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Post by quadfather on Mar 23, 2024 12:45:35 GMT
I've also got a ps4 downstairs plugged directly in the router, so I'll download something on that and check
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Post by quadfather on Mar 23, 2024 14:42:42 GMT
And I see a gigabit switch now days fetches the princely sum of 26 pounds, so that's manageable
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Post by dfunked on Apr 5, 2024 8:01:10 GMT
I've just taken the risky move of switching from BT to Vodafone for 900Mb interwebs a couple of months before my contract ends. Apparently they offer up to £100 assistance with termination fees, which should just about cover it (and I get a £40 voucher too)
I was getting sick of double April price increases, so moving renewal date back a bit means I'll only have an extra month of April price increases in future.
Hopefully they're not going to be complete shit seeing as I'm using my own router.
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X201
Full Member
Posts: 5,148
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Post by X201 on Apr 5, 2024 15:00:59 GMT
Had an automated offer from Virgin Media: everything I have now for £15 less.
BT is three times faster and a further £15 cheaper.
I pressed the reject offer button.
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Post by quadfather on Apr 5, 2024 15:37:28 GMT
At 150mbps you should be getting at least 15MB/s download so it sounds like something is amiss somewhere. Now you mention in, I've got a really old 6 port switch in the attic. Totally skipped my mind to check the capacity of that. I bet its a little shitty 100mb switch or something. I'll have to check. Cheers for that Aaaaaand it was a shitty 100mb switch! Aaaaand 2 of the powerline adapters are only 600, not 900, so I've ordered replacements. However, the good news is now I've upgraded to 900, my ps4 downstairs that is directly connected to the router is now super fucking fast. It estimated 8 minutes to download doom3 and that's 15gb. Happy with that. I'm sure the stuff in the attic via the powerlines will be lower, but at least I've removed the bottlenecks as much as I can now. |
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Post by muddyfunster on Apr 6, 2024 7:48:55 GMT
I've just taken the risky move of switching from BT to Vodafone for 900Mb interwebs a couple of months before my contract ends. Apparently they offer up to £100 assistance with termination fees, which should just about cover it (and I get a £40 voucher too) I was getting sick of double April price increases, so moving renewal date back a bit means I'll only have an extra month of April price increases in future. Hopefully they're not going to be complete shit seeing as I'm using my own router. I also ditched BT for Vodafone though where we are we can only get 40Mbps ADSL. I kept the Vodafone modem/router but only using it as a modem with my downstream Unifi router in a DMZ to avoid double NAT. Seems to work pretty well, though I have had one incident of speeds dropping by half and a power cycle of the Vodafone box sorted it. Hopefully that proves infrequent. |
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Post by dfunked on Apr 6, 2024 7:59:11 GMT
From what I've read you can just contact support to get credentials off them, then just whack them into the PPPoE settings on your own router. (but yeah, would be a bit different for FTTC as you'll need a modem for that)
I'll probably set up their router temporarily though as it's due to go live on a working day and I can't fanny about with my connection much.
My BT router never even came out of the box. I opened it up for the first time the other day to see if I could nick the power supply for something else.
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Post by vicedestroyer on Apr 6, 2024 13:37:27 GMT
I've just taken the risky move of switching from BT to Vodafone for 900Mb interwebs a couple of months before my contract ends. Apparently they offer up to £100 assistance with termination fees, which should just about cover it (and I get a £40 voucher too) I was getting sick of double April price increases, so moving renewal date back a bit means I'll only have an extra month of April price increases in future. Hopefully they're not going to be complete shit seeing as I'm using my own router. I take it, this is part of the CityFibre network? I am very interested to see what reliability is like with them. I am currently with BT and for whatever reason, my full fibre connection is costing me about £80 a month. My contract is up in August and I expect I can renegotiate my price. But I am happy to change to any of the providers from CityFibre. I am looking forward to your 3 month appraisal. |
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Post by quadfather on Apr 6, 2024 13:42:50 GMT
I've had BeFibre doing the rounds up here (north-west) along with virgin.
The BeFibre costs are pretty competitive I have to say. I was paying £39 for standard talktalk broadband which isn't even worth comparing speeds with fibre. 900mbps with BeFibre is costing me £15 a month for 3 months, then it's £30 per month afterwards on a 2 year contract.
They've even got a better deal than that now, only for new customers where the first 6 months are £5 a month, then it goes up to £34.
Both of those deals are still cheaper than talktalk anyway. And you're getting 900.
I've had it for about 3 weeks now and touch wood, everything is faultless. (Apart from my bottlenecks which is my issue and I've sorted now anyway). So pretty good experience so far for sure.
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Post by dfunked on Apr 6, 2024 17:16:34 GMT
vicedestroyer nope, Openreach only around here unfortunately. I'd bloody love a symmetrical connection!
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crashV👀d👀
Junior Member
not just a game anymore...
Posts: 3,892
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Post by crashV👀d👀 on Apr 6, 2024 20:07:42 GMT
I've had BeFibre doing the rounds up here (north-west) along with virgin. The BeFibre costs are pretty competitive I have to say. I was paying £39 for standard talktalk broadband which isn't even worth comparing speeds with fibre. 900mbps with BeFibre is costing me £15 a month for 3 months, then it's £30 per month afterwards on a 2 year contract. They've even got a better deal than that now, only for new customers where the first 6 months are £5 a month, then it goes up to £34. Both of those deals are still cheaper than talktalk anyway. And you're getting 900. I've had it for about 3 weeks now and touch wood, everything is faultless. (Apart from my bottlenecks which is my issue and I've sorted now anyway). So pretty good experience so far for sure. Exactly this. I'm on MS3 networks and using MTH (Monkey Tree Hosting) as my ISP. Frankly the cost baffles me. It's loads cheaper than PlusNet and that's not even counting the landline I no longer have to pay for. .99p for 3 months and then £29.50 after that for the 18 month contract. I use the term loosely but it's a bloody steal in comparison to what I was paying and getting before hand |
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Post by Dougs on Apr 6, 2024 20:40:19 GMT
The network operators have had a huge amount of investment and that's predicated on a good amount of take up in an area, so they are pricing competitively with their anchor ISP. MS3 are trying to break the KCom monopoly, so are more incentivised to price well. In reality, there's going to be a lot of consolidation shortly but for the most part, consumers won't feel it.
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Post by quadfather on Apr 7, 2024 12:12:15 GMT
Just powerlined my whole house now. Fuck me, I'm knackered. The back of the house is 4 storeys. Up and down the bloody stairs multiple times!
The powerlines are a slight bottle neck but it's still an absolute massive improvement all round the house now.
Done!
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Post by monkman5000 on Apr 10, 2024 10:34:31 GMT
Thinking about moving off Virgin fibre, which we've had for about 14 years, and switching to Sky (also fibre). Never really had a problem with Virgin, it's been very reliable in general, but it's getting too expensive compared to the competition - even if I tell them I'm leaving. Is this a bad move? Is Sky a decent option? I used the Uswitch website and it came out on top.
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Post by vicedestroyer on Apr 10, 2024 10:52:11 GMT
The way I see it and I'm happy to have my logic corrected, is that when choosing ISPs, you look at who provides the network. Virgin has its own network. Sky broadband is provided by Openreach. Since BT owns Openreach, you might as well sign up with them, if the price is right.
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Post by SpiralScratch on Apr 10, 2024 11:34:16 GMT
Service-wise I have no complaints about Sky but worth bearing in mind that the price you pay after your first 18 months may end up being not much different to what you're paying now with Virgin.
I'm paying £38 a month for 150Mbps which is about the best I can do on standard Openreach as I'm a long way from the cabinet. I think that package is £29 for new customers. You can do the haggle rigmarole with them at contract renewal obviously, I should the next time it comes around.
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crashV👀d👀
Junior Member
not just a game anymore...
Posts: 3,892
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Post by crashV👀d👀 on Apr 10, 2024 11:44:07 GMT
The line service is largely out of their hands I believe unless they have their own equipment in the exchange (not sure if this is still a thing). If the line service is stable for the most part (I only ever had 2 issues in 15+ years) then the differentiators become the customer service and home equipment.
Both sky and Plusnet who I had to raise them with were fast to resolve and kept me up to speed throughout so
little engagement but what I did have was good.
for equipment, sky had a router with only 2 lan ports and you did't have access to the credentials to use your own equipment.
Plusnet had a dual modem and hub combo which was eventually replaced by a single router. I went this route for the extra ports but the new router is shitballs so I eventually just bought my own better kit and just used the modem.
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Post by SpiralScratch on Apr 10, 2024 11:50:52 GMT
further to that, I think with BT's own FTTC contract you can use your own router provided you don't need voice, not so with Sky as you say.
the new Sky router has 4 LAN ports, I need all 4. Wifi coverage could be better but that may be more down to my house and not a great location for the router. I need a booster for upstairs at the back.
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Gruf
Junior Member
Even more taciturn than my name suggests
Posts: 1,615
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Post by Gruf on Apr 10, 2024 12:00:08 GMT
Still with TalkTalk even though my contract with them ran out a few years ago, they just kept me on my usual rate, £26 for 65mps, the best I can get at my place.
Have not been able to find a significant saving anywhere else so just stuck with them, might try a Black Friday deal for BB and TV at some point, but not really fussed, I can "obtain" everything I need to watch.
Didn't realise that some won't let you use your own router though, thats a must for me.
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Bongo Heracles
Junior Member
Technically illegal to ride on public land
Posts: 4,661
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Post by Bongo Heracles on Apr 10, 2024 12:13:00 GMT
The way I see it and I'm happy to have my logic corrected, is that when choosing ISPs, you look at who provides the network. Virgin has its own network. Sky broadband is provided by Openreach. Since BT owns Openreach, you might as well sign up with them, if the price is right. They all have their own back end infrastructure and capacity issues. I was let out of a Vodafone contract a year early because they were completely oversubscribed in my area and Sky, for example, have the occasional outage when their DNS servers shit themselves. But sky are generally fine, to the point that I'm reluctant to be leaving them after 4 years but they just refuse to accept my house is capable of hitting speeds of over 150mb. 'So why is it raining leaflets from gigaclear and hey broadband offering me 1gb and *every* speed checker other than yours offers a minimum of 500mb?' 'They must not be accurate' |
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Post by rhaegyr on Apr 10, 2024 12:26:08 GMT
Sky have been incredibly reliable for me but I get a pretty poor price now as I've been with them 5+ years.
Switching to Virgin as soon as I can as they're new in my area (and the prices are decent with me already being an O2 mobile customer) and I'll just get a dodgy Firestick for IPTV.
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Bongo Heracles
Junior Member
Technically illegal to ride on public land
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Post by Bongo Heracles on Apr 10, 2024 12:35:33 GMT
Ive got the full beans with them, tv, mobile and BB all up for renewal this year. I'm fine keeping the telly if they price it right but the other two are definitely moving.
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Post by quadfather on Apr 10, 2024 12:37:54 GMT
Sky have been incredibly reliable for me but I get a pretty poor price now as I've been with them 5+ years. Switching to Virgin as soon as I can as they're new in my area (and the prices are decent with me already being an O2 mobile customer) and I'll just get a dodgy Firestick for IPTV. Have a look into the iptv stick capacity beforehand as my mate has got a dodgy one and just got 900mpbs fibre and the stick doesn't accept the extra capacity so not sure if you need one that has higher bandwidth capability. I don't know much more than that as I haven't got one but my mate is scratching his head about it at the moment |
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cubby
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doesn't get subtext
Posts: 6,403
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Post by cubby on Apr 10, 2024 12:41:56 GMT
Local broadband company does 500mbps for £22 a month, so thinking of switching to that from sky.
Only thing is that the sky q box is so convenient as it acts as a powerline booster as well, so will miss that.
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Post by monkman5000 on Apr 10, 2024 13:19:34 GMT
So I'm gathering that Sky is OK but you have to use their router? I've just bought a decent 3-unit mesh system, so that's no good. You can't set the Sky box to modem-only mode (or whatever the non-Virgin equivalent is)?
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Bongo Heracles
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Technically illegal to ride on public land
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Post by Bongo Heracles on Apr 10, 2024 13:26:52 GMT
You can turn off most of the networking features so mesh does work. Without DHCP and using a single address my deco mesh works fine with the sky router.
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Post by monkman5000 on Apr 10, 2024 13:29:01 GMT
OK, I've got a Deco mesh but my networking skillz are not up to yours I suspect, although I have occasionally dabbled on a router's admin page. How easy was it to set up like that?
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Bongo Heracles
Junior Member
Technically illegal to ride on public land
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Post by Bongo Heracles on Apr 10, 2024 13:46:57 GMT
Really easy. Just log into the router and uncheck a few boxes. You can also use them in access point mode which uses the routing on the router but Ive found the deco better. YMMV and so on and so forth.
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Post by darkling on Apr 18, 2024 13:57:44 GMT
My Virgin Media contract is coming to an end soon, so I accepted one of their offers for "M250 Fibre Broadband".
I'm also an O2 mobile customer, so I get VOLT benefits... my current Virgin package is for "Volt M250 Fibre Broadband" obviously signifying the VOLT increase is already applied.
Does anyone know if the new "M250 Fibre Broadband" offer I've taken out is eligible for a VOLT increase up to M350, or do Virgin offer broadband packages with VOLT pre-applied for existing customers?
I asked Virgin Media via their chat, and they said it isn't eligible for an upgrade up to M350 as I'm an existing VOLT customer, but I tend to get the impression their staff rarely know what they're talking about.
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hedben
Junior Member
Formerly: hedben2013
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Post by hedben on Apr 20, 2024 14:15:11 GMT
Thinking about moving off Virgin fibre, which we've had for about 14 years, and switching to Sky (also fibre). Never really had a problem with Virgin, it's been very reliable in general, but it's getting too expensive compared to the competition - even if I tell them I'm leaving. Is this a bad move? Is Sky a decent option? I used the Uswitch website and it came out on top. I came in here to say almost precisely this - so I’ve had a lot of answers I was looking for already - thanks! Basically I can go with Sky for £42/m or stick with Virgin for £72/m, for the same speed, no TV or phone. My main concern is that Virgin sent an extender for no extra money so it reaches the far ends of my house - are Sky decent for that, does anyone know? I’d be interested in a mesh or similar at some point, but right now we’re skint due to an upcoming holiday, so I’m really just looking for the same internet for less money with minimal hassle. |
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