Connection capping @ 67.997 Mb/s - is this an unofficial limit agreed with BT?

[#1]

Is it purely conicidental that BT announces average UK BB speed of 67Mb/s and many friends and colleagues notice a drop from speeds above this back to the "magic" average speed number?

I suspect this magic figure has been agreed between BTW and ISP's such as Plusnet to avoid issues / penalties for being able to supply BB speeds upto x mbp/s , 67Mb is average therefore achievable for the majority of consumers.

Those customers with short line length to green cab and low distance to local exchange may have historically achieved stable connections at greater speed but now appear to be capped back to the average figure.

Can you confirm if the plusnet Unlimited Fibre package customers connection profiles have been modified by BT and set at the 67mb/s banding? - it certainly looks like this is the case as many of us can see that there is a big difference between line stats for actual speed (67Mb/s) and attainable speed (87-93Mbps *Though this would be capped at the 76Mb/s std  80/20 BT down/up split).  

[#2]

This is the ADSL thread.

Your query is not related to it.

[#3]

I know that this board is intended for ADSL, but it is called Broadband, and FTTC is in fact broadband so it isn't surprising that people post Broadband queries to this board.

Perhaps the board should be renamed, or perhaps people should be more tolerant of the misunderstanding?

[#4]

Gel,

The question was posted to "Broadband" and Fttc / VDSL connections should come under this heading!
Don't sidestep the question or attempt diversion from query - it's simple > have BT / Plusnet colluded and capped Fttc connections at 67mb/s ?

[#5]

Moderator's note:

Thread moved from Broadband to Everything Else.

[#6]

Cheers for support Corringham!

Just to keep Gel happy and prevent their thread OCD kicking in - have opened post in the "Fibre Broadband section"

[;-p

Moderator's note by Mike (Mav): Insult(s) removed as per Forum rules.

[#7]

Mav,

You have the time to moderate and over zealously censor posts - what about possibility of actually answering a consumers query fella? 

[#8]

Mods are customers with no access to Plusnet systems.

[#9]

No drama Mav, cheers for responding!
So no different from Plusnet staff and their frequent inability to access btw test & monitoring systems lol

[#10]

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@Demonix wrote:

Is it purely conicidental that BT announces average UK BB speed of 67Mb/s and many friends and colleagues notice a drop from speeds above this back to the "magic" average speed number?

I suspect this magic figure has been agreed between BTW and ISP's such as Plusnet to avoid issues / penalties for being able to supply BB speeds upto x mbp/s , 67Mb is average therefore achievable for the majority of consumers.

Those customers with short line length to green cab and low distance to local exchange may have historically achieved stable connections at greater speed but now appear to be capped back to the average figure.

Can you confirm if the plusnet Unlimited Fibre package customers connection profiles have been modified by BT and set at the 67mb/s banding? - it certainly looks like this is the case as many of us can see that there is a big difference between line stats for actual speed (67Mb/s) and attainable speed (87-93Mbps *Though this would be capped at the 76Mb/s std  80/20 BT down/up split). 

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I have read through this conspiracy theory several times trying to understand your logic.

As t understand, it you believe that speeds are being deliberately capped at 67 Mbps as this is the published average speed. Surely if the intention is to maintain an average speed over a range of subscribers then the speed of those capable of going faster should be increased to the absolute maximum in order to compensate for those on longer lines, where physics dictates that 67Mbps speed is not attainable?

I suspect that the reason for speeds dropping is much more mundane in that as more customers are connected to a cabinet both crosstalk on the multicore cables never designed for high frequency traffic used on the final leg to homes plus upstream network congestion due to more use of streaming services is throttling speed.

The speed that Plusnet offers to customers is not a secret it is simply obtained from https://www.dslchecker.bt.com/ In the very few cases where the minimum speed cannot be obtained then I have noted that Plusnet offer cancellation without penalty. I am not aware of any other issues/penalties applied to ISPs for not being able to supply the specified speed.

[#11]

 
Conspiracy theory no - just coincidental that BT state average UK BB speed as 67Mb/s then look at Plusnet Unlimited Fibre top package and low and behold they have now listed  speeds of up to 67Mb/s  (Not a great surprise as part of the BT family) - then a couple of days later my speed plummets from near perfect to the same figure - just seemed to be a likely conclusion given many folk I have spoken to  have also experienced drops from being stable above 70+mb/s to the magic average of 67Mb/s - strange or a network change?
 
But the mundane is also possible:
Yes - BTW's overloaded, archaic and decaying infrastructure (coppper/alloy) from cab to premises doesn't help! (have recently had connection moved to a newer, nearer <200m and less populated cab which initially was great but suspect further FTTC uptake is now&nbsp; slowly causing crosstalk and stability issues with a knock on affect on BB speed.
And even though most ISP's and BTW seem to ignore crosstalk issues as a result of over populated cabinets and that DLM is a poorly configured digital Nazi that's unfit for purpose along with G.inp etc which don't help...
FTTP is sadly a long way off for many but would alleviate reliance on&nbsp; the copper/alloy lines that were never designed for transmission of data and suffer from the issues mentioned above.
Recent long period of very hot weather across UK could also have played a part&nbsp;As the temp goes up the SNR can go down &amp; the DLM drops the speed, will monitor as we are having a cool spell and see if automated speed Nazi sorts it's life out?
&nbsp;
or maybe we are being capped at the average by Plusnet and BT...&nbsp;
&nbsp;
&nbsp;

[#12]

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@Demonix wrote:

Conspiracy theory no - .... look at Plusnet Unlimited Fibre top package and low and behold they have now listed  speeds of up to 67Mb/s 

No. Not up to but:  66Mb average download speed

Mathematics says that if the average is 66Mbps and the Maximum is 66Mbps then the Minimum must also be 66Mbps.

I agree that FTTC is a dog's breakfast of a system. Rather that biting the bullet and starting again with FTTP we have cabinets stuffed full of electronics then added to with G-INP and possibly in the future, Vectoring just to get the data over a few hundred metres of copper cabling that was never designed for the purpose.

It all needs maintenance so I guess that it all makes work for the working man to do, with its attendant profit opportunity for BT shareholders!

[#13]

Aye the legacy copper / nasty cheapo alloy lines need ripping out ASAP - no amount of Openreach engineers can fix what is essentially dead tech.

Fibre and IP telephony are the way forward that will provide the nice 330mb/s connection with out crosstalk etc and greater reliability as long as BTW actually contracts decent cable layers who can splice properly ! Grubby, misaligned fibre is often what's provided when BTW try and rush supposed network improvement though.

[#14]

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@Baldrick1 wrote:

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Mathematics says that if the average is 66Mbps and the Maximum is 66Mbps then the Minimum must also be 66Mbps.

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Or to put it another way; If the maximum speed was capped at 67Mbps then the average would be lower than than 67.

[#15]

Hello @Demonix,

Sorry to hear you feel this way. As the advertising rules have changed, we can now only advertise the average speed that at least 50% of customers actually see at peak times. 

Each fibre connection will still be provisioned same as before 40/10 or 80/20 and you will still receive within the estimated speeds of your line shown here.

I have run a GEA test which shows your line is operating within the top end of your estimates and can be seen below. Please don't hesitate to get in touch if you need any further assistance.

Test Outcome	Pass
Test Outcome Code	GTC_FTTC_SERVICE_0000
Description	GEA service test completed and no fault found .
Main Fault Location	OK
Sync Status	In Sync
Downstream Speed	66.9 Mbps
Upstream Speed	20.0 Mbps
Appointment Required	N
Fault Report Advised	N
NTE Power Status	PowerOn
Voice Line Test Result	Pass
Bridge Tap	Not Detected
Radio Frequency Ingress	Not Detected
Repetitive Electrical Impulse Noise	Not Detected
Cross Talk	Not Detected
Estimated Line Length In Metres	565.4
Upstream Rate Assessment	Very Good
Downstream Rate Assessment	Very Good
Home Wiring Problem	Not Detected
Downstream Policing Discard Rate	0.0
Customer Traffic Level	Upstream and Downstream Traffic Detected
Technology	VDSL
Profile Name	0.128M-67M Downstream, Retransmission Low - 0.128M-20M Upstream, Retransmission Low
Time Stamp	2018-07-28T11:30:00

Parameters	MIN	MAX	AVG
Down Stream Line Rate	66.9 Mbps	79.9 Mbps	71.1 Mbps
Up Stream Line Rate	20.0 Mbps	20.0 Mbps	20.0 Mbps
Up Time	834.0 Sec	900.0 Sec	899.2 Sec
Retrains	0.0	3.0	0.0

Current and Last 15 Minute Bin Performance
Parameters	Last Traffic Count(Upto 15 mins)	Current Traffic Count(Upto 15 mins)
Start Time Stamp	2018-08-10T10:04:36Z	2018-08-10T10:19:36Z
Ingress Code Violation	0	0
Egress Code Violation	0	0
Errored Seconds	0	0
Severely Errored Seconds	0	0
Unavailable Seconds	0

Moderator's note by Mike (Mav): Excess white space removed.