I was just looking up thinkbroadband's list of ISPs for someone on a forum, and 
was pleased to see that AAISP gets the best user rating. I had to warn, though, 
that even though the advertised service if 20 meg it is unlikely they will get 
better than about 6 meg down their BT line.

So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is there 
anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater than they had 
with ADSL1? If so, please tell us the speed and the distance to the exchange if 
you know it.

Given that the data rate may be limited by whatever is on the other end, and 
that even watching continuous video is unlikely to max out the bandwidth, does 
having a speed higher than 6-8 meg actually get a noticeable benefit most of 
the time?

(I know we all want the highest speed possible eventually, but I want to know 
whether higher speed provides much benefit with the net as it is today.)

On Sat, 03 Oct 2009 13:44:35 +0100, Alfred E Neuman wrote:

> So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is
> there anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater
> than they had with ADSL1? If so, please tell us the speed and the
> distance to the exchange if you know it.

Distance to exchange: probably about 3-5km.

Old downlink speed: 5000-6000 kbps; new speed: 9700 kbps.
Old uplink speed:   400 kbps;       new speed: 1000 kbps.

These are sync speeds but seem to be borne out by reality. The uplink 
speed is the most noticeable, as I do use that separately.

-- 
Use the BIG mirror service in the UK:
 http://www.mirrorservice.org

Alfred E Neuman wrote:
> I was just looking up thinkbroadband's list of ISPs for someone on a 
> forum, and was pleased to see that AAISP gets the best user rating. I 
> had to warn, though, that even though the advertised service if 20 meg 
> it is unlikely they will get better than about 6 meg down their BT line.
> 
> So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is 
> there anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater 
> than they had with ADSL1? If so, please tell us the speed and the 
> distance to the exchange if you know it.
> 
> Given that the data rate may be limited by whatever is on the other end, 
> and that even watching continuous video is unlikely to max out the 
> bandwidth, does having a speed higher than 6-8 meg actually get a 
> noticeable benefit most of the time?

I'm on 2Mbit and downloads from many sites hit 230kB/s, ie full speed.

When I tried ADSL MAX, although a disaster overall, during training
period I was seeing up to 730kB/s but very many fast adsl reconnects
and lowest download speeds were not much below 600kB/s.

Advantage of higher speed is you can download from multiple sites
to fill your bandwidth, and some sites would manage to fill
bandwidth anyway.

Other advantages of MAX were higher upload speed and much lower
latency. For me the BRAS adjustments down to 160kbit three times
over first three months convinced me my line or BT equipment at
exchange were not suitable. My suspicion is it was being
deliberately dropped to save them having to increase capacity.

David

> (I know we all want the highest speed possible eventually, but I want to 
> know whether higher speed provides much benefit with the net as it is 
> today.)

Alfred E Neuman wrote:

> So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is 
> there anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater 
> than they had with ADSL1? If so, please tell us the speed and the 
> distance to the exchange if you know it.

I sync at 14meg, although my BRAS rate has slipped down to 12meg. This 
is obviously way above anything I used to get on ADSL1 - although to be 
fair, I do live in London, which probably gives me an advantage...

> Given that the data rate may be limited by whatever is on the other end, 
> and that even watching continuous video is unlikely to max out the 
> bandwidth, does having a speed higher than 6-8 meg actually get a 
> noticeable benefit most of the time?

Most of the time, no. I could happily two-box Everquest and listen to 
streaming music on my old 2meg link. Where I notice it is downloads - 
I've pulled down full Ubuntu images in a matter of a few minutes. It's 
*extremely* noticeable on downloads with a close mirror, but otherwise 
it's really just numbers...

(which, incidentally, is why I'm ignoring the fact that my BRAS is a 
little below where it should be)

Pete

Pete Favelle  writes:
>I sync at 14meg, although my BRAS rate has slipped down to 12meg. This 
>is obviously way above anything I used to get on ADSL1 - although to be 
>fair, I do live in London, which probably gives me an advantage...

  I too live in London, but have moved back to ADSL1 (a steady 5.5mb 
only) as unstable ADSL2 BRAS rates meant that BT kept nailing me down 
*below* this rate, and AAISP support got tired of keeping pushing me 
back up to the 7mb and above at which I was normally sync-ing.

I'm waiting until self-adjusted BRAS comes in before moving back, 
according to AAISP advice, as I've understood it.

Not very happy with this altogether.
-- 
___________________________
Christopher Webber,  Blackheath, London,  UK.
http://www.zarzuela.net

On Sat, 3 Oct 2009 15:52:07 UTC, Christopher Webber 
<cdw@zarzuela.net.invalid> wrote:

> Pete Favelle  writes:
> >I sync at 14meg, although my BRAS rate has slipped down to 12meg. This 
> >is obviously way above anything I used to get on ADSL1 - although to be 
> >fair, I do live in London, which probably gives me an advantage...
> 
>   I too live in London, but have moved back to ADSL1 (a steady 5.5mb 
> only) as unstable ADSL2 BRAS rates meant that BT kept nailing me down 
> *below* this rate, and AAISP support got tired of keeping pushing me 
> back up to the 7mb and above at which I was normally sync-ing.
> 
> I'm waiting until self-adjusted BRAS comes in before moving back, 
> according to AAISP advice, as I've understood it.
> 
> Not very happy with this altogether.

Same here - Huge dropouts with a Zyxel P660R-61C - Swapped it for the 
A&A approved P660HW (twice) and still only managed 2-3M. Like you have
reverted to ADSL1. Interestingly, although my download is around the 
same as before the move to 21CN, around 7M, my upload has doubled to 
800K. 

And the old Zyxel *still* does not like 21CN even on ADSL1.

Another very unhappy bunny in Orpington.
-- 
Regards
Dave Saville

Dave Saville wrote:
> Interestingly, although my download is around the 
> same as before the move to 21CN, around 7M, my upload has doubled to 
> 800K. 

I don't think the upload increase is all an ADSL2+ issue. I'm on ADSL1 
but have the premium option, which increases my upload from 443kbps to 
832kbps. ADSL2+ just goes as fast as it can, which is usually better 
than 832kbps.

-- 
Steve Swift
http://www.swiftys.org.uk/swifty.html
http://www.ringers.org.uk

Swifty wrote:
> Dave Saville wrote:
>> Interestingly, although my download is around the same as before the 
>> move to 21CN, around 7M, my upload has doubled to 800K. 
> 
> I don't think the upload increase is all an ADSL2+ issue. I'm on ADSL1 
> but have the premium option, which increases my upload from 443kbps to 
> 832kbps. ADSL2+ just goes as fast as it can, which is usually better 
> than 832kbps.

On 21CN there is no longer an artificial cap on upload speeds of 400k for 
non-Premium customers, so people on ADSL1 will normally get 832k provided that 
the line can handle it. On ADSL2+ they may get over 1 meg, but only if the line 
is happy with ADSL2+ (which mine isn't).

Actually I suspect my line is fine, but BT insist on lowering sync speeds to 
the point where I get about a 12dB noise margin in both directions, where 
previous experience suggested I would be fine at 6dB or below.

On Sat, 03 Oct 2009 13:44:35 +0100, Alfred E Neuman wrote:

> So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is 
> there anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater 
> than they had with ADSL1? 

er isn't "ADSL1" the old fixed 2Mbps service that involved an
exchange equipment upgrade to "ADSL2" aka "ADSL MAX" with the famed
"up to 8Mbps" and now we have, with another exchange equipment
upgrade, ADSL2+ and "up to 24Mbps"?

> Given that the data rate may be limited by whatever is on the other end, 
> and that even watching continuous video is unlikely to max out the 
> bandwidth, 

Watching decent quality SD video will max out 24Mbps(*)... Freeview
quality will fit in 6Mbps but that is pretty awful. I can't watch
Freeview 'cause it's just so crap. DSAT is better there are still
visible artifacts from the compression but they are a little more
subtle on the main stream channels.

Bear in mind that the slowest SDI broadcast signal is 143Mbps but is
rarely used, 270Mbps is the "norm". HD SDI bit rates go up to
2.9Gbps. Something has to suffer with around 100:1 of lossy
compression taking place for SD.

-- 
Cheers
Dave.

Dave Liquorice wrote:
> er isn't "ADSL1" the old fixed 2Mbps service that involved an
> exchange equipment upgrade to "ADSL2" aka "ADSL MAX"

Er… no. I'm on ADSL Max using ADSL1 and getting ~6Mbps.

-- 
Steve Swift
http://www.swiftys.org.uk/swifty.html
http://www.ringers.org.uk

Dave Liquorice wrote:
> On Sat, 03 Oct 2009 13:44:35 +0100, Alfred E Neuman wrote:
> 
>> So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is 
>> there anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater 
>> than they had with ADSL1? 
> 
> er isn't "ADSL1" the old fixed 2Mbps service that involved an
> exchange equipment upgrade to "ADSL2" aka "ADSL MAX" with the famed
> "up to 8Mbps" and now we have, with another exchange equipment
> upgrade, ADSL2+ and "up to 24Mbps"?

I thought that, but when my line was set back to the old ADSL MAX setting they 
called it ADSL1. I think fixed 2MB and ADSL MAX use the same protocol over the 
line, just different speed adaptation strategies, whereas ADSL2+ is a whole new 
process.

So what is ADSL2, without the "+"?

On 3 Oct, 13:44, Alfred E Neuman  wrote:
> I was just looking up thinkbroadband's list of ISPs for someone on a forum, and
> was pleased to see that AAISP gets the best user rating. I had to warn, though,
> that even though the advertised service if 20 meg it is unlikely they will get
> better than about 6 meg down their BT line.
>
> So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is there
> anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater than they had
> with ADSL1? If so, please tell us the speed and the distance to the exchange if
> you know it.
>
> Given that the data rate may be limited by whatever is on the other end, and
> that even watching continuous video is unlikely to max out the bandwidth, does
> having a speed higher than 6-8 meg actually get a noticeable benefit most of
> the time?
>
> (I know we all want the highest speed possible eventually, but I want to know
> whether higher speed provides much benefit with the net as it is today.)

On ADSL1, I used to sync at 8128/448kbps. On ADSL2+, it is currently
syncing at 16220/1071kbps, with  SN margins of 9.0 and 8.5dB
respectively and a reported BRAS rate 14000000/1119000, Opt Out. I am
about 1km from the exchange.

I use a SpeedTouch 5x6 router and all appears to be pretty stable.

Speedtest (using the Maidenhead server from West Hampstead) shows
download speeds of up to 13.6Mbps, compared with about 7Mbps
previously. Upload speeds are typically between 0.7 and 0.85Mbps.

For the most part, the increased speed makes little difference to what
I do, but uploading pics to websites does appear to be significantly
faster.

Alfred E Neuman wrote:
> So what is ADSL2, without the "+"?

I think that ADSL2 got out into the wild before the specification was 
complete. Some further changes were applied, but since it was still 
ADSL2, it was called ADSL2+ to distinguish it from the earlier incantation.

An alternative explanation: it was handled by IBM. We used to be graded 
(according to our performance) as 1, 2, 3, or 4. Getting a 4 was bad 
news, and people found it upsetting, so they changed the scheme to 1, 
2+, 2 or 3. Of course, now getting a 3 is bad news, so people find that 
upsetting. I expect the scheme to migrate to 1, 2++, 2+ or 2 in the not 
too distant future. Buy shares in the company that manufactures the "+" 
keys - they will be wearing out much faster, and sales will be booming!

-- 
Steve Swift
http://www.swiftys.org.uk/swifty.html
http://www.ringers.org.uk

On Monday 05 October 2009 12:13, Alfred E Neuman wrote:

> Dave Liquorice wrote:
>> On Sat, 03 Oct 2009 13:44:35 +0100, Alfred E Neuman wrote:
>> 
>>> So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is
>>> there anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater
>>> than they had with ADSL1?
>> 
>> er isn't "ADSL1" the old fixed 2Mbps service that involved an
>> exchange equipment upgrade to "ADSL2" aka "ADSL MAX" with the famed
>> "up to 8Mbps" and now we have, with another exchange equipment
>> upgrade, ADSL2+ and "up to 24Mbps"?
> 
> I thought that, but when my line was set back to the old ADSL MAX setting
> they called it ADSL1. I think fixed 2MB and ADSL MAX use the same protocol
> over the line, just different speed adaptation strategies, whereas ADSL2+
> is a whole new process.
> 
> So what is ADSL2, without the "+"?
There are a total of 5 ADSL standards:
 * G.992.1 - also known as ADSL1. Should let you do around 12MBit/s down, 
1.3MBit/s up, but lots of little errors in the spec mean you end up limited 
to considerably less (8MBit/s down, 1MBit/s up).
 * G.992.2 - not used in the UK, but also known as "splitterless ADSL1".
 * G.992.3 - ADSL2. Same frequency band as ADSL1, but has had a lot of work 
put in to iron out ambiguities in ADSL1. Also improves the relationship 
between the packet layer (ATM in the UK) and the physical layer, so that you 
can actually get packets through it at around 12MBit/s down, 1.3MBit/s up.
 * G.992.4 - not used in the UK - "splitterless ADSL2".
 * G.992.5 - this is ADSL2+. It's just PHY layer changes to ADSL2, to let 
you have an extra 1.1MHz of downstream spectrum; the infamous "Annex M" for 
extra upload is part of this.

If you get exceptionally bored, all 5 are available for download at 
http://www.itu.int/rec/T-REC-G/e - be warned that they're dry and dull :)

Simon

"Alfred E Neuman"  wrote in message 
news:ha7gv0$ril$1@aioe.org...

>I was just looking up thinkbroadband's list of ISPs for someone on a forum, 
>and was pleased to see that AAISP gets the best user rating. I had to warn, 
>though, that even though the advertised service if 20 meg it is unlikely 
>they will get better than about 6 meg down their BT line.
>
> So, now that most of us have had access to ADSL2+ for a few weeks, is 
> there anyone out there who actually gets a speed significantly greater 
> than they had with ADSL1? If so, please tell us the speed and the distance 
> to the exchange if you know it.
>
> Given that the data rate may be limited by whatever is on the other end, 
> and that even watching continuous video is unlikely to max out the 
> bandwidth, does having a speed higher than 6-8 meg actually get a 
> noticeable benefit most of the time?
>
> (I know we all want the highest speed possible eventually, but I want to 
> know whether higher speed provides much benefit with the net as it is 
> today.)

I live exactly 1km from the exchange (as crow flies) and got a 6.5 meg BRAS 
on ADSL1

When I moved to ADSL2 my BRAS went up to 11meg but BT's systems have reduced 
my BRAS to 5.5meg now mainly as they insist on setting the noise margin at 
16db when 6db worked fine when I had the 11 meg bras.

I've had AAISP manually reset the margin to 6db but BT then reset it to 16db 
after a few hours even though I would always get a very steady data 
througput with the 11 meg bras.