[RetroEd]

Is anyone with BT for their broadband?

I'm having major hassle with Orange. In over five years I've never had any trouble, but my livebox router keeps restarting itself now. I've tried everything, new box, new power supply, relocating the livebox, restoring the firmware... multiple calls to Orange and just twenty minutes ago it reset itself. They suggested I try it wired, so as a last resort I am. I've always been wireless though, so don't see how this will help, my 360, iPod and all the other stuff is still wireless. I'm just waiting for it to disconnect with a wired connection now, and then I'll be giving Orange another call.

[Ben]

I was with BT for a while and they were fucking horrendous. We were supposed to be uncapped, but the 'fair usage' limit was so low that they restricted us every month. And when we had problems if it was anything more complicated than resetting the router they were useless.

If you can I'd say get Virgin, they've been pretty solid for us

[JimboXiii]

ditto for virgin, esp if you are lucky enough to be in a cable area.

We've just gone with Sky, for some reason even though we leave on a newly built estate, we can't get full broadband speeds, limit is 6.5mb. When i ran a speed check last night it was a lightning fast 436kb... My 3 mobile dongle was faster than that, i fucking hate Sky. Half the channels don't work on the telly either because the whole housing complex has a shared receiver (we don't have a dish, just some sky points in the front room) but the signal strength is so low we're missing about 15-20 channels. Sky say it isn't there problem even though its there fucking equipment. bunch of robbing cunts.

[RetroEd]

I've just requested my MAC code from Orange. I've tried literally everything, and still get random restarts. They're sending out another Livebox because they're adamant that that's where the problem lies, but come on, they have to know it's not by now. So I called the UK customer services and should have my MAC emailed to me within five days.

I have looked at Virgin but I'm out of their main range so can't get as good a deal as elsewhere, same with O2. A few friends have BT and can't seem to praise it enough, but I'm aware that everyone seems to have varying experiences as far as broadband goes. A couple months ago I would have recommended Orange to anyone.

The one I was looking at was the BT Unlimited Option 3 (you'll have to click the unlimited option 3 tab to view it). It's more than I'm paying now, but I have to get away from Orange as I can't play an online game for fear of being disconnected. It's seriously done my nut, been on the phone to technical support constantly for the last week and a half.

[RetroEd]

I just had another look on Vigin Media, and it looks like I can get a package for a not too unreasonable price, cheaper than BT anyway.

The Broadband XL + Phone XL Unlimited bundle is normally £26 but because I'm out of the cheapo range it would be £30. It looks like that will include my BT line rental as it says I'll only get one bill, but it doesn't explicitly say this. Can anyone confirm that's correct? £30 for line rental, unlimited calls and unlimited broadband doesn't sound too bad.

There's also a £35 one-off startup fee apparently.

Quote

£6.00 for the first 2 months*
*When you take a Virgin Phone Line for £11 a month.
Then from £30.00 a month after that.

That's what made me think line rental was on top of the £30 charge.

[JimboXiii]

you will have to have either a phone line with virgin or with BT, not sure if that is included within the £30 though, IIRC when i spoke to them last year, line rental is included in the price. I don't understand this "range" thing. I wanted to go with o2 because i get discount because of my mobile contract, but i was out of "range" with them. Doesn't it just come down the phone line, or am i missing something?

[RetroEd]

Ah, just went to confirm the order to see if it gave me any extra details, and it did.

Quote

One-off costs
* Activation fee £35.00
* Connection costs £0.00

Freebies
* Wireless kit FREE

Monthly costs
* Broadband XL £0.00
* Phone XL Talk Unlimited £6.00
* Line rental £11.00
* Line features £0.00

Total monthly cost (inc VAT)
* First two months £17.00
* Thereafter £41.00

So it would actually cost £41 a month, which is about the same as BT. Not only that, but I'm pretty sure BT do rolling 12 month contracts now, so I'd have to pay to get out of that, and the £35 Virgin connection fee. I think I may just go with BT, seems easier.

And yeah, I don't get the range thing either. Just another way of making extra cash, I guess.

[JimboXiii]

bummer, oh well. People i know that are on BT seem to get on fine with it. Like you mentioned earlier everyone has horror stories about all the major ISP's.

[Craymen Edge]

Until BT "Upgraded" my exchange, rendering me without a usuable connection for most of November and December, I was with Plusnet. Until then they'd been pretty good, and reliable for over 4 years.

Not sure how they measure up against BT broadband, but they have some good offerings in terms of download limits, or traffic shaping.


I'm with Virgin now, my phone and broadband are both on cable. When I signed up I got charged the £35 activation fee, but also got a £35 credit paid back to me the same month. It might be worth talking to a rep if there's a virginmedia store near you.

As for the internet access, the first time the speed indicator went over 1.1MB/s while downloading a file, made me happier then a grown man really should be about such things.

[JimboXiii]

Craymen Edge, on 18 January 2010 - 04:10 PM, said:

As for the internet access, the first time the speed indicator went over 1.1MB/s while downloading a file, made me happier then a grown man really should be about such things.

THIS.

plus its great for streaming *cough cough* "videos" *cough cough*

[Sly Reflex]

Dude, I'm on BT and I pay £15 a month for option 3 which is unlimited downloads and free calls (not including line rental). Granted, I've been with them since day one, but you should totally get on to them and haggle a good deal out as I'm sure they would just be happy that they were taking a customer from one of the other companies more than anything. My speeds are really shit, but for the most they are stable. You get random NAT issues but it can always be sorted with a quick reset of the router. I think that's just the home hub though, it's not as good as a netgear or belkin, but you have got to use it if you want the VoiP phone handsets.

[RetroEd]

Yeah, I think giving BT a call may be the way forward. It won;t hurt to give it a try anyway, in hope of a better deal.

My third Livebox turned up today from Orange. It's been connected for 12 hours so far with no disconnections, but I'm expecting it to drop any time soon. It's completely random, so I'll keep an eye on it. My MAC code arrived in my inbox from Orange today also, so I'm free to switch over when I am ready.

[RetroEd]

It was going well, then the replacement Livebox decided to restart itself twice in the last ten minutes. Bye bye, Orange.

[spatular]

not sure if this is the right place but i'm having broadband problems too, as in it's not working at all, the sync light is off on the router, which seems to mean either the router is broke or there's a problem on the line. i'll try and change the microfilter and maybe try an old usb modem tonight. Anyone have any ideas what else to check?

sorry i'm no help Ed, we're on madasafish, i wouldn't really say anything bad or good about them, just seems like standard service.

[Craymen Edge]

spatular, on 22 January 2010 - 10:48 AM, said:

not sure if this is the right place but i'm having broadband problems too, as in it's not working at all, the sync light is off on the router, which seems to mean either the router is broke or there's a problem on the line. i'll try and change the microfilter and maybe try an old usb modem tonight. Anyone have any ideas what else to check?

sorry i'm no help Ed, we're on madasafish, i wouldn't really say anything bad or good about them, just seems like standard service.

Getting the insulting your intelligence question out of the way first: have you tested your line still works for calls?

Testing with another router would be great, also you can try using the test socket http://www.plus.net/...st_socket.shtml

[spatular]

Thanks Craymen, i'll try out some of that tonight i checked there was a dial tone but never rang anyone, my mum will no doubt test that out soon enough.

[JimboXiii]

i just had a thought about your Router. It might be you have to many devices connecting wirelessly to it.

[RetroEd]

I don't think I had too many things connected. At one point I've had seven or eight things connected. It has been playing up with just the laptop, 360 and iPod connected recently. Orange sent me a Siemens router/modem and it seems to be working better, although I don't get the free second line calls like I did with the Livebox.

Anyway, I went onto BT.com earlier and have set up broadband with them, and have an unlimited anytime call package for the landline which is an extra 4.99 a month. I've gone for one of the cheaper broadband packages as I can always upgrade if I need more bandwidth, if I go over two months running I get charged an extra quid per GB I think, but they send emails if I'm anywhere approaching it, but it's pretty much impossible to downgrade these days.

BT reckon my broadband will be switched over by the 1st of Feb. I'm canceling my Orange direct debit next week.

[JimboXiii]

here is the speed check from my internet



no, I'm not on dial up

[Ben]

Sunday night is as bad a time to test as you're going to get tbf to the isp's. We pay for 10, quite often get that (9.4 anyway) but yeah, it does take a hit at peak times