June 10, 2011
Virgin Media’s 100Mb fibre broadband is now available to over 4 million UK homes with the rollout of this ultrafast broadband set to continue.
 Virgin’s fibre optic broadband network covers 13 million UK homes that by mid-2012 should hopefully all be covered by this 100Mb broadband that Virgin are rolling out. Currently over 100 towns across the UK have access to this super fast network from Virgin Media. Their fibre network consists of fibre optic cable to the street-side cabinet and then a coaxial cable form there to the users home to help offer these super fast speeds.
Virgin are able to boast that this 100Mb fibre broadband service can offer broadband speeds up to 16 times faster than the UK average broadband speed (reported by Ofcom in March to be 6.2Mb) and will mean that it could take just 5 seconds to download a full music album, a TV show in 30 seconds or a HD movie in 7 minutes.
Despite the big headline speeds the costs are still extremely competitive form Virgin, with the 100Mb broadband available from Virgin for just £35 per month when taken with a phone line, or for £45 when taken as a stand alone product.
Virgin are not looking to rest on their laurels with this headline package, they are already trialling a 200Mb broadband service and also believe that their network will have the potential to deliver broadband speeds up to a staggering 400Mb in the future.
Virgin Media executive director of broadband, Jon James, said:
“As data consumption rises and consumers grow increasingly reliant on their broadband service, only Virgin Media’s unique network is primed to cater for the UK’s impending data explosion. With four million homes now able to ‘get in the fast lane’ with our 100Mb service, the UK is racing up the broadband league tables and we’re delighted to be playing the leading role in boosting the UK’s digital infrastructure.“
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March 16, 2011
100Mb broadband is now available to 1 million UK homes via Virgin Media’s cable network.
 Virgin Media are aiming to have the 100Mb broadband speeds available to all of its network by mid 2012 which would then mean that half of UK homes (13 million) would be able to sign up to this superfast broadband speed.
The executive director of broadband at Virgin Media, Jon James said;
“Reaching the one million home milestone1 is a hugely important step in ensuring consumers are able to keep up with the latest developments in this digitally connected world. We had more then 10,000 registrations on the first day we unveiled 100Mb so there is real desire for better broadband and all the wonderful things you can do with a fast connection. When we finish the roll-out of 100Mb across our network, half the country will have access to ultrafast broadband. That’ll be six years ahead of EU targets.”
The 100Mb broadband is available for £35 per month when it is bundled with other virgin Media services or for £45 when bought as a single product.
Virgin are keeping themselves in front in the broadband speed stakes with the new BT Infinity network only going to be offering fibre broadband speeds of up to 40Mb for the majority of place thats will be covered, despite the fact that BT are launching their own 110Mb broadband service for the premises that they connect will full fibre to the home.
The list of places that are currently enabled to receive the 100Mb fibre broadband from Virgin Media are:
- Barrhead, Renfrewshire
- Barry, South Wales
- Bedford, Bedfordshire
- Canniesburn, Scotland
- Cardiff, Wales
- Cheshunt, Hertfordshire
- Colchester, Essex
- Cwmbran, South Wales
- Dunstable, Bedfordshire
- Ely, Cambridgeshire
- Enfield, Greater London
- Epsom, Surrey
- Farnborough, Hampshire
- Gorseinon, Wales
- Grantham, Lincolnshire
- Greenock, Scotland
- Guildford, Surrey
- Hatfield, Hertfordshire
- Heckmondwike, West Yorkshire
- Hinckley, Leicestershire
- Leatherhead, Surrey
- Nailsea, Somerset
- Pentwyn, South Wales
- Port Talbot, South Wales
- Refrew, Renfrewshire
- Rotherham, South Yorkshire
- Sketty, South Wales
- Southport, Merseyside
- St Mellons, South Wales
- Stevenage, Cambridgeshire
- Stockport, Greater Manchester
- Telford, Shropshire
- Treforest, South Wales
- Trowbridge, Wiltshire
- Wardley, Greater Manchester
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December 8, 2010
Virgin Media’s 100Mb broadband has now gone live for 4 lucky towns which make them the places with the fastest broadband in the UK.
The 4 towns of Heckmondwike, Farnborough, Colchester and Barry in South Wales were the initial 4 places to have the new “ultra-fast” Virgin Media 100Mb fibre broadband go live. Along with the 100Mb download speeds it will also offer 10Mb upload speeds which is faster than much of the country can even manage as a download speed.
The new 100Mb broadband does require a new N standard router to deal with the increased speeds, however the router is future proof as it can deal with potential broadband speeds of 400Mb which may come in the future.
The cost for the Virgin 100Mb fibre optic broadband is £45 per month as a stand alone product although this is reduced to £35 per month when it is also taken along with a phone line from Virgin Media at £12.24 per month. Installation of the service is £40.
It is expected that the new service will be rolled out to the whole of the Virgin Media network by around mid-2012 which would cover around half of the UK.
Not to be left too far behind, BT are to launch their own 110Mb broadband service (conveniently slightly faster than Virgin Media) around March 2011. However, this will only be available to customers who receive FTTH/P (Fibre To The Home/Premises) from BT, although BT’s roll out of fibre optics in the main will be FTTC (Fibre To The Cabinet) which will offer a download speed of up to 40Mb.
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October 26, 2010
100Mb broadband from Virgin Media could arrive this week if Prime Minister David Cameron is to be believed.
The Prime Minister said during a Confederation of British Industry (CBI) conference that Virgin Media would be launching a super fast broadband 100Mb broadband service this week.
What Mr Cameron said was:
“…we’ll work with utility companies to get more investment in our energy, with construction companies on our roads, with the telecommunications industry on broadband. This collaboration is already working. Virgin Media is rolling out a new superfast broadband service this week.”
He soon followed up and said about the 100Mb broadband connection.
Virgin Media have not confirmed or denied the date that their new 100Mb broadband service is due to launch but it would be quite a safe bet that it will be some time this week if the prime minister is talking about it’s launch.
Last week it came out that a BT 110Mb fibre broadband service would be launched in March next year, with the cynical amongst us thinking it was to get “one up” on Virgin Media to be able to say that they are offering the fastest broadband in the UK.
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March 15, 2010
If The Conservatives win the General Election they have pledged to deliver 100Mb fibre broadband across Britain by 2017.
Having just launched their “Technology Manifesto” it says that:
“We will be the first country in Europe to extend superfast 100 mbs broadband across most of the population. This is up to 50 times faster than Labour’s planned broadband network – and will open up new opportunities for the next generation of British high tech companies, and put Britain at an advantage when it comes to developing innovative online platforms and services.”
The wording above is a bit mis-leasding as they are comparing the minimum 2Mb Universal broadband that Labour have and not Labours aim of having 90% of the UK covered with Next Generation fibre broadband by 2017, which will be in part funded by the controversial 50p per month “broadband tax” that will be applied to every landline in the UK.
They would also hold BT to it’s word on requiring them to open up their ducts for other companies to lay their own fibre in them to houses where it is available and in return part of the BBC License fees would be used by BT to help deliver high speed broadband to more rural areas where the cost would be too high otherwise for BT to make it a commercially viable option.
The manifesto also read:
“Our plans will give Britain the fastest high speed broadband network in Europe, helping to create 600,000 additional jobs. We will make the British government the most technology-friendly in the world, and meet our ambition that the next generation of Googles, Microsofts and Facebooks are British companies”
It is good to see that with this election that technology and in-particularly high speed broadband is quite an important factor to it which we hope will result in the investment that is needed to make sure that Britain does rise up the ranks of high speed broadband nations instead of falling behind other advancing nations.
The General Election is widely anticipated to be on May 6th.
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