Don't!! I'm just wondering if the contention ratio changes at peak times (ie after 7pm when the casual browsing crowd come online) Maybe BT is confusing financial data for some kind of file sharing and limiting the pace. But it recognises streaming video/audio and doesn't interfere as it knows it will affect the users experience.
That occurred to me as well, but I'm certain that BT has been limiting peer-to-peer traffic (such as torrents etc) between 4pm and midnight for years. It was doing it before September and it is doing it now. So if anything BT may be curbing the traffic that uses the specific protocol used by IB to stream quotes for whatever reason after 7:05pm. That's why I need to find out what protocol IB uses to stream their quotes. At least I can ask BT for an explanation and threaten to switch to another operator if they don't fix this problem.
I was going to suggest this too, they've probably changed their policy from limiting known leeching programs to limiting all unknown programs that have a steady feed. Also, they probably delayed the time of day the strangling takes place after complaints from businesses. They (BT) can probably fix it by adding IB/TWS to their list of "approved" streams. Good luck.
Well I was just on to phone for 30 minutes with a very helpful BT Broadband tech support guy. He completely understood what my problem is and he too was puzzled as to why this happens just to streaming market data at that time of day and since Sep. 6th. There's no mention of this issue in their database and he asked around in the BT tech department but nobody was aware of this problem. I asked him to circulate an e-mail to their tech department, perhaps somebody is aware of what is causing it. In any case it would be helpful if others who are experiencing this problem called BT Broadband on 0800 111 4567 or 0330 123 4567 to report it. If BT was made aware of it by a few of their customers there's a possibility this matter may be escalated within BT's tech dept and perhaps resolved. I'm not holding my breath, but you never know, as their customer service has improved noticeably of late.
Problem solved. I set up a personal VPN with the NY server of http://strongvpn.com/ and the fatal freezing issue no longer occurs. This confirms my suspicion that the problem is being caused by BT, which back in September and without giving notice to anyone must have started to restrict certain types of data traffic (other than peer-to-peer which is blocked between 5pm and midnight) after 7:05pm, even though nobody at BT will confirm it. The VPN obviously makes IB's or any other kind of traffic inside the VPN tunnel invisible to BT filters, so nothing gets blocked any longer (including peer-to-peer stuff if anyone's interested.)
Thanks for that info, handy. I've been onto them today, worse than useless tyring to explain to them. In the end I requested a MAC code so I could switch ISP's (Be there promise never to choke traffic)
No problem. If you don't want to go to the trouble of switching operators, the VPN service I mentioned is only $7/month. Also, with most of their servers being located in the US, it allows you to watch all TV shows in HD etc on US networks' websites (unavailable if you're abroad) and peer-to-peer now also works 24 hours/day for me. I was thinking of switching operators as well, but aside from this recent annoying problem I kind of like BT Broadband, as I consistently get 8Mbs and in several years I have never experienced any outages, not even once.
Update from me: I've changed ISP to BETHERE. I was on 6 meg I'm now on 11 and the data issues have gone, very happy.