Peak times see a drop in broadband connection speeds

A recent report released by a popular broadband information site found that broadband connection speeds dropped drastically during peak hours and has led to speculation on whether many of the provider will be able to cope with the increase demands on their networks.

The conclusions from a recent report on broadband connection speeds found that at peak times of day many broadband speeds fell by up to 40 percent. Tiscali was one of the providers that were tested for its worst and best broadband speeds and the difference between these two speeds last month came out at just below 40 percent, with a 25 percent drop on average.

Be broadband and O2 were at the other end of scale in the tests and had just an 11 percent difference between their worst and best. These broadband providers do, however, use the same unbundled network as each other even though they are marketed as completely separate brands.

An spokesman for the popular broadband site said “When comparing download speeds for all providers between various times of day, we can see that the average speed drops by over a quarter at peak times showing work still needs to be done to increase capacity to meet demand.”

There has, however, been an increase in the average broadband lines speeds throughout the UK according to the report from the broadband information site, which used speed tests that were carried out by users of its own site to compile its data.

The spokesman said “The average speed nationwide has increased for the first time since July 2008, up by 14.02 per cent to 3.667Mbps.” For the fourth month in a row the company named as the fastest broadband provider was Virgin Media. Virgin recently released its new 50Mbps broadband service in certain parts of the UK.