Yep. Known as a “donkey” vote. There’s no law to say you can’t spoil or invalidate your ballot. As long as you turn up and cast a vote.

In reply to a post by broadband66:

"they tell me that you can spoil your vote "

That is still a vote!

Not really, it is more of a none of the above.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

I think you mean "upto 20 Mbps is good for me, and I only use two way roads, never dual carriageways and never use motorways".

I have no problem with that, but that doesn't mean 3G is still the right thing for the networks to supply in 2022. 3G was circuit switched, and so there was a maximum number of connections. This meant as more and more people bought mobile devices then some would get no connection at all. Not even a notification about a text, or Whatsapp message could get through. 4G and later solved that by using packets.

Phones don't generally last 10 years, so 4G started in 2012/2013, and by 2020 majority of people had 4G phones. By the end of 2024, 3G will be switched off in the UK.

I never said 3G was the right thing to stay on and i understand why we changed to 4G technology wise, more than speed, I am trying to point out that high speed is not required on a phone. 5G is just about speed, in fact reliability wise it sees like 5G is worse than 4G and stops dead when it hit walls.

You are right, most phones don't last ten years, I do try and keep my phone for as long as I can, some people seem to change their phones as often as they change their socks , no wonder there is so much electrical waste. When the time comes to replace my phone, I will see what is available, I will not look for 5G, hopefully my phone will last for another 3-4 years. By that time we may have 5G here, but as i said, not bothered to be honest.

Sometimes change IS for the consumer, to enable millions of more consumers to use the same service you are using. "concurrency". Yes, more concurrent users gives more money to the operators, but they also pay out a stunning amount for the infrastructure. And why do we dislike companies making money and employing people? Surely most of us are in jobs, and need to get paid to afford food, fuel, housing etc?

Not bothered about companies making money, it is when they get greedy I have the problem

I think you are lucky to have the reliability, but when FTTP comes past, why not pay for a 40/20 service at the lowest cost. As you know I left Plusnet at £37 a month to go to Virgin £53/month, because the uplink speed wasn't sufficient for home working due to copper degredation. I do not need 200 Mbps, but I needed faster than 3 Mbps uplink. That was my only option.

To be honest, I am surprised at how reliable it has been, my main problem have been hardware, I am back to the Hub one now openreach have sorted out the compatibility problem, and it is working ok, at the moment. The zyxel for some reason still have Wifi problems, even after a mate got it working again after going pop.

i pay £24 a month for 3^Mb/s, more or less, it was £23 but they put it up by a quid. i only went to FTTC as the wireless service i was using went to pot and could not cope, also FTTC had just started here and was cheaper with a faster speed.
I went to the wireless service, because it was better than ADSL 3Mb/s service I got at the time and cost only a little more. When the wireless service was at it's peak I got 10Mb/s, then towards the end it was slower than my original ADSL and when I say original, i mean the 512Kb/s

FTTC was available and i went for it.

At some point you will have to swap from copper to fibre as the delivery mechanism when the network provider (most likely Openreach) cease VDSL services, which is likely a few years away yet.

I found out that my exchange stop sell is September 2023, I thought it was 2025. Oh my god, that is next year. Open reach will have to get a move on if they are going to do the whole city in fibre by then.
As I have said before, my plusnet contract ends in 12 months, I have said i will make up my mind what to do nearer the time, but thinking about it over the last few weeks and being happy with the service I have, if plusnet give me a good offer to stay with them, then I will. That will at least give me another 18 months of not being hassled to move over to FTTP, i hope.
i don't want the hassle, i don't want to pay the higher price, i have heard that some provider sell a lower speed FTTP package, but I have looked and found nothing, they are all 100Mb/s or more. But they must do lower speeds, because of when they move people from FTTC.

My other problem is will ISPs keep emailing people to update to a higher speed, I have heard of people having emails and even phone calls from their ISP to try to get them to update to the next speed on FTTC. They can't do that to me as I can't get any faster.

As i said, still 12 months to go, i know it will zoom by, but it gives me a bit of breathing space. i may not even be here then.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

5G is just about speed,

Er no. It is, again, about capacity. Speed is one way of measuring capacity, and is the only topic the marketing depts understand.

in fact reliability wise it sees like 5G is worse than 4G and stops dead when it hit walls.

Only 5G at 3.x GHz is stopping at walls, some networks are transmitting 5G on lower frequencies as well. Its another 10/15 year transition.

By that time we may have 5G here, but as i said, not bothered to be honest.

In 5 years it should be everywhere 4G is, and most likely the 5G support will come in the chipset of your next phone.

Not bothered about companies making money, it is when they get greedy I have the problem

And trying to define that could take the rest of the year, certainly off topic for TBB.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

Er no. It is, again, about capacity. Speed is one way of measuring capacity, and is the only topic the marketing depts understand.

but if they keep on about speed, then people like me who is not bothered about speed is not going to jump at it, the same with FTTP. While i know it is not all about speed, that is all, as you said marketing say, speed, speed and more speed. Not interested in going faster.

In 5 years it should be everywhere 4G is, and most likely the 5G support will come in the chipset of your next phone.

Well again i have read and hear stories about the reliability of 5G, and it is not, some people are getting slower speeds than they do with 4G. I know the council refused permission for a 5G mast, something to do with it being too close to a school, so even our own council have some problems with how safe 5G is.
So far we have one mast and it is on top of a hotel in the centre of town.
My next phone may support 5G, but i am not going to look for it, 5G is not on the list of what I want from a phone, to be honest I want to pay as little as I can and still get a usable phone, which is why I went for an Oppo.


It seems like Out of reach is doing their fibre here as well as ZZoomm as I spoke to a Zzoomm bloke this morning, and he said they are still going underground and out of reach is doing their own network.
spoilt for choice, we have none, now we will have two fibre networks.

But the ballot paper was used in one way or another and it is classed as a vote.

So yes really!

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

but if they keep on about speed, then people like me who is not bothered about speed is not going to jump at it, the same with FTTP. While i know it is not all about speed, that is all, as you said marketing say, speed, speed and more speed. Not interested in going faster.

Which is why ignore the marketing, read the technical information sites, and wait and see. Generally if your phone has the right radio chip, most of the networks now include 5G capability for no extra cost. (Not all PAYG yet).

Well again i have read and hear stories about the reliability of 5G, and it is not, some people are getting slower speeds than they do with 4G. I know the council refused permission for a 5G mast, something to do with it being too close to a school, so even our own council have some problems with how safe 5G is.

The councils sadly don’t have any scientific advisors, and many just reject based on ‘hearsay’ which is not how the UK should be working. It is likely a “new 5G mast” would be one of the Poles of Wonder from the Three network, which they need because their existing mast density is low, and it also carries 3G and 4G signals.

5G is seen as unreliable so far as the frequency allocated originally by Ofcom is very high so has poor distance and poor indoor coverage. The networks are allowed to use other licensed frequencies, and one of the benefits of 3G shutdown next year will allow the networks to choose to deploy more 4G capacity or 5G capacity.

which is why I went for an Oppo.

I have a OnePlus Nord (original), which like Oppo is owned by BBK, and all their handsets include 5G support for no extra cost.

spoilt for choice, we have none, now we will have two fibre networks.

Quite likely in most built up of the UK, and something our government wants, competition. It is also possible that Zzoom are paying Openreach to fix issues in the ducts they discover when trying to use the Openreach infrastructure.

Toob in my town is having to install poles in areas where the OR cabling is concreted into the ground (no duct) and some are complaining. No sign of OR doing their own network here yet. We need some competitors to VirminMedia, whom don’t seem able to fix their failing infrastructure.

Changing topic a bit. How do you feel about the new posts going up?

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Changing topic a bit. How do you feel about the new posts going up?

None in my estate, fingers crossed our ducts are accessible when they get to us. The other side of town? I’d put up with them for reliable broadband, given the hassles I have with VM !

In reply to a post by broadband66:

But the ballot paper was used in one way or another and it is classed as a vote.

So yes really!

Surly it will ba classed as a spoilt vote, so not a vote. Not that i agree with forcing people to go to vote, up to people at the end of the day.