In reply to a post by billford:

In reply to a post by sodicka320:

What email address would you guys recommend to prevent this happening again.

By far the best way is to buy your own domain name from someone like 1and1 (others are available- I know 1and1 'cos I use them!).

It's only a few quid a year for basic use and then your email is completely independent of any ISP, and doesn't have the spam/privacy concerns that are sometimes raised with the free providers.

Good point.

Sometimes spammers target a domain (i.e. @talktalk.net) and generate random addresses based on that (i.e. [email protected], [email protected]). So obviously, @hotmail.com etc is vulnerable to this method.

Your own domain name, i.e me@sodicka320 is less likely to be covered by this approach.

In reply to a post by kwhite01:

So obviously, @hotmail.com etc is vulnerable to this method.

And how... I used to have a hotmail account (it may still exist for all I know), but it took me longer to sort through the spam than it did to read and reply to legit emails, so I ditched it.

I don't trust Google as far as I could spit St Paul's Cathedral... don't know anything about Yahoo.

In reply to a post by kwhite01:

So this means I could be affected by crosstalk.....meaning that the speed I initially get could drop as more people go live on my cabinet? Crosstalk...noise?

Yes - the speed you get initially can drop as more people get onto the cabinet. And yes, to each modem, the crosstalk from other modems is considered as noise.

Here's my personal experience:

My current line is 400 metres, with an estimate of 55/18. It initially achieved 80/20, with maximum attainable speeds of 88/26 (reported by the modem). Over 18 months, the crosstalk has increased, and the modem now reports attainable speeds of 72/25.

What sort of effect is it likely to have...i.e. big speed drop?

Crosstalk is a funny beast, and depends more on how close the copper pairs are within the cable, for how far, and how accurate the twists are - which ultimately depends on the manufacturing process.

It also depends on which exact pairs carry VDSL, so ultimately it depends on which other subscribers take an FTTC service.

So the impact is random.

The actual effect can come in two ways - it either appears as noise, which causes your modem to sync at a lower speed, or it appears as interference that causes data errors. If enough errors happen, DLM will intervene to add FEC & interleaving (which affects both speed and latency) or adds banding too (which further affects speed).

In reply to a post by kwhite01:

So, my estimate is about 28mbs,

BT's estimate already takes into account a reasonable worst-case for crosstalk on a line that otherwise works OK.

So while you may see a speed drop from your initial connection speed, that initial speed should be higher than the prediction (as an early adopter) and it ought to eventually drop to somewhere near the prediction.

Some lines have faults that mean they don't hit the prediction, but that is a different ballgame.

Thanks for all the info

Our works website is hosted by 1 and 1 and has domain email also . Email through them seems to have more down time than the others but still good enough.

Seems to work out at £1 a month.

Are there any other recommended companies for email hosting?

Cheers

@WWWombat - Awesome post. Thank you.

You don't need email hosting with 1&1, just the domain which only cost's a couple of quid a year.

All you do then is use 1&1 to forward to your ISPs accounts. If you change ISP just change the forwarding.

This is what I've done for years, and it works very well. I have webmail with my ISP if required, and use Thunderbird at home, and my tablet to collect mail whilst at work.

Hi Ronski

Sorry if being a tad dim but how would you get 1 and 1 to do it for free for new customer?

This for home not the work one , which I have gone from TT to PN fibre.

Cheers

In reply to a post by billford:

In reply to a post by kwhite01:

So obviously, @hotmail.com etc is vulnerable to this method.

And how... I used to have a hotmail account (it may still exist for all I know), but it took me longer to sort through the spam than it did to read and reply to legit emails, so I ditched it.

I don't trust Google as far as I could spit St Paul's Cathedral... don't know anything about Yahoo.

Thats what I'm saying - as @hotmail.com is a well known domain, IT IS vulnerable to the spam issue. And as I said, I havent used the others that I mentioned, so I couldn't comment on how good they were.

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

In reply to a post by kwhite01:

So this means I could be affected by crosstalk.....meaning that the speed I initially get could drop as more people go live on my cabinet? Crosstalk...noise?

Yes - the speed you get initially can drop as more people get onto the cabinet. And yes, to each modem, the crosstalk from other modems is considered as noise.

Here's my personal experience:

My current line is 400 metres, with an estimate of 55/18. It initially achieved 80/20, with maximum attainable speeds of 88/26 (reported by the modem). Over 18 months, the crosstalk has increased, and the modem now reports attainable speeds of 72/25.

What sort of effect is it likely to have...i.e. big speed drop?

Crosstalk is a funny beast, and depends more on how close the copper pairs are within the cable, for how far, and how accurate the twists are - which ultimately depends on the manufacturing process.

It also depends on which exact pairs carry VDSL, so ultimately it depends on which other subscribers take an FTTC service.

So the impact is random.

The actual effect can come in two ways - it either appears as noise, which causes your modem to sync at a lower speed, or it appears as interference that causes data errors. If enough errors happen, DLM will intervene to add FEC & interleaving (which affects both speed and latency) or adds banding too (which further affects speed).

In reply to a post by kwhite01:

So, my estimate is about 28mbs,

BT's estimate already takes into account a reasonable worst-case for crosstalk on a line that otherwise works OK.

So while you may see a speed drop from your initial connection speed, that initial speed should be higher than the prediction (as an early adopter) and it ought to eventually drop to somewhere near the prediction.

Some lines have faults that mean they don't hit the prediction, but that is a different ballgame.

Thanks, very interesting.

Sodicka320, it's not free you need to pay for the domain, which cost from £3.59 per year (first year is £1.19). But it's a very cheap way to get your own personalised email address you can take to any ISP

So say you register www.smith.co.uk, you then log in, and under Communication/Manage, select the Manage E-mail users option, then select new, the only option you will have is Forward.

From here you set up your email address, you could have any name you want before the @smith.co.uk.

Then you enter the address it forwards to, you need to set it to forward to your PN email address.

You can create multiple PN email addresses, and you can create multiple 1&1 email addresses. You can even set one address to forward to multiple accounts if you wanted.

If you change ISP, you just edit where the address forwards to.

Oh, and try and keep the domain name short, nothing worse than a very long email address, I just used my surname, and have email addresses for all family members, which forward to separate PN email accounts.

Hope that makes sense, any problems just PM me.