Virgin Mobile doffs its cap: Web speed limit axed after outrage Virgin Mobile UK has suspended its internet speed cap while it tries to get its network reliability back up to scratch. Large numbers of the operator's customers suffered intermittent connectivity over the last week or so, quite possibly related to the company's attempt to impose a 2Mbit-per-second cap on mobile internet …
VM: So, are you going to buy our new 4G service?
Cust: No, I'm fine on 3G
VM: {fiddle-fiddle-tweak} So are you sure you don't want 4G?
Cust: Hmm, 3G seems a bit slower these days, but it's good enough
VM: {more-tweaking} You sure?
Cust: Wow it's slow on 3G these days, but still OK
VM: {clunk-fiddle-kludge} Absolutely sure?
Cust: What the... this 3G is useless! How much did you say 4G was?
I got a letter from VM yesterday warning about potential problems with a 115V PSU for my StupidHub.
It informs me to unplug the StupidHub, call them and they'll send me a new PSU.
Did anyone else get one too, or is this just their way of relieving network congestion by getting us all to disconnect?
I unexpectedly got a new power supply for my cable modem in the post.. I replaced to old one and sent it back in the envelope they supplied.
Since then I've had an SMS asking me to confirm I got the new one and then about a week after I said yes I got a letter through the post telling me they were going to be sending me a new power supply.
Are you REALLY complaining that Virgin is making sure you have SAFE equipment? I am also on Virgin Broadband and have also been asked to check my PSU for my modem. In my case it was referring to the OLD modem that has been removed. Did you even read the letter? Probably not if you are referring to a 115v PSU.
This is a safety recall of their hardware. That is called being responsible. (The fact I had been running that old PSU for six years or so without hiccup is kinda funny timing they only ask about it after I removed it....)
I think what they are worrying about is those people running their NEW superhub on the OLD PSU from the old modems.
Also note - this safety recall has NOTHING to do with Virgin Mobile and this story about 3G
'But sneaking it out in the hope no one will notice, and then screwing up connectivity for all, just makes the whole industry look shabby.'
Nah. It makes Virgin look shabby.
Tarring everyone with the same brush actually makes it more likely to happen. If people think they're all the same as Virgin then why bother moving?
Caps and traffic shaping are inevitable in the mobile data industry because of the precarious economics of the service, but its rare things are handled this badly, so Virgin deserve all of the good PR which follows.
I wonder if this is connected with the dodgy 3G coverage I have had in Brighton the past couple of days? BBM usually works all over the place without troubles. Except the past couple of days round the city. Have had to wait to get back to a UMA WiFi connection for BBM to kick back in.
Odd coincidence with this Virgin\T-Mobile caps conversation...
These sort of issues have been around from 2008.
It would help if the operators would be honest, but there's fat chance of that when they won't even tell their tech guys that changes have been made in some areas of the country, and not others.
An example from 2008 is how 3G capable cells in the Birmingham area passed Javascript through a rewriting/compression proxy (supposedly to speed things up), screwing up certain sites, but in Barnstaple this didn't happen, so the sites worked correctly.
The poor techies were baffled by this until a lot of digging by them showed that they were being misled (deliberately ?) by T-Mobile manglement about a 'phased roll-out' of the proxies.
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