[andyking]

I get about 4Mbps on a connection that advertises itself, in true British ISP fashion, as "up-to" 24Mbps. However, I pay a far less eye-watering ~$11 a month for a connection with no formal cap (although there is a "fair use policy" so if you sit seeding torrents for an entire month you're likely to get a nasty letter). It's spotty, unreliable, disconnects and reconnects at a slower speed at night and conks out if someone in the house picks the phone up.

I don't know what it's like in other countries, but no one here seems to get what their connection is "up-to". The closest I know of is a friend in London who gets about 18Mbps.

In my area, they're apparently installing FTTC (cabinet) this summer. It basically means it'll only be copper for the final 100 metres or so and will offer "up-to" 40Mbps. I'll wait and see...

[pistoriusp]

I was visiting my brother in December in London. He had 24Mbps connection from Virgin. It was saturated to death during peak times. His major problem seemed to be the upstream.

He upgraded to 50Mbps/1.5Mbps upstream and his problems went away.