Bt broadband talk

I have broadband talk on a home hub 1.0 using a hub phone. BT in their wisdom want to upgrade the hub to the new 3.0 hub which means the hub phone is no longer available.
However I do have a spare 2wire 2700 HGV still in it box. Is it possible to configure this to accept the hub phone.
Is the 2wire any good is it a sgood as the new hub 3.0?

I do not trust the BT hype over how good it is.

Edited by deleted (Wed 04-Jan-12 12:52:29)

The 2700HGV is an ADSL modem/router combo - it does not incorporate a base station for a BT cordless phone.

However, you can connect a wired phone (or cordless phone base unit) to the 2700HGV via the supplied adaptor to use on VOIP services. Land-line access can still be achieved by dialling an extra specified digit before the landline phone number.

In your case - you would need a new cordless phone if you move to either the Home Hub 3.0 or 2700HGV.

I have found the 2700HGV to be a reliable router operating well on my long line back to the exchange. It runs much cooler internally than the more domestic brands - i.e. Linksys, Netgear, Belkin, DLink, etc.

I have no experience of Home Hubs.

As a modem the 2wire2700 is one of the best there is and if you have a medium to long line or a noisy line it can get you additional bandwidth.

You can configure the two wire to run with any BT Broadband Talk (or possibly other ISP) phone numbers but there is no charger or DECt capability so you would need a new DECT phone to work with it.

BT don't hand out free hardware for no reason. Are you upgrading to Infinity?

If you are signing-up to infinity, you will lose the broadband talk account.

Why?

There is no clear answer I have ever found. I suspect it's to do with trying to retire a niche product.

Here's one of many forum grumbles about it. See the last post of this,

http://community.bt.com/t5/BB-Speed-Connection-Issue...

If you are a new customer or regrade to infinity, you lose it.

If you already have the Infinity + BBT talk combo, you get to keep it until you regrade.

From a technical angle, it appears to work.

Maybe "Broadband Talk" as a specific product, but not VOIP.

I have Infinity and have two VOIP numbers terminating in my router and then out to handsets.

In reply to a post by MHC:

Maybe "Broadband Talk" as a specific product, but not VOIP.

I have Infinity and have two VOIP numbers terminating in my router and then out to handsets.

Absolutely. It seems to be a phasing-out of the BBT product.

It was more to do with the OP's assertion that BT were upgrading their router for them - there's only two situations that happens,

A) India may ship a new one if the existing one appears faulty.

B) As a sweetener for a new contract or regrade.


Incidentally, which router\voip adapter do you use?

Edited by deleted (Thu 05-Jan-12 14:49:19)

BT have used teh phrase "Broadband Talk" to mean VOIP in te general sense and also a specific product with a monthly cost.

On the link you provide and it says "Issues with Infinity" that is interesting because on the Business side they are still promoting VOIP albeit as "Broadband Voice" http://business.bt.com/broadband-and-internet/intern...

I have today converted from Home Hub router to 2wire and its fine I had to lose the BTtalk product if I upgraded so chose to use the 2wire device, This gave me such a reduction in my monthly cost plus a speed a speed upgrade to 17Mbt from my 6.4Mbt. I doubt they will ever install Infinity here.

Took a while working through the install and Bt no help at all. So from tomorrow I get speed increase but at the cost of the extra line in. So now if i can only get wifey off the phone I can use it.

Do you know your 0560 VOIP number?

If so, try to get it working on the 2 wire. I can provide the method ...

In reply to a post by MHC:

Do you know your 0560 VOIP number?

If so, try to get it working on the 2 wire. I can provide the method ...

Definitely worth a shot. Likewise, I can pitch in if needed.

(It's also perfectly feasible to use another voip provider, and probably work out cheaper - you can still have extra lines if you want them.)

Edited by deleted (Thu 05-Jan-12 22:34:47)

In reply to a post by shtu:

(It's also perfectly feasible to use another voip provider, and probably work out cheaper - you can still have extra lines if you want them.)

My first is free along with 500 minutes - which I rarely use.

The second is £5/month including a large block of minutes which I rarely exceed and if I do, the charges are minimal on BT - 1800 minutes excess last month and the cost was just £2.50

The Saga continues:- after some configuration changes to the new 2 wire router it started to run ok and I actually managed to get the system running better than when I had the HomeHub 1.0
Great I thought now all I need is the speed upgrade.
The loss of the hubphone seems to be ok as I transffered the Anytime plan to the main line and saved money.

However now BT in their wisdom upgraded me overnight and guess what, now I have half the speed I had before the upgrade. Down to .550 Kbps download Bandwidth.
BT say thay cannot help as I have a third party router which is strange as its a BT 2700HGV part number.

After several calls it comes to light that the BT 2wire 2700HGV router is not compatible with the new speed service. (Think BS)
Still as now they offered to send free of charge a new HomeHub 3.0 its worth a try.
Now thinking this I have just replaced the 2wire with the old Homehub 1.0 version

Guess what I now have 12Mb/s download and 1.5Mbps bandwidth. depends on who's speed site you use.
So it could be they are correct which prompts the question?
Does the 2 wire 2700HGV require new firmware to run on the higher speed broadband ?

The 2700HGV is used with BT's business packages. We got 8Mbps on our business line. I haven't tried it on my home line since the PSU is bust. Be aware that serious problems have been reported with firmware updates, so I wouldn't tinker with it if I were you. See here for the latest news.

I had a regional number the same as my exchange.

The 2700HGV is fully capable of running at 20Mbps on an ADSL2+ line, the only exception might be the older v4 software.

Can you access teh GUI and tell me what the hardware and firmware versions are ... also, there is a training history page which can be very useful ... take a decent screen shot of that and host it then post a link here.

In reply to a post by grarcher:

I had a regional number the same as my exchange.

That is just an overlay on top of the 0560 number - I have exactly the same but have to use the 0560 to set up the router.

I can do that tomorrow but the setting for ATM PVC Search should this be selected or not.
MTU is 1500
I know the Hardware version is 2701-100589-005 taken from the System information page
Firmware is 6.3.9.63-plus.tm This is an upgrade to the initial version and the device was only turned on yesterday
Key code is 528y-27g4-a222-22bj-b22v

Not sure what you mean by training pages?

In reply to a post by grarcher:

I can do that tomorrow but the setting for ATM PVC Search should this be selected or not.
MTU is 1500
I know the Hardware version is 2701-100589-005 taken from the System information page
Firmware is 6.3.9.63-plus.tm This is an upgrade to the initial version and the device was only turned on yesterday
Key code is 528y-27g4-a222-22bj-b22v

Not sure what you mean by training pages?

10589-005 is one of the later units and the firmware being .63 (through an upgrade) confirms it.

VPI/VCI should be 0 & 38
Routed VC Mux
And I am not sure about ATM PVC search. I am on Infinity and the 2700s are used as additional WAPs.

MTU at 1500 should be OK but try it at 1492 and 1478 - changing te PC too. On Infinity 1492 is the optimum.

The Training page http://home/xslt?PAGE=C_5_3 is a log of sync, loss of sync and resync events and includes SNR,Attn, Speed &c http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y31/Polchraine/TBB/... and http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y31/Polchraine/TBB/... are snapshots from my ADSL2+ connection.

That page also has a bit loading graphs which is of use too. It shows how many bits can be carried by each Tone/Bin.

I think I know that page and will try and get it done.
meanwhile you mention changinging the PC,
>MTU at 1500 should be OK but try it at 1492 and 1478 - changing te PC too. On Infinity 1492 is the optimum.<

I have a I7 running XP and 6GB ram in triple channel mode. am not aware of what could be changed on the PC to help can you guide me please.

I have today run some tests ands it was interesting I opened three browsers IE8, Chrome & Opera.
Opened same speed test on each and used the 2wire bandwidth tester on another page on each browser.
Using the Homehub 1.0 which is now back on line I get when running the test one browser at a time until complete.
Fastest download speed on IE8 of 15.4B/ps Bandwidth of 1.4 Bps
Chrome is next at 14.9 /15 bps and bandwidth of 1.6
Opera is worse of all running intermittaly at 14 4bps and bandwidth of 1.5.bps

I am now going to convert back to the 2 wire to get the page you want and run the test again.

I have today re connected the 2wire router and speed was ok again but after some changes it lost speed, I realised after some changes this product likes to be rebooted, still after some further testing I felt that the MTU setting of 1492 seemed most stable and fastest although resets tended to reset to default 1500 so a reboor and edit to 1492 with reset of Internet connection only seemed to solve this.

I now run same speed tests same sites and found results interesting.
IE8 again seemed most stable and fastest 15.4 with bandwidth of 1.4
Chrome was much slower at 13.8 but bandwidth was 1,5
Opera gave exactly same results as IE* which was a surprise.

Not quite the results I expected. I was expecting chrome to perform better must have been listening to the adverts.

Still not so bad when you consider its Saturday Lunch time but still not the 18MPS speeds that I am supposed to get and I am only 385 metres from the exchange.

Here is link to the hosted pages from the training page.
http://s1201.photobucket.com/albums/bb346/grarcher/

Edited by deleted (Sat 07-Jan-12 14:19:33)

Find a copy of DrTCP it is free and allows an XP machine to have MTU and RWIN changed.

Today Sunday logged on and tested again 2wire device was left on line overnight this time the speed test showed it had dropped to 1 - 3 somtimes 4 Bps and very erratic. Tried some resets and different settings with no real result so in desperation re connected the Homehub1.0 and it ran ok, speed now testing at 15+ and its Sunday afternoon.
This puzzled me so after some checking of the Homehub settings, again swapped out the Homehub for the 2 wire device, but again speed very low & erratic did try the settings directly from the home hub set up and several reboots. It was still slow & erratic.
Now in desperation swapped the connected 2wire out and back to the Homehub1.0. Speed now fast again 15+ Bps and steady.
So what has changed overnight can bthome broadband recognise its not their router and lock out the 2wire device by its mach address. (Might try another unit)

Apart from business broad band connections on which it seems you can use any router, are the ISP's for home use locking out what is to them third party devices as I have come across this with Sky broadband, again trying to connect a 2wire router.

I still cannot get to the dizzy heights of 16 or even the 17.5 commit rate they say I should get.
I am still puzzled why BT tech say the 2 wire is incompatible? maybe they do lock them out.
Who can we ask?

Might be the PSU brick. Does the router work OK when the PSU is cool? Ditto the router.

Edited by micksharpe (Sun 08-Jan-12 17:54:54)

BT will NOT lock out any device. You are free to use your own if you wish. I have seen many 2700/2701 units or BT Res lines.

BT Tech's comments should be that they do not support it - which is different.

the setting for ATM PVC Search should this be selected or not.

It should not be selected.

Have a look at: http://bt2700hgv.tripod.com/ir1002700HGV.htm

Then do a factory reset and use the DNS poisoning the web site refers to before reconnecting.

Its now getting very interesting, due to some work I do I have aquired several routers amongst then was two 2wire 2700 HGV.
Today I configured the second 2wire device I had so it had the same configuration as the first one I tested on Saturday, which on Sunday having been online overnight started to give slow erratic speeds. against the Homehub 1.0
Sunday I ended up leaving the Homehub in place as I could not get the 2wire device to work well. Did some tweaks to the MTU setting on pc and managed to find an increase in speed on the homehub 1.0.
Today haveing made the changes set the two 2wire routers side by side and tested each in turn. I found the first router set up on Saturday still unable to give any real speed very variable and no more than 5mps switched to brand new device just out of the box today and straight away it ran at high speed with the same configuration. switched back tote device I set up on Saturday and again slow.
Now I switched both the 2wire devices out and re started the Homehub 1.0 its now giving me 15.5 mbps and steady it does seem to be the better performer at the moment which is a surprise.
Now do I now switch the Homehub router off restart the second 2wire router and leave it on overnight to see what happes?

Can you run a set of tests with the two 2Wire devices.

Have Task Manager running in the networking tab and then do speedtests in the following order on the first 2700

http://speedtest.btcentralplus.com/
http://speedtest.btcentralplus.com/beta/ twice
http://speedtest2.thinkbroadband.com:81/speedtest.html
http://www.thinkbroadband.com/speedtest/broadband.html
http://speedtest.net/ using the Recommended server and one other close by

Take a screen shot of Task Manager <Alt><Prnt Scn> and save that

an hour later repeat it with the second 2700 (to allow the BT test to run)


Host the two images and provide a link ... it will be worth seeing what the differences might be.

The situation has been getting much more intersting as I took the 2wire device that had slowed down and did a factory reset, finding that in fact it does not fully reset it retains some information.
In the end, found that to truly to reset this it needed a complete reset using all the reset buttons found under diagnostics page used in order from top down, then a cold reset using the reset button from a switch off & on.
Then it allowed me to configure the dchp as I wanted and allowed me to set up the block to the provisioning server. Now the speed returned.
So now I started to test found on all the routers I had to test, The two 2wire units the Homehub 1.0; they all gave about 13+ Mps download which could vary to below 4Mps which is nothing like the promised 17+ from BT.
Then I found the information on setting the MTU & Rwin this now is getting much more interesting.
I tried to use Drtcp but found it a bit of a mystery but found TcpOptimiser and this came with a wealth of information on each adjustment so used this to tweak the settings for my Rwin. But MTU calculated as set.
With windows default of 65535 for Rwin the speeds were as before then tried 64240 again no difference in speed but then started to increase the Rwin by doubling the 64240 figure to 128488 and then the speed increased to the point where the tests seemed all to report 15+ Mps.

Now I ran your tests and the results are here .
http://s1201.photobucket.com/albums/bb346/grarcher/


Meanwhile I tried to talk to BT they said they would send me a new router as it would cure the problem they did but it was a Homehub2.0. It arrived damaged.
So now they are supposed to be sending me the Home Hub 3.0 which until I get this they seem not to want to help see why the speed is not as promised this magical 17+

But the question I ask is why must we have to study the system to this extent to get this speed and I live only 385 metres cable length from the exchange?

Lookig at those images, the two 2wires seem to get a nice consistent speed across the various sites with a quick rise, flattish top and quick fall. That is what I would expect.

The HH is a bit different ... the BT Beta and one TBB are rather rough! Was the failure caused by a HH issue?

In answer to your question ... MONEY! Everyone wants everything as cheap as possible, so BT and other ISPs have to cut everything back. At one time a technician would come and set up ADSL from scratch but there was a cost. How much extra would it cost to have another army of UK tech support and technicians going out and dealing with all of this? BT Business is more expensive, but support is UK based, response times to fault are NBD &c.

The failure looks to be a Java script error or an IE 8 error.
I keep getting a error log appear on my desktop for a java script error when accessing that site.
But one of the most annoying problems is IE8 keeps on having to recover the web page and it just will not allow the BT standard Speed test to run.
IE8 also has an annoying habit of freezing so you just have to close and restart. Its not a virus either as its well protected and daily updated. so far I have not found the cause its why I run chrome & Opera as I just cannot make up my mind on which one I like. I have to have IE8 for the main program I use it does not like the other two.