Need a new ISP

[Ghaz]

Hey guys,

I am leaving for Uni in about 3 weeks . So I am going to need an ISP. I currently use Sky (which when not on connect is epic). However, as a student funds are limited, so we aren't sure if we can afford Sky TV and broadband. So, I am after a decent ISP.

According to BT and another site, possible speeds in the area I am moving to are up to 5.5mbs, which is not bad. So I am looking for someone who can provide maybe up to 8mbs.

Having had a house fire I have recently been in a temp house, with sky connect. This slows down to a horrible speed during the day, like 0.2mbs, to the point where downloading a .torrent file take a looong time. So I would rather an ISP than can offer reasonable constant speed (a little slowdown is okay, just not the difference of a few kbs to 800kbs like here).

As I will be sharing a house, a decent download limit is needed, maybe 40GB+.

My other concern is how much they monitor you (I like to torrent >.>). I heard virgin like to watch you closely.

So, what would you guys recommend?

Also, woo for passing my A-Levels!

 

[rapidman17]

02 8 meg comes to £4 a month if you use the quidco £70 cashback.... im not sure if it is still running though...

Got ma results as well- wat dya get lol?

 

[Ghaz]

02 8 meg comes to £4 a month if you use the quidco £70 cashback.... im not sure if it is still running though...

Got ma results as well- wat dya get lol?

A in physics, B in Maths, B in Further Maths.

If I did not have a major house fire the month before the exams I think I would have got an A in maths, as I was aiming for an A. But ABB got me into my first choice .

You?

 

[rapidman17]

ABB is good man, you doin engineering or something?

AS results were AAA in Eng Lit, Geo, Business Economics.....

Still A2 to go so no break for me....

 

[I Hunta x]

Virgin 10 meg is very good value if you get it in a package, not sure about stand alone.

I get 10 meg, Large TV package, Unlimited any time house phone, and 300 mins unlimited texts mobile thingy for £40 a month.

Cant fault it imo, in the ~5 years ive had virgin/ntl its only been down for around 72 hours, and 48 of them were maintenance we were told about.

9/10

 

[sprento]

For what it's worth Ghaz, Ive been downloading the F*+K out of Virgin with every legal torrent file available come film or game and I'm still here. O2 is prob the best for the price over speed but I don't know your availability so it's not a choice I can make. I know O2 offer a wireless for up to 8 MB pretty much anywhere in the UK however I don't know your options, who's available ?

 

[llwyd]

If bt say you can get 5.5 on adsl then check if your exchange supports bulldog/C&W LLU services. Virgin National do an 8mb adsl2+ service for pretty cheap and there is no capping, the system cant support it. You will be traffic shaped on certain things in the evening but there are ways around that If you know how long your line is I can fine out the noise and attenuation for you and tell you exactly what speed you can get, got some guy in works adsl2+ service bumped up to 22 meg last week

Plus you have the advantage of being able to contact me about any problems hehe

O2 / Be* are also pretty good, again best to go for an LLU service rather than IPStream

 

[SwaleSmith]

bethere broadband is adsl2+ and I am acheiving 14mb which Im very pleased with.

llwyd I tried to get be* to boost my speed but they said its at the fastest setting anything I can do (useing stock thomson modem)

 

[Talonaer]

id definately recommend bethere, keeps me and 5 housemates happy at 10mbps where we live almost 2.5k m from the exchange!!!

 

[llwyd]

bethere broadband is adsl2+ and I am acheiving 14mb which Im very pleased with.

llwyd I tried to get be* to boost my speed but they said its at the fastest setting anything I can do (useing stock thomson modem)

ST330 or ST510? The st330 maxes out at 8mbps. They can do it by lowering your SNR to the edge of stability but wont, its often against policy as then the same people will moan about having intermittant PPP links and synchro. Same with people requesting interleaving be removed,

 

[Ghaz]

@rapidman: Nice man, well done. I'm doing Physics, Astrophysics and Cosmology. It sucks that I didn't get the second A, I could have got a scholarship. B is the best I could have managed in Further Maths, some of that stuff is hard . GL with A2 though.

@llwyd: Wait, what is adsl2+? Don't think I have heard of that before. According to the site I went off, the postcode to where I am moving is 0.79km from the exchange, but I don't know what would be the best way to find out if it supports that stuff.

Otherwise virgin sounds quite good, would it be good to get the phone line from them rather than BT?

 

[I Hunta x]

its deff worth giving virgin a call about there bundles, or just look online.

online bundle page thingy:

http://allyours.virginmedia.com/html/bundles/index.html

 

[llwyd]

@llwyd: Wait, what is adsl2+? Don't think I have heard of that before. According to the site I went off, the postcode to where I am moving is 0.79km from the exchange, but I don't know what would be the best way to find out if it supports that stuff.

Otherwise virgin sounds quite good, would it be good to get the phone line from them rather than BT?

There is no advantage currently to taking line rental other than its ever so slightly cheaper and support is easier. You wont get told to ring BT to have PSTN checks done, then have to ring them again to close the automatically opened fault ticket so virgin can proceed with raising a ticket. I and another spent a long time testing the line rental provisioning systems prior to release and it all works flawlessly, however, as it stands, other parts of the live system (ie. the middleman system between us and BT) is playing up, couple that with the fact that BT limit wlr orders to 1000 a day and we've been taking 1500+, things are a bit sketchy. What happens to the excess orders I hear you cry...nothing, they fail and stay at the bottom of the pile until there is a drop in orders. Personally, if planning to take line rental I would leave it another month until phase 2 kicks off

Usually if your sync speed in your router is matching or higher than what samknows says you can get, you'll be on adsl2+ (providing theres nothing wrong with your line or CPE). Or try running a test on speedtester.bt.com - if it works youre on adsl, if not, adsl2+

 

[SwaleSmith]

llwyd....help!!!

Since last night my broadband with be* has gone ape it fell to an unstable 7mb/sec and after a few router-reboots got an unstable 9.5mb/sec I have been stable ever since I have been with be with speed profile setting on and gaming off and a brilliant 14mb/sec stable.

Nothing has changed with my line, I have updated the firmware (no difference) and changed all my filters, also tried the test socket and no improvement was told to call a funny number (1770 i think) to do a noise test but could here nothing wrong....be are monitering my line for 24hr but, after speaking to them many times and judging by what the have told me to do etc I have no confidence they are sort of hinting to me this is the best even though I explain that I have been at a stable 14mb!

Have been really happy with Be's service but I am now only stable on the slowest speed profile @ 6mb/sec what a downgrade!

Gonna give them till tomorrow if it cant be resolved may go elsewhere if not are there any other good adsl2+ providers out there??

Or better still do you have any ideas on the trouble???

p.s I use the colnbrook (SL3 9NZ) exchange

 

[llwyd]

llwyd....help!!!

Since last night my broadband with be* has gone ape it fell to an unstable 7mb/sec and after a few router-reboots got an unstable 9.5mb/sec I have been stable ever since I have been with be with speed profile setting on and gaming off and a brilliant 14mb/sec stable.

Nothing has changed with my line, I have updated the firmware (no difference) and changed all my filters, also tried the test socket and no improvement was told to call a funny number (1770 i think) to do a noise test but could here nothing wrong....be are monitering my line for 24hr but, after speaking to them many times and judging by what the have told me to do etc I have no confidence they are sort of hinting to me this is the best even though I explain that I have been at a stable 14mb!

Have been really happy with Be's service but I am now only stable on the slowest speed profile @ 6mb/sec what a downgrade!

Gonna give them till tomorrow if it cant be resolved may go elsewhere if not are there any other good adsl2+ providers out there??

Or better still do you have any ideas on the trouble???

p.s I use the colnbrook (SL3 9NZ) exchange

What router is it youre using? Check your downstream in the router to make sure it's not a throughput issue. When youre losing your connection you need to diagnose whether it is the DSL or the PPP link that is dropping, paste your router logs up if youre not sure.

Ring them and ask them to find your current downstream, SNR and attenuation and let me know. They will pull their readings from modems at the other end of your line, comparing them with the stats in your router can be helpful

Dont jump ship just yet, it's rarely the providers fault so its worth giving them a chance. If they have a decent email support system (unlike virgin) I would be happy to deal with it for you if theyre struggling lol, I often guide virgin cable tech support around their own systems if I have an issue

 

[mrapoc]

Idnet...but i dont pay for it/its not cheap

I cant get LLU around here anyway apart from *shudder* Orange

O2 are supposedly the nicest of the LLUs

 

[SwaleSmith]

What router is it youre using? Check your downstream in the router to make sure it's not a throughput issue. When youre losing your connection you need to diagnose whether it is the DSL or the PPP link that is dropping, paste your router logs up if youre not sure.

Ring them and ask them to find your current downstream, SNR and attenuation and let me know. They will pull their readings from modems at the other end of your line, comparing them with the stats in your router can be helpful

Dont jump ship just yet, it's rarely the providers fault so its worth giving them a chance. If they have a decent email support system (unlike virgin) I would be happy to deal with it for you if theyre struggling lol, I often guide virgin cable tech support around their own systems if I have an issue

Useing the supplied thomson one think its a 585v7 how do I bring up router logs I'll post them....they did also say that there was noise on the line from there end?

 

[Ghaz]

Right, I will probably go with virgin. I also think I will go with BT for the line rental, because if I fall out with virgin for some reason (I've had bad experiences with ISPs) I won't have the faff around with changing the line rental. I'm not going to worry about the torrent watching because the piratebay guys should be releasing their VPN soon. Thanks for your help guys!

 

[SwaleSmith]

Changed filters and renewed my phone line all is fine back upto 13,780mb

I highly recommend Be* they seem faster and much better value unless of course your able to get fibre

 

[Bungral]

O2... They use Be*'s line or the other way around. They are one and the same really but big savings can be made with O2 if you have P&G or monthly contract (£5 p/m I believe) plus you can get umm it was £60 cash back for me from Quidco... Think you can get it down to something stupid like £3.50 a month by doing that.