A personal view of PN

We shifted over to PN (after a long long period with bt) for non-fibre bb and calls just over a month ago. For the benefit of any considering such a move, I thought it might be worthwhile summarising my non-technical thoughts:
* the transfer was trouble free
* service has been exemplary
* 582 router (our 2nd) is rubbish
The latter opinion is clearly borne out by several other posters here and on PN's own forum. It appears that the savings I looked forward to will be mopped up by the purchase of a replacement. What a pity that a company which performs so well is let down by its choice of router!

It's a change to hear the good news .

Most migrations must be going well. It's full LLU FTTC >> PN FTTC that is the one fouling up possibly 100% of the time.

Re the router, can't your old Home Hube be used? I thought the recent ones weren't locked down, and even the older ones could be unlocked?

My only complaint about the router is regarding the wireless for use on FTTC. As far as I can remember that's the case with all the complaints about it.

Are you having some other issue? From what I see on the BT forums a fair few think the wireless on the HH isn't a lot of use either - though opinions on that seem to vary more than here on the 582n.

Edited by RobertoS (Sun 07-Apr-13 12:34:44)

I just switched from O2 to Plusnet (unlimited fibre) last Wednesday, and I have to agree with every point. Router sent out in time, engineer appointment met (and the ease of the work needed was a pleasant surprise), and so far so very very good with the service- speeds high, rock solid stability. A had a few technical questions which were answered in four hours, and all the other communication has been great too- all the info I needed, without marketing guff or pointless repetition. Shame the wireless performance of the 582 is so weak. Could just about get 100% of my O2 connection on 'their' 582, the fibre falls off rapidly with a bit of distance. Full performance sitting in the room, less than half downstairs. Ho hum.

On FTTC I use one of these.

I ought it for use on IDNet FTTC as their router price was too high, so I took a punt on this as I could send it back.

Still using it on PN in preference to both the previous Plusnet Netgear WNR1000 and current 582n, both of which I took - one on joining, one on upgrading to unlimited. I run it on 2-channel, which the PNs ones don't seem to do.

Thanks folks.

My HH was the curly one but, having been told by PN that it wasn't compatible, I haven't got it now, which is a bit of a naus.

Yes, it's the unpredictable dropouts on wifi which are so frustrating. I'm not a techie and have resorted to best endeavours from various knowledgeable bods online. No probs with ethernet.

It must be a source of equal frustration to the good guys at PN that they are stuffed by this router. I appreciate that they can't say so, but surely there must be someone in sunny Sheffield tasked with analysing how their time is occupied - and addressing same?

In reply to a post by spranglebolt:

Yes, it's the unpredictable dropouts on wifi which are so frustrating. I'm not a techie and have resorted to best endeavours from various knowledgeable bods online. No probs with ethernet.

It must be a source of equal frustration to the good guys at PN that they are stuffed by this router. I appreciate that they can't say so, but surely there must be someone in sunny Sheffield tasked with analysing how their time is occupied - and addressing same?

Agree entirely. Why on Earth do they not just hold their hands up and admit it? Even HHs from Ebay are better although I have gone back to my old 585 and some TP Link homeplugs to keep the show on the road here.

Meldrew

I have recently organised three new connections with Plusnet (one FTTC and two ADSLx2)

Two of the three have been absolutely fine with no complaints - the third we are still struggling to get an acceptably stable service after almost 2 weeks since it was migrated from BE/O2.

My view is that Plusnet are pretty good customer service wise (at least you can talk to someone in the UK). Where it all falls down is BT Openreach which holds Plusnet (and presumably the other non LLU ISP's) to ransom.

It would appear that some regulatory intervention is required to sort BT Openreach out who appear to be a monopoly of sorts and answer to know one.

I'm sure we will get there in the end and all will be sweetness and light - just hope you dont need BT Openreach to get involved.

Regards

Alan

Edited by deleted (Mon 08-Apr-13 15:49:03)

In reply to a post by farrina:

My view is that Plusnet are pretty good customer service wise (at least you can talk to someone in the UK). Where it all falls down is BT Openview which holds Plusnet (and presumably the other non LLU ISP's) to ransom.

When I had my problems trying to switch to PN, approx 1 year ago, it was PN who kept trying to argue that everything was correct (or that it was someone else's fault).

I accept that some of the problems were probably down to faulty work (by BT Openreach) at the Exchange, but even then PN preferred to put-head-in-sand & tried to pretend everything was fine.

Just to summarise, I had tried to change from O2 (line operating at 18 Meg) to PN & PN were trying to justify that I could only get less than 2 Meg on my line because of its "Long-Length" (it is approx 500m Cable Length from the Exchange).

My suspicions are that PN's Service is OK for the "run-of-the-mill" issues, but they go into defensive mode for anything else!

the tg582n is used my many isp's including LLU operators

just a cheap router that offers a good sync speed

In reply to a post by Stanman_24:

just a cheap router that offers a good sync speed

The sync speed is, of course, irrelevant for FTTC users, who would no doubt prefer a cheap router with good wireless!

try the tp link range

Have you upgraded from Copper to Fibre in your move to PN.

I have no idea why O2s 582 would have better WiFi performance than ours. :/

In reply to a post by Stanman_24:

try the tp link range

If I need a router I probably would, but I haven't got the TG582n myself.

worth it m8 as my ping on blops has dropped down to 31ms

Intriguing that you guys seem to think that 582 probs are limited to FTTC. Our internal wifi based on antediluvian copper deserted us three times again yeserday. So yes, as someone wrote, we're going to ask Mr Amazon for a TP W8968.

That's a reasonable point about the wireless issue on the 582n not being confined to FTTC. But it is far more noticeable on FTTC.

However in my case in a steel-framed house, its strength is slightly better than my Buffalo's. The problem for me is that it and the previous Netgear WNR1000 won't connect at above 65Mbps and the actual throughput is well under half that.

Pages slow to load, buffering when watching F1 stuff, and so on. So it isn't just the Status connection speed at issue. I had no such trouble on ADSL2+ with my own Netgear 834PN.

The Buffalo provides 300Mbps, though my laptop card is only 150Mbps so that's what I get. Throughput is no problem.

Sorry but where have we ignored you? If it's a separate thread then I'll happily take a look however I don't think that posting in someone elses topic is the best way to draw attention to this.

Yes, I was on copper (about 13mbps) with O2. I doubt their 582s work any better on fibre!
Speedtest from the downstairs sofa gets about 35-36 mbps, half the ethernet/wireless upstairs.

Just a personal view I'd like to add,

I've been with Plusnet FTTC since January, and have had exemplary service from them, and I haven't had any problems whatsoever with the supplied 582n router. From what I gather I'm in the minority - although I am very technically literate and went through all the options and customised the settings to my needs - including disabling the automatic wifi channel selection, and forcing it to a specific channel.

I've not had any problems whatsoever. I have now upgraded from this, however this is for other reasons. (Now running a Buffalo WHR-G300Nv2 with DD-WRT).