Sky Vs BT Broadband Speed Help Needed Please

Sky Vs BT Broadband Speed Help Needed Please

Author
Discussion

Big Tav

Original Poster:

645 posts

163 months

Thursday 19th December 2013
quotequote all
Hi Guys, I need your help please to work out who is telling me the right info here. My contract is up with Sky BB and am thinking on going to BT just to get the BT Sport for the UFC since they took it off all Sky subscribers. I can't get high speed stuff like Infinity so I m stuck with the slowest ones.

Sky are telling me they are faster than BT at my house. I did an online speed check and I got 3.67mb. The Sky guy did a check and said I was getting 4.9 but it could be up to 7mbs (which I don't think is right).

I called BT and they said the above is impossible. They said my line is only rated to 3mbs and they own the line and Sky rent it from them so how could they be quicker? He said the best they could offer is up to 3mbs but they estimate my actual speed would be 1.5 to 2mbs.

Who do I believe? The Sky service is great but I need to pay £15 pm on top if I want BT Sport which is rubbish.

Who is telling me the right info? If I am happy with the Sky speed would BT at least be as good? BT said they have the best router and also won awards for the fastest speeds etc but that might not apply in my street.

Any replies are greatly appreciated as I don't want to make an 18 month mistake!

papercup

2,490 posts

218 months

Thursday 19th December 2013
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Its a BT line. Who sells you broadband on it is irrelevant; the line can support a certain speed and that is that. Sky are lying.

Torquey

1,888 posts

227 months

Thursday 19th December 2013
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Id believe bt.
You should get exactly the same speed with both (providing they don't cap it, which I'm sure they wouldn't on anything less than 8mb).

I'm in the same position and have to put up with 3.5 mb until I can get fibre.

MissChief

7,095 posts

167 months

Friday 20th December 2013
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You have email matey.

StixUK

53 posts

124 months

Friday 20th December 2013
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http://www.samknows.com/broadband/broadband_checke...

see if you are connected to an LLU service...

I have just found out that I can now be connected to the SKY broadband network through their LLU, whereas talktalk was the only one available a year ago.

Sky may be able to reach a faster speed because they may have installed their own equipment at the exchange.

When I phoned sky a year ago in my area they were reselling the BT line and were charging me £17 p/m for upto 8MB line, whereas my line was quoted 3MB MAX by BT.

I made the switch to TalkTalk and my d/load speed has been 11Mbps ever since as they don't use BT equipment at the exchange they have their own LLU so can provide a faster speed.

As mentioned earlier, Sky have not got their own equipment in my local exchange so instead of them reselling BT's line, they now have their own LLU, so I could achieve similar speeds as I have with TalkTalk.

Check the link above and enter your BT landline number and postcode, if you don't have a BT line, click the No BT Line link and enter your house number and postocde. This will tell you the LLU providers in the area, you are likely to recieve the best speeds and cheapest prices from them until you can get fibre or cable.

StixUK

53 posts

124 months

Friday 20th December 2013
quotequote all
Torquey said:
Id believe bt.
You should get exactly the same speed with both (providing they don't cap it, which I'm sure they wouldn't on anything less than 8mb).

I'm in the same position and have to put up with 3.5 mb until I can get fibre.
Not necessarily true.

Depends if he/she is in a Sky network area running off their own equipment or if they are re-selling BT line.

Accelebrate

5,244 posts

214 months

Friday 20th December 2013
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papercup said:
Its a BT line. Who sells you broadband on it is irrelevant; the line can support a certain speed and that is that. Sky are lying.
Not necessarily true as others have pointed out. If you're on an LLU package with Sky it can make quite a difference. My brother gained around 5MB moving to Sky.

Big Tav

Original Poster:

645 posts

163 months

Friday 20th December 2013
quotequote all
How can I find that out? That could explain why the Sky guy said I was getting a faster speed than what BT said it was rated at. BT said it was their line though.

andy-xr

13,204 posts

203 months

Friday 20th December 2013
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I'd be more inclined to go with a provider who can give you a better contention ratio or find a wireless internet provider if you can. I'm in something similar, having had Infinity at my last place, we cant get it here. The unlimited Sky Broadband clocks in at around 13Mbps on speedtest, but the ping is awful, 80-100 milliseconds. If I could find a provider that'll have a lower contention ratio, or I can go onto a business grade broadband I'm not too bothered about headline speeds

Big Tav

Original Poster:

645 posts

163 months

Friday 20th December 2013
quotequote all
I just got this message when I went to Samknows.com

Summary of results for EH299FB at 17:39 20/12/2013
Congratulations, you are in a broadband enabled area.
Click here to compare packages available to you.
The following services are available in your location:

BT Wholesale ADSL
BT Wholesale ADSL Max
TalkTalk (CPW) LLU
Sky Broadband / Easynet LLU
Please select the options on the left for more information about broadband availability at your location.

Is this why I am getting better than BT?

Jonnas

1,004 posts

162 months

Friday 20th December 2013
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I live in the middle of nowhere.

BT 2Mbps all day long, steady as a rock

Moved to Sky, up and down like a wes drawers between 0.3 and 1.1. Shocking.

Moved back to BT, 2Mbps and steady as a rock again.

This is not a mistake I will be making again......

Muzzer79

9,806 posts

186 months

Friday 20th December 2013
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I had a BT engineer at my house to sort a problem with the line.

I enquired about the Broadband speed, etc.

He explained that when you change provider, it's just a simple case of, for example, taking your plug out of 'BT' at the exchange (or whatever it is now) and plugging it into 'Sky'

The speed and service are absolutely the same.

He just said to go for whoever has the best deal.

So, I promptly changed to Sky biggrin

FourWheelDrift

88,382 posts

283 months

Friday 20th December 2013
quotequote all
Jonnas said:
I live in the middle of nowhere.

BT 2Mbps all day long, steady as a rock

Moved to Sky, up and down like a wes drawers between 0.3 and 1.1. Shocking.

Moved back to BT, 2Mbps and steady as a rock again.

This is not a mistake I will be making again......
Was that via a cable or Wifi? Either way it is probably the stty netgear Sky router they force you to use, but don't have to.

I've moved to Sky because BT employ incompetent liars in sales, jobsworths in billing and who's support know frankly the square root of fk all and have exactly the same speeds using my Draytek as I had previously from o2.

egor110

16,818 posts

202 months

Friday 20th December 2013
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I'm toying with the idea of moving to bt from sky as we've just got infinity some of your bt experiences are putting me off though.

Currently getting a speed of 2.12!! and they estimate we can get a max of 30.

Been on the phone to sky and they've offered me there fibre optic for £10 month for a year if i stay.

StixUK

53 posts

124 months

Friday 20th December 2013
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egor110 said:
I'm toying with the idea of moving to bt from sky as we've just got infinity some of your bt experiences are putting me off though.

Currently getting a speed of 2.12!! and they estimate we can get a max of 30.

Been on the phone to sky and they've offered me there fibre optic for £10 month for a year if i stay.
Sounds like a good deal, you will get swiped into a 12 month contract and check for line rental commitments.

Fibre is the dogs, which I cannot wait to have in my area.

Saying that I stream HD Movies off lovefilm through my PS3 and my MAX downspeed is 11Mpbs and I never get any buffering.

StixUK

53 posts

124 months

Friday 20th December 2013
quotequote all
Muzzer79 said:
I had a BT engineer at my house to sort a problem with the line.

I enquired about the Broadband speed, etc.

He explained that when you change provider, it's just a simple case of, for example, taking your plug out of 'BT' at the exchange (or whatever it is now) and plugging it into 'Sky'

The speed and service are absolutely the same.

He just said to go for whoever has the best deal.

So, I promptly changed to Sky biggrin
Glad you got a better result hopefully.

I moved to TalkTalk and tbh have never had to use their 'customer service' so I cannot comment on that.

I got an unlimited data package for like £7 p/m and I have their phone as well. All in it is £26 p/m (and now they are including YouView for free into their packages.

Maybe you should have a look at switching to them. You are still in your cooling off period to Sky.

Big Tav

Original Poster:

645 posts

163 months

Sunday 22nd December 2013
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Any updates on this? Can anyone help? Should I stay with Sky or BT? How can I check if I am on Sky's LLU exchange.

Accelebrate

5,244 posts

214 months

Sunday 22nd December 2013
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You've already posted that your exchange is unbundled for Sky, so you'll be on their LLU package. As for what difference it'll make what speed do BT reckon they can provide? The estimates are generally quite accurate.

Big Tav

Original Poster:

645 posts

163 months

Monday 23rd December 2013
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Unbundled? I don't really know what that means. So the sky guy was right in saying my line is upto 7mb as it is their own hardware and will be faster than BT?

Accelebrate

5,244 posts

214 months

Monday 23rd December 2013
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LLU = Local Loop Unbundling. I suspect Sky will probably be slightly quicker for you. Are any of your neighbours not on Sky? You could maybe see what sort of speeds they get to confirm.