This is where Ian Burley, DPNow's editor and founder, shares his unique thoughts and impressions on subjects that he hopes will be of interest to others on the subjects of digital photography and other related or loosely related topics! You can follow DPNow Editor's blog on Facebook and Twitter, too.
Big broadband Internet boost from Virgin in the UK
Posted 11-01-12 at 06:03 PM by Ian
At home we subscribe to Virgin Broadband's 20 megabit service which is delivered by (cable) fibre to the street and via coax copper to the house. We've actually been experience a rather choppy service of late - apparently due to a fault in the network that is taking weeks to fix.
But according to BBC News today I may well be happy to forgive them soon because Virgin has announced it is to at least double the connection speed of 4 million of its cable broadband subscribers. In fact, as a current 20 megabit subscriber, I'll get an upgrade to 60 megabits. Those on 50 megabit connections will be upgraded to 100 megabits and those already on 100 megabits will only get an increase to 120 megabits, which is the current maximum speed possible.
Some of us will need new cable modems, but these will also be provided free of charge. Can't wait!
But there remains a broadband divide - Julia's parents are lucky to get 300K bits/second on their broadband ADSL connection and BT's schedule to get their exchange in Eversley upgraded to fibre, which could increase their speed to 40 megabits, has been delayed from September last year to June this year - and I'm not betting that the new June date will be honoured.
But according to BBC News today I may well be happy to forgive them soon because Virgin has announced it is to at least double the connection speed of 4 million of its cable broadband subscribers. In fact, as a current 20 megabit subscriber, I'll get an upgrade to 60 megabits. Those on 50 megabit connections will be upgraded to 100 megabits and those already on 100 megabits will only get an increase to 120 megabits, which is the current maximum speed possible.
Some of us will need new cable modems, but these will also be provided free of charge. Can't wait!
But there remains a broadband divide - Julia's parents are lucky to get 300K bits/second on their broadband ADSL connection and BT's schedule to get their exchange in Eversley upgraded to fibre, which could increase their speed to 40 megabits, has been delayed from September last year to June this year - and I'm not betting that the new June date will be honoured.
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I'm unfortunately in the group with Julia's parents although I haven't tested my speed lately. The last time I did, it was 900k up, about 500k down - and that's one of the fastest speeds in our village due to the fact that we're over 2 miles from the local exchange.
I CAN'T WAIT for Northamptonshire to get it's "Superfast Broadband Project" together: I think our exchange is due to be upgraded around 2014! And 12 miles away at work, in a very small town, the BT speed is 100mbs per second but I have to say it's not as reliable as Virgin ADSL.Posted 11-01-12 at 07:49 PM by Caz 
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Quite by coincidence I had a call from BT today at the office. We use BT for our phones at the office and the chap mentioned that BT's fibre broadband service (which we use but via a better value reseller) is being upped from 40 megabits to 80 megabits. I hope they upgrade the 8 megabits upload speed as well (Virgin are).
Posted 12-01-12 at 12:22 PM by Ian
