Giganet (CityFibre): really poor experience

I've just moved to Giganet from another CityFibre ISP (TalkTalk UFO in York) and the experience has been very poor so far. I thought I should detail my particular tail of woe for anyone else who is considering signing up with them.

Migration itself went smoothly and Giganet took over service on the right day. They supplied a router (Technicolor DGA4134) which is fine but very basic and I didn't intend to use it.

Problems:

- IPv4 behind CGNAT: despite being on their top 1Gig package I'm hobbled with CGNAT. When I signed up 10 days ago, the website claimed they offer a static IPv4 for £1 per month. I'm now told static IPs are "not available yet" so I'm stuck with a connection that's not reachable from the internet side via ipv4, so my home backup server is unreachable for some clients.

I've asked to be moved onto a real dynamic IPv4 (I don't actually need a static) but apparently they can't do that either.

- I want to use my own router (pfSense) so I logged a ticket a few days before I went live requesting my PPPoE username/password; ticket went unanswered. I had to discover the details myself by packet capture.

- Intermittent IPv4 routing errors: web sites on ipv4 will just time out randomly with "no route to host"; sometimes it succeeds, sometimes it fails, and it can vary from 1 second to the next. Still waiting for support to get back to me.

- No access to a customer portal (it's "temporarily unavailable") so I can't see any connection details, invoices etc.

The good news is I'm not tied into a contract so I'm free to leave (and if they can't get me off CGNAT I will have no choice).

So in summary, if all you want to do is browse the web and stream TV, you're probably OK with Giganet. But if you're any kind of power user (and if you're ordering a gigabit connection you probably are), I'd advise you to look elsewhere.

And if anyone has any recommendations for a CityFibre ISP I'd love to hear them.

Sounds like a nightmare.

I believe Zen offer connections over Cityfibre, and are still the only Which? recommended ISP.

Have a look at their rewards here: https://www.zen.co.uk/why-zen/awards/

Cheers,
Andy

Thanks. I'm looking at Zen's Full Fibre 900 but their website indicates it's only 100mbps upload speed. Is that correct? I was expecting symmetrical speeds, 900 mbps up and down.

Looking at their website, that does appear to be the case, which is strange as the Cityfibre network is perfectly capable of gigabit upload.

Seems that they might be nerfing it to match Openreach's offering by capping the upload.

Might be a simple mistake though, why not give them a call and check?

Zen services on CityFibre are symmetrical, but they can't advertise it on the website due to Ofcom rules about speed tests and the percentage of customers getting particular speeds.

See this (very long ) thread about it. A Zen employee on the forum (Ajays) confirms that the speeds are symmetrical. See post from john83 on 7th Jan 2022.

Zen Speeds

Perfect, thanks for that!

Interesting, I just renewed 12m with Giganet (over CityFibre) having had no problems with them for the last year, but they do seem to have gone downhill, I've had two tickets open and close without any obvious effect, so I had to call support (who to be fair did sort out one of them - still waiting on the other but its not impeding service) - wondering now if maybe I made a mistake renewing!

Having said that, I've had static IPv4 since I started, no issues with that, and never seen any CGNat (that would also be a deal breaker for me!) - and make more use of IPv6 now too (I run several servers at home and the IPv6 option is handy as they don't offer any more than 1 static v4. Just a shame IPv6 is so under utilized in this part of the world!

Not had many problems getting onto the account portal page (where the PPPoE username and password is displayed etc.) but its never been perfect!

Not had any obvious IPv4 routing errors, probably because I'm not forced through this CGNat nonsense!

Running OPNSense myself rather than pfSense

I am however, seriously considering a Three 5G backup option sorted (once the price rises come in (today?) and I know how much it will be costing) luckily I was seeing 1000+ MBit on 5G here! I did have VM business line as backup until a week ago (didn't realise how long I had left on the contract when I ordered with Giganet) but its pretty much had no traffic flowing over it for the last 12 months - was an expensive backup option at 1.5x the price of giganet!

6 Months ago I'd have recommended Giganet (in fact I did here several times) but I'm not sure I would now. I'd also be wary of Zen - they are not free of issues either (it was a close call for me) but they had (have?) some weird PPPoE balancing/routing issues, so be sure to check out the forums here before deciding!

In reply to a post by poppadum:

- I want to use my own router (pfSense) so I logged a ticket a few days before I went live requesting my PPPoE username/password; ticket went unanswered. I had to discover the details myself by packet capture.

Is one those things with is silly for them not give that information. I never tryied to packet capture it, If can get by packet capture then it is not really secure data.

How did you do this?, other would be intrestred (me especially)!

Also it something which ("useless") regulator OFCOM should do something about it. Why is not just given upon a simple request? (no fee)

[rant]
(It probley take OFCOM 24 months before they make there minds up if worth do a public consultation, if doing agree then public consultation would take about another 18-32 months, if after public consultation it agreed it should done then they have another 12-32 months to imploment it)
[\rant]

In reply to a post by amiga_dude:

Is one those things with is silly for them not give that information. I never tryied to packet capture it, If can get by packet capture then it is not really secure data.

Correct: if they're using PAP (Password Authentication Protocol) then the password is sent in clear text.

If they're using CHAP then only a hash of the password+challenge is sent (that's how Openreach's old IPStream DSL service used to work)

These days, many networks don't bother validating the password at all though: they know through out-of-band means exactly what line the PPPoE session is originating on.

In reply to a post by amiga_dude:

Also it something which ("useless") regulator OFCOM should do something about it. Why is not just given upon a simple request? (no fee)

Ofcom considers such issues are best handled by the market. If you're a power user who wants to do unusual things, then choose a provider that supports that type of activity.

Presumably such power users should be on a business tariff anyway? With different Ts & Cs and facilities.

In reply to a post by philg:

Having said that, I've had static IPv4 since I started, no issues with that, and never seen any CGNat (that would also be a deal breaker for me!)

Indeed, I can't believe they think CGNAT is at all acceptable on a premium package. Apparently they can't give me a static IP because I'm on "network 2" not "network 1", and they can't move me to network 1.

In reply to a post by philg:

make more use of IPv6 now too (I run several servers at home and the IPv6 option is handy as they don't offer
any more than 1 static v4. Just a shame IPv6 is so under utilized in this part of the world!

Agreed, I'm more than happy to use IPv6 and I do, but some sites are still ipv4-only.

In reply to a post by philg:

6 Months ago I'd have recommended Giganet (in fact I did here several times) but I'm not sure I would now. I'd also be wary of Zen - they are not free of issues either (it was a close call for me) but they had (have?) some weird PPPoE balancing/routing issues, so be sure to check out the forums here before deciding!

Thanks, I will check it out.

In reply to a post by amiga_dude:

Is one those things with is silly for them not give that information. I never tryied to packet capture it, If can get by packet capture then it is not really secure data.

How did you do this?, other would be intrestred (me especially)!

I enabled the PPPoE server on my pfsense firewall and connected the Giganet supplied router to it. Then I enabled pfsense's built-in packet capture, let it run for a few minutes, and then used Wireshark to analyse the capture file.

In reply to a post by pluralist:

Presumably such power users should be on a business tariff anyway? With different Ts & Cs and facilities.

Really? People shouldn't expect to be able to make full use of their internet connection to do all the things a proper internet connection is capable of? In that case, why even offer a 1gpbs package at all if they only want casual users as customers?

I expect it depends on whether or not they also offer business packages. Most providers that do state specifically in their SOHO Ts & Cs that business use above Home Office levels is not allowed.

My previous post was to some extent prompted by your own opening post: "... so I'm stuck with a connection that's not reachable from the internet side via ipv4, so my home backup server is unreachable for some clients".

You are a customer of theirs, so easy enough for you to check your Ts & Cs, and let us know .

In reply to a post by pluralist:

Presumably such power users should be on a business tariff anyway? With different Ts & Cs and facilities.

Why, because someone know more about the internet than using it for social media they should pay more (for faster fix times, and a different helpdesk) than others? I really don't get your logic.

VM back in the days of NTL tried to charge anyone using VPNs they should be on a business plan, until they risked losing about 50% of their customer base. They quickly backed down.

Most "business" use is LOWER data transfer (and hence cheaper for the provider) than DOMESTIC use. Home users watch streaming TV in UHD for hours.

In reply to a post by poppadum:

In reply to a post by philg:

Having said that, I've had static IPv4 since I started, no issues with that, and never seen any CGNat (that would also be a deal breaker for me!)

Indeed, I can't believe they think CGNAT is at all acceptable on a premium package. Apparently they can't give me a static IP because I'm on "network 2" not "network 1", and they can't move me to network 1.

In reply to a post by philg:

make more use of IPv6 now too (I run several servers at home and the IPv6 option is handy as they don't offer
any more than 1 static v4. Just a shame IPv6 is so under utilized in this part of the world!

Agreed, I'm more than happy to use IPv6 and I do, but some sites are still ipv4-only.

In reply to a post by philg:

6 Months ago I'd have recommended Giganet (in fact I did here several times) but I'm not sure I would now. I'd also be wary of Zen - they are not free of issues either (it was a close call for me) but they had (have?) some weird PPPoE balancing/routing issues, so be sure to check out the forums here before deciding!

Thanks, I will check it out.

When they say that the "can't", in the vast majority of cases it mean "won't" or "cba".

In reply to a post by poppadum:

I'm more than happy to use IPv6 and I do, but some sites are still ipv4-only.

Replace "some" with "almost all".

Even the BBC haven't enabled their website for IPv6. Nor have technical journals like The Register. They ought to know better, but they just CBA.

So at the consumer side it's not really a choice between IPv4 and IPv6: it's a choice between IPv4 only, or IPv4+IPv6.

The latter is more work, but has the advantage that you can bypass the provider's CGN box when talking to those sites which *do* allow access over IPv6 (e.g. Google/Youtube, Netflix)

To run a pure IPv6 network to reach the Internet you need access to a NAT64 box, and there's only one ISP I know of which provides that (AAISP).

In reply to a post by candlerb:

To run a pure IPv6 network to reach the Internet you need access to a NAT64 box, and there's only one ISP I know of which provides that (AAISP).

I understand EE's mobile network does that as well (pure IPv6 to end users, but with access to the v4 internet)

Thanks for the recommendations everyone. In the end I decided to bit the bullet and go with AAISP which will mean spending a bit more than I was originally going to, but for the (I hope) reliability and support worth it for me.

Migration itself was a bit of a pain as I had 48+ hours of no connection at all, but that was a CityFibre issue. Back up and running now

If you're interested then this presentation covers a lot of this

https://indico.uknof.org.uk/event/38/contributions/4...

In reply to a post by jpm:

If you're interested then this presentation covers a lot of this

Thank you! I probably saw something like that a while back

Now, reading that, I'm annoyed with myself that I completely missed the fact that AAISP were offering Cityfibre now!! I'd have probably jumped ship to them (esp. as I am already considering their l2tp and voip solutions for multiple IPs and for my 5G backup for when someone next destroys the CF cabinet with their amazon van) and they are my local ISP lol) - oh well, next year I guess.

Well it appears after 11 months ive been moved to CGNAT connection, from basically a fixed IP. Makes this service useless for me, I pay for two connections this one and BT to failover each other, no point having a fail over that cant work with the services I need to access.
Ive emailed them to put me back, or im off. Cant think why they think this is acceptable, ive not had CGNAT ever over the many types of connections ive had over the years, even mobile ones, ive always had a public IP. Really shocking.

Edited by Rolandrat (Sun 07-May-23 18:38:19)

Is this the same problem I am having? I suddenly lost ability to get external access to devices inside my network and appears I am being allocated a local IP address to the WAN so DDNS is completely borked. Getting help from CS is like pulling teeth after more than a week i was told it was being escaled to the technical dept and heard nothing since.

I have been able to ping the router using IPV6 address but trying to put my NAS and the ports for the applications i run in the ipv6 firewall doesnt seem to work. The cloud connection for connecting to my NAS OS works but doesnt seem to rely on port forwarding so cant use it to for conecting to my media server and other things behind the router.

I dont really understand setting up subnets with ipv6 which theoretically seems to be the other way connecting through myrouter.

For completeness I am using Giganet ovr Cityfibre with an Asus router - i have tried the Technicolour router supplied and seem to be having the same issues so am pretty sure its not something ive messed up.

Anyway, can someone advise if they think its likely to be CGNAT being my problem?
Second, given I can ping my router and get some access to my NAS from outside, can i actually make things work over ipv6?

Probably, what does the IP address of the WAN show on the router? If its in the 100.x.x.x range its CGNAT, also the IP address on a "what is my IP" website will be different to what you see in the router.
There's no going back, you are stuck like this until they allow static IP again, end May or early June I was told, but I dont trust them anymore so Im off, which is like painful, they appear to be like Sky TV, easy to join, nightmare to leave.

Yes it begins100, however shows as disconnected on the my services page on the website. I hadnt planned on finding an extra 36 quid a year for a fixed ip address - if it ever comes available anyway!.

I wonder if the ownership changes at the company is impacting things - first they were going to offload domestic customers to cuckoo then took over their parent company and now its major investor (fern trading) is merging it into their other businesses.

Anyway if anyone is still reading and understands IPV6 please help me as Im not confident i'll hear from giganet

Hi, hitting the same issues, I've just moved off of TalkTalk FTTP onto Giganet. IPv4 routing errors are driving me potty and I've been getting random small period disconnections.
@poppadum what speed/cost did AAISP offer? The checker doesn't report a Gigabit service in York for me.

You won't regret going with AAISP, they run a great network.
They aren't without the odd issue, however they communicate quickly and give regular updates.

Just an update - after 4 weeks of ignoring my support ticket Giganet they finally came back and admitted that the problems i had were due to being switched to a CGNAT network and that they cant give me a fixed IP address until some time next month. (They have been saying that most of the year that fixed IP was coming soon so not counting on it happening!).

I have tried various things including putting a VPN on my router with port forwarding (airvpn) but that didnt seem to work and leaked ip addresses, IPV6 connection would be great if my phone provider supported it, but doesnt. I have settled for tailscale on my NAS, laptop and phone so can dial into applications and media. I am trying to work out how 'funnel' is set up so in future I can directly connect the tailscale nodes it without having an application running at both ends, but dont need that right now so can live without it.