The huge amounts of faults that all the ISPs customers are currently seeing are BECAUSE of BT. Had they made their 1mb and 2mb products rate adaptive, then broadband for end users like all of us would be much improved.
VERY broadly speaking, the further you are from your local BT exchange the more noise you get on your line. The more noise, the more 'trouble' the higher broadband frequency has to get to you, so intermittenent drops in connection, no connection at all etc. If your product is rate adaptive (like BTs 500 products, 512 broadband), then you buy 1mb, but if you are long way from exchange, the product can rate adapt itself to less than 1mb, you get slightly slower speed, but you GET broadband as the product has down rated itself to your noise margin to let you get service.
As I say, VERY roughly speaking....
Lets face it, other than cable or LLU (local loop unbundle) companies, pretty much everyone just resells BTs IP stream or datastream products and your broadband HAS to come down metalic pairs that are either owned by, rented from or originally laid down, by BT.
If you have a problem with your broadband, its generally not your ISPs fault, its the network provider that provides that broadband service thats at fault or its the spyware, firewall etc. thats on your PC. It can be your ISPs client software as well (quick nod to AOL there) but even in the AOL case, their software tells you its been disconnected, you probably get the same disconnection from any other ISP, its just they dont have their own client software shouting at you thats its been disconnected, it disconnects while youre reading a web page, then reconnects, by the time you are ready to move on, its reconnected again and you never new. perception difference there.
Sadly, resellers (ISPs) dont have 'much' of a choice at the moment, its BT, small cable coverage or nothing. The future is changing though, Local Loop Unbundling will change all this, as ISPs can run their own networks and have their own equipment in BTs exchanges. More choice for the consumer, always a good thing.
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