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[sir moanalot]

i got rid of my bt home hub due to endless connection problems and have decided to get everything with sky surf, talk and view. well its dragging on with dates given and passed with more excuses, i just want a straight answer from the phone hens!!
i am currently on my missus dial up zzzzzzzzzzzzz so hope to be back with you all soon, missing you lots love tone. xxxxx

(she told me to put that in )

[Marks DTM Calib]

Buy your own router and set it up (not hard) rather than rely on a service providers equipment...

I use Virgin who so far have been pretty reasonable....

[hotel21]

Just done the same - dumped BT for the phone, dumped Sky for the telly, dumped O2 for the mobile and went all Virgin-like.

Did I say this started before Sky pulled the plug on Sky1 supply to Virgin?

10 meg supply is up and down like a night maidens nether garments.....

Over the weekend, it averaged a bare 1 meg with a 750 plus ping.

Took 3 or 4 abortive attempts at cabling install but finally got there.  

Spent the day trying to suss the wireless hub in the house so that son and daughter can use their PC's to do uni work and leave my machine alone as its the only one with net access at the moment.

[theolodian]

Have had NTL, now Virgin, for a while.  Net is often slow but completely offline very rarely.  TV box is dreadfully slow and always crashing, total POS.  Have to extract from the TV unit and unplug to reset.  TV signal often gone, blips in signal quite regularly.  Guide takes a dog's age to load.  Now no Sky1 or 2, so less than half as much to watch as before.  Started playing Halo again TV is so boring.  One good thing is on demand.  A few OK shows on there and can watch any time.

[Martin_1962]

BT seem OK for Internet and Freeview is fine for TV.

[STMO123]

BT seem OK for Internet and Freeview is fine for TV.

Yep. Been on BT basic broadband for ages now, its fast enough for me. Theres supposed to be a monthly download limit, which i regularly exceed. But, since I'm out of my 12 month tie in, they let me off

[theolodian]

BT seem OK for Internet and Freeview is fine for TV.

Don't get freeview, despite living in a decent sized town!  

DSL is fine, except it costs an arm and a leg for a modem with ethernet.  The free cable modems have ethernet, and you can get WiFi/Cable modem all-in-ones.

[Taxi_Driver]

BT seem OK for Internet and Freeview is fine for TV.

Don't get freeview, despite living in a decent sized town!  

DSL is fine, except it costs an arm and a leg for a modem with ethernet.  The free cable modems have ethernet, and you can get WiFi/Cable modem all-in-ones.

Im with Martin....since my Freeview probs were sorted....or topuptv.....its been fine since.
New aerial on the roof and cabling and also topuptv downloaded a fix so it now ignores the oxford transmitter and gets everything from the mendips one.

I use BT phone line with tiscali adsl....did have probs with that to start with.....i was paying for 2M connection but only got 1M.....Tiscali call centre blamed it on line quality.....but a nice bloke in the back room at tiscali did summat to get me running at 2M  

I did look at the cost the other day.....i could go for NTL all in one package (TV/Internet/phone) for a fiver less a month.....but as its working fine....i dont want to break it!

[TheBoy]

I threw away the junk hardware both DSL suppliers gave me.  Currently running a pair of Siemens routers on each line.  The Zen line in particular is very stable...


System up:   253 days 9 hours 31 minutes
Line up:     252 days 4 hours 13 minutes
Attenuation:
        Local:  35.5 dB
        Remote: 17 dB
Noise Margin:
        Upstream:       24 dB
        Downstream:     30 dB
Xmit Power Level:       11.93 dBm

[STMO123]

I threw away the junk hardware both DSL suppliers gave me.  Currently running a pair of Siemens routers on each line.  The Zen line in particular is very stable...


System up:   253 days 9 hours 31 minutes
Line up:     252 days 4 hours 13 minutes
Attenuation:
        Local:  35.5 dB
        Remote: 17 dB
Noise Margin:
        Upstream:       24 dB
        Downstream:     30 dB
Xmit Power Level:       11.93 dBm

mmmmmm......hieroglyphics....I love em

[Elite Pete]

Im with Tiscali and have been for about 6 years. The service they provide is good but there customer service is crap, I have been waiting for 13 days for a MAC code and according to OFCOM Tiscali should provide it within 5 days, but ive read that Tiscali a terrible and wont supply MAC codes so you can't go elsewhere. They have until Thursday and then im going to rip somebodys throat out down the phone

[STMO123]

Im with Tiscali and have been for about 6 years. The service they provide is good but there customer service is crap, I have been waiting for 13 days for a MAC code and according to OFCOM Tiscali should provide it within 5 days, but ive read that Tiscali a terrible and wont supply MAC codes so you can't go elsewhere. They have until Thursday and then im going to rip somebodys throat out down the phone

That'll be a neat trick

[JesterRT]

Well, I just moved house, and jumped on the NTL/Virgin bandwagon.  Nothing fancy, just 2MB line (supposedly), TV and Phone package.

This weekend gone I was happily watching the telly when all my services were cut off.  Checked the phone - dead except calls direct to virgin.  Broadband - dead.  It was Sunday, and after nearly 20 minutes on hold waiting to speak to someone it turns out they can't do anything about it.  They'd completely screwed over the billing.  I'd set up direct debit, so there should never have been a problem.  

Anyway, long story short, I set the wife on them...

...and I'm on half price broadband for a year, telephone calls made previously during the week were refunded and the services were restored within 5 minutes.  8-)

[bestseany]

The only problem with using your own hardware with Sky broadband is that you can't!

They don't give you a username and password for your broadband account and the Sky-branded Netgear router that they supply to you has special firmware on it with the username and password pre-programmed, but you can't access it.

[Kevin Wood]

The Zen line in particular is very stable...

I've got Zen at home and it's absolutely rock solid. Not the cheapest provider but you get what you pay for IME.

I've had a couple of instances where it has failed. Their support is great until they inevitably say "everything's checked out fine our end, we'll raise a fault with BT" whereby it's a week before anything happens. On both occasions it turns out some muppet unplugged the line from the DSLAM at the exchange. I guess that's the same for everyone who relies on a line that terminates in a BT exchange though.

Kevin

[ClarCE]

The Zen line in particular is very stable...

I've got Zen at home and it's absolutely rock solid. Not the cheapest provider but you get what you pay for IME.

I've had a couple of instances where it has failed. Their support is great until they inevitably say "everything's checked out fine our end, we'll raise a fault with BT" whereby it's a week before anything happens. On both occasions it turns out some muppet unplugged the line from the DSLAM at the exchange. I guess that's the same for everyone who relies on a line that terminates in a BT exchange though.

Kevin

Used to use Zen, we're very reliable - did find them expensive though.  Changed to uk online and had an average of 22Mbits (yes 22) we were only 200 meters from the exchange  

Moved again now, out of range sadly, so now on Pipex 8MBit which I can say is very good, hasn't died on us yet in 5 months.  We've got a belkin wireless router with adsl modem in it, link to 1Gbit switch and from there we got 3 pc's plus the server on a pretty speedy 1Gbit network..  I access internet with the laptop via wireless directly through the belkin..

I managed to get Micro$oft Partner status through work, so naturally its all vista ultimated up, apart from the server which I've left 2k server on as I doesn't do much, more of a NAS these days - and my laptop which has the vista business varient...

All in all it works very well...

Chris.

[theolodian]

Well, maybe someday it will be worth having good broadband and no TV.

http://www.joost.com/

[Martin_1962]

BT seem OK for Internet and Freeview is fine for TV.

Don't get freeview, despite living in a decent sized town!  

DSL is fine, except it costs an arm and a leg for a modem with ethernet.  The free cable modems have ethernet, and you can get WiFi/Cable modem all-in-ones.

Bet you can - try a better aerial contractor

[theolodian]

BT seem OK for Internet and Freeview is fine for TV.

Don't get freeview, despite living in a decent sized town!  

DSL is fine, except it costs an arm and a leg for a modem with ethernet.  The free cable modems have ethernet, and you can get WiFi/Cable modem all-in-ones.

Bet you can - try a better aerial contractor

We rent, house split into 5 flats.  

[TheBoy]

The only problem with using your own hardware with Sky broadband is that you can't!

They don't give you a username and password for your broadband account and the Sky-branded Netgear router that they supply to you has special firmware on it with the username and password pre-programmed, but you can't access it.

LOL, Netgear, that would explain the constant dropouts on the Sky lines I know about....  

[Admin]

The only problem with using your own hardware with Sky broadband is that you can't!

They don't give you a username and password for your broadband account and the Sky-branded Netgear router that they supply to you has special firmware on it with the username and password pre-programmed, but you can't access it.

LOL, Netgear, that would explain the constant dropouts on the Sky lines I know about....  

Indeed...

I would not go for any of these "all in one" packages. It means you are buying based on price, not quality. I have made that mistake before.

I would love to comment on Zen, just as soon as Ornage provide me with a genuine migration code!!  

[Elite Pete]

Well ive just vented my anger on some foreign chappy in a far away land. Its now been 23 days, 4 phone calls and 3 emails since I asked Tiscali for my MAC code and all they do is bullsh1t down the phone. So I called OFCOM and they are now dealing with it. They have told me that since the 4th of Feb ISP have to give you a MAC code with 5 days or they could have a large fine. So fingers crossed  

[STMO123]

Well ive just vented my anger on some foreign chappy in a far away land. Its now been 23 days, 4 phone calls and 3 emails since I asked Tiscali for my MAC code and all they do is bullsh1t down the phone. So I called OFCOM and they are now dealing with it. They have told me that since the 4th of Feb ISP have to give you a MAC code with 5 days or they could have a large fine. So fingers crossed  

OOOOOO......Your a tiger when your angry Pete

[Marks DTM Calib]

My Netgear ADSL router and wireless access point have been totaly faultless....all running the latest software mind...

[TheBoy]

My Netgear ADSL router and wireless access point have been totaly faultless....all running the latest software mind...

Netgear have a surprising common habit of fixing one issue with firmware, and creating a whole load of new issues, which is why I cannot recommend them...