Interesting. I'm with PN on the cheapy upto 40Mbps tariff (though I think I get ~32Mbps or so), seems OK to me. No real complaints and I don't think I do enough zippy network-based gaming to notice latency etc. Now makes me wonder what's happening to have them at the bottom of the barrel behind types such as Talk Talk!
But I'm a lot more dubious about VM. Maybe some of our commenters who use them could enlighten me. I had heard stories about them using various means to make sure that such speed tests are unhindered as much as possible, meanwhile other traffic is shaped to oblivion. Is that still the case in your opinion?