BT’s fibre broadband speeds “match and exceed” Virgin Media’s

If your current broadband connection leaves a lot to be desired, then you might be happy to hear all the latest news when it comes to fibre technology. Various Internet service providers, such as BT Broadband and Virgin Media, have begun deploying fibre to upgrade their current networks in order to provide their users with faster access to the Internet.

Early this month, Virgin Media had announced that they had completed the first phase of their fibre deployment. The firm began rolling out fibre at the beginning of this year. The completion of the first stage will provide one third of the UK with high-speed broadband connections with download speeds of up to 100Mbps. This includes residents in Harborne in Birmingham, Lincoln, Seven Kings in Greater London, and Solihull.

BT Broadband has also been busy with their own fibre projects as well. The broadband giant announced its Fibre-to-the-Premises service that will provide superfast broadband speeds to its users. It was initially slated for completion by 2015, but accelerated rollout now has the estimated year of completion at 2014.

Earlier this week, BT revealed that the service was already available at 10 UK exchanges, with the service being called BT Infinity: Ashford, Bradwell Abbey, Chester South, Exeter, Forest Hill, Highams Park, Ilford Central, Leytonstone, St Austell and York exchanges.

That said, the competition between the two broadband firms is definitely heating up. Just recently, BT has announced that it is expanding the types of subscription plans for BT Infinity to include an option that will have a download speed of up to 100Mbps with an upload speed of 15Mbps. It is worth noting that Virgin Media’s service offers speeds of 100Mbps but with an upload speed of 10Mbps.

This new option from BT Infinity also comes bundled with unlimited weekend and evening phone calls and is priced at £35 per month.

Managing director of BT’s consumer division, John Petter, said: “We are seeing very encouraging takeup of our fibre-based broadband and we now have more than 300,000 customers. BT Infinity Option 3 matches the top speed currently available in the UK and beats the upload speed offered by Virgin Media’s best offering.”

Source – PC Advisor