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Shrug
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Registered: 18-11-2012
The YouTube Problem
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on 18-11-2012 20:51
This was intended as a reply to an existing thread, but as there are already about a hundred threads like this I doubt one more will look out of place. Obviously, none of us are currently able to stream video at even the rates we are used to from domestic ADSL lines; our newly-upgraded fibre network is running behind ADSL2 which can be bought for less than a tenner a month.
I was 'upgraded' from 50M fibre (been a customer for one year) to 100M 'for free' and have had nothing but problems since that day. Unless I'm connecting to speedtest.net of course, then my connection absolutely flies.
Since I am actually a network engineer, I can surmise a couple of things;
- Virgin apply asymmetric traffic management that allows connections to popular speedtesting websites to go fast, but is aggressively throttling most other things. 100M to backbone is an absolute fantasy, which is why I never signed up for 100M a year ago. Connect to speedtest and you'll get a nice number, but you will never see those speeds on real-life traffic even if the other end is capable of sending it. The traffic management won't allow it, the business model won't allow it.
- The infrastructure was not prepared for this 100M rollout, not even close. When you hear about 'high utilisation on a UBR' that is not a coincidence, it is basic service oversubscription that is simple to plan ahead if you are bothered. The reason tech support can't help is because this was a business decision to one-up Sky and BT in an ad campaign, I can't imagine any self-respecting engineer thinking this upgrade was a good idea. There is nothing a tech support engineer can do; he has been given the loaves and fishes, but this time there are 50,000 customers and they all want seconds.
- Different parts of the UK Virgin infrastructure have different wrinkles and requirements, but the 100M rollout has hit them all at once with unpredicted (not unpredictable) results; some people are getting alright connections (although rarely 100M) and others aren't, likely due to variations between equipment capability vs high-usage subscribers. Again, this points to a blanket decision which has end-user experience as its last priority.
The only solution to this will be even more aggressive traffic management upstream. Bittorrent, non-Main Street Internet video streaming (hello Hulu) and unrecognised non-HTTP traffic will be throttled even more consistently and severely. They may be able to shoehorn in some extra upstream capacity to get YouTube working again, but as a whole the route to the internet outside the Virgin VPN network is simply not working.
Pretty much Virgin just made our restaurant a buffet but didn't order any extra food.
I'll see if they can get it working in a month or so, after that I'll be moving on. Fortunately I have other options. My personal regrets to any tech guy who reads this and thinks I'm getting on his case, if I am incorrect on any of the above points I would sincerely welcome an explicit correction.
Cheers,
~Paul
Source and follow up posts
http://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Up-to-120Mb-Setup-Equipment/The-YouTube-Problem/m-p/1566474
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