed estimate of 2mb when you signed up? Which is what you're getting... Not sure why you think PN have failed to deliver on anything or how you plan to use them giving you the speed you were estimated as an argument to get out of your contract.

[#14]

The girl on the other end of the phone said that I should get the same speed as I was getting with sky which was at the top end of the estimate. When I was getting 3 Mbps with Sky, 3 Mbps is within the estimate and the ISP that does not compromise on service and has award winning customer service tells me that I should get the same speed, I expect the same speed, not 1/3 less.

[#15]

Just thought I'd chip in with my observation re moving from Sky to Plusnet (actually O2 to Sky, then to Plusnet)...
Just over a year ago I was with O2 and getting as high as 11.6 mbps.  
Then Sky took over O2 and download dropped to around 10.5 mbps.  
A couple of months ago I switched back to Plusnet (was with Plusnet between 2003 to 2010) hoping that perhaps the speed might recover a bit...
...sadly, no such luck - with Plusnet the download speed is generally around 9.5 mbps.  
As far as I can remember, I believe all three providers use(d) the same SNR margin target (down) of 6dB (I don't know whether there may be other differences such as interleaving etc).
Since the only difference(s) are all back at the exchange, I'd have to conclude that both O2 (Be) and Sky's equipment is superior/less noisy in some way than BT's (Plusnet's) kit.
[Note: I'm using exactly the same modem-router etc, in all three cases.]
Now, whilst 9.5 mbps is still pretty good for my needs, and I 'respect' Plusnet - nevertheless when my 12 months contact is nearing its end I shall be giving some consideration to switching back to Sky, especially if their prices/offers are as good as they currently are (i.e. free unlimited BB for 12 month, and only 7.50 a month thereafter, and they don't fleece you for an extra £11.88 a year just for having 'caller display' [as Plusnet do] as it's included for free, as it really should be for any modern telephone service).
[Seriously Plusnet - stop charging for 'caller display' - in this day an age it's quite ridiculous, and nothing but a cynical rip-off.]