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By Julia Kukiewicz Staff Writer
Monday, 23 February 2009
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Top 3 Truly Unlimited Broadband Packages
The best and cheapest truly unlimited broadband deals
- Plusnet Unlimited
£11.99 - £15.99 per month
The UK's first truly unlimited broadband keeps your speeds high with a traffic management system that will never put you in the slow lane.
- O2 Standard
£7.50 (O2 customer) or £12.23 (non-O2 customer)
The fairest fair use policy of them all at the best price in the UK
- Be Value
£8 for 5 mths, then £13.50 per month
Fast broadband with another very fair fair-use policy.
Compare the broadband packages of:
 Compare broadband packages from Plusnet Broadband
Compare broadband packages from O2 Broadband
Compare broadband packages from Be Broadband
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THE broadband package they said would never happen is finally here. This week Plusnet launched their very first Unlimited Broadband deal and with prices starting at just £11.99 it's a steal.
Why the big fanfare? Because Plusnet have long been famous (in the ISP world anyway) for refusing to sell so-called "unlimited broadband" and doing so very loudly.
The problem is that for a long time there's been a divide between 'unlimited' and restricted broadband packages. When you compare broadband you find that the biggest companies are often the ones offering unlimited broadband, which when you read the small print often turns out to include very restrictive fair-use policies.
These fair-use policies are unlikely to affect light to medium internet users but if you often download movies or music, you're big on online gaming or you use VoIP programmes such as Skype frequently then you could fall foul of the policy and find your broadband speed severely restricted or even cut off completely.
So, What's New?
In the past Plusnet have always offered restricted broadband packages: a certain amount of GBs and the chance to buy more or the chance to take advantage of unlimited downloads outside of peak hours. This was great, especially for very heavy downloaders, but it did have the tendency to seem a bit fiddly.
Now a few things have changed. First, Plusnet have been going from strength to strength - mostly down to their great reputation for excellent customer service and product development - so they've been able to add extra capacity to their network and there's talk of adding ADSL2+ technology at exchanges. That means more space for your usage and increased speeds.
Second, they've developed an all-new, all-singing, all-dancing traffic management system. This system prioritises the things you need fastest, like web-browsing, and downgrades those that can stand to go a bit slower, like peer to peer downloads.
That means when you're paying for an 8 mb/s download speed that's what you'll get.
Last, but certainly not least, Plusnet have launched a new pricing system based on geographical region. They've been able to do this because Ofcom have decided to deregulate the most competitive regions, saving Plusnet money in areas where customers have a choice between four or more broadband providers.
Plusnet then pass this saving onto you: so for around 65% of the country Plusnet Unlimited Broadband will cost a very healthy £11.99 a month rising to around £15.99 in other parts of the country.
Find out more about exactly how Plusnet have managed all this technical wizardry below. Or compare the best unlimited broadband deals for you with our broadband comparison tables.
How They Do It
Plusnet's new traffic management system is similar to a system that they already use for their gaming broadband: speed dependent activities like gaming, VoIP and web browsing are given the highest priority which keeps speeds high while bandwidth-guzzling activities like peer-to-peer downloads are slowed down at certain times to allow other activities faster speeds.
Even better your speeds aren't based on your personal usage, but on what you're doing at the time. So you won't have your gaming session slowed to a halt even if you were busy downloading GB's of data the night before. Similarly, if you're in the middle of a huge download but you go to surf the web your web surfing will remain fast, but at certain times your peer-to-peer downloading will run at slower speeds.
As with some of Plusnet's older packages usage between 12am and 12pm is not traffic managed at all so it still offers a perfect time for faster peer-to-peer scheduling.
The pricing works on the basis that since Ofcom have deregulated the most competitive networks broadband providers no longer have to pay BT to use those exchanges. They can then pass the savings on to the consumer.
Plusnet are the first broadband supplier to pass these savings onto their customers, and are doing so on their new packages; Plusnet Unlimited broadband and Plusnet Value broadband.
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