Mighty Gadget Blog: The latest technology news & reviews in the UK

Cable broadband has always seemed to be out in front in comparison to ADSL and that gap looks like its going to get even bigger with the latest news that Virgin Media will be offering 100Mbps broadband to its 4.1 million customers. That’s a staggering 24 times faster than what any of its current competitors can offer.

I currently subscribe to their 50Mbps which after a few teething problems getting my network up and running, has been outstanding. At first I didn’t really notice much difference between it and it’s 20Meg service but now it’s running smooth I can’t wait to see the full potential I’ll get when i can upgrade again. In theory at 100Mbps downloading will be lightning quick. 30 seconds for a HD TV programme and 7 and a half minutes for a full HD movie. Not to mention the speed for online gaming.

Company CEO Neil Berkett said: "There is nothing we can't do with our fibre optic cable network, and the upcoming launch of our flagship 100Mbps service will give our customers the ultimate broadband experience.” There’s already talk that Virgin Media are starting to test and pilot 200Mbps in the South West and the Midlands……………BRILLIANT!

There has been a lot of discussion and rumours of Virgin launching its 50Mbps ADSL product recently.

Virgin Media has started a viral campaign of the new product showing off the new cable modem/router they will be supplying.

While this may indicate the new service will be arriving any time soon Think Broadband previously announced that the roll out will take to April 2009 to complete and around 40% of us will have a choice of a 50Meg product by then.

Price wise it is said to cost £52 but this is unconfirmed and you will also have to sign up to a 12 month contract.

It will be interesting to see what the upload speeds are like. I find this speed becoming more and more important recently so a 50 meg down and 0.5 meg up would be a bit pointless.

It is also worth noting that cable does not suffer the same problems as ADSL when you move away from the exchange, however user congestion does play a part in the speeds.