Comment : BT & Virgin Media Fiber Based Broadband Comparison

BT has just unveiled a new super fast broadband service, Infinity, which is likely to give some nightmares to the bean counters at Virgin Media with an "unlimited" 40mbps phone line costing £25 per month.

But things are far from being as crystal clear as one might have wished. For starters, while offering "unlimited" broadband, both Virgin media and BT have different definitions for the term.

Telegraph says that BT's unlimited package is actually limited to 100GB per month although BT's fair usage policy page (here) specifies that "unlimited" would be subject to network management, commonly known as traffic shaping.

By contrast, although Virgin Media does have a similar set of terms and conditions for its XXL service, they told the Telegraph that none of its estimated 40,000 customers had ever been penalised for downloading too much content.

Then there's the speed difference, Virgin Media offers a 50mbps download speeds with upload speeds of a few mbps. While BT's Infinity download speed only reach 40mbps, its upload speed goes up to 10mbps which is the fastest quoted upload speed we've seen around.

When it comes to pricing, there are finer details that prospective customers need to scrutinise on both sides. The Virgin Media offer carries a first year TCO of £412 for the first year or £36 per month (if you take their phone line) while BT carries a monthly cost of £36.53 even when the line rental is included.