From what I understand from other TalkTalk Business resellers, the traffic is prioritised over the regular TT traffic. There are at least three levels of priority over the domestic service class.

TT congestion doesn't happen in every area, but Andrew's latest speedtest data shows some significant peak-time TT congestion on average, so it must be pretty bad in some places. However, it shouldn't be an issue if your traffic is prioritised.

I don't know about what the Post Office offers, but a TTB reseller such as Pulse8 will allow you to select any of those three priority levels. And you can have a month-to-month contract, so if it doesn't work out, you can go elsewhere.

(I've no axe to grind, I'm just a happy customer -- I've found Pulse8 to be extremely helpful with line faults and regrades. They're also one of the few ISPs that still offer the ADSL 2+ "Annex-M" 2 Mbps upload option.)

Edited by richi (Fri 16-Oct-15 09:27:42)

I agree with all you say, but you miss one point. The Post Office will be paying for a certain maximum throughput capacity, and if that isn't adequate there will be congestion, whatever it's priority either side of the pinch-point.

Plus, that only applies on TT's LLU network. Their BTW capacity is woeful.

(I bet you picked up on Pulse8 due to the posts by prof and myself, which led adslmax into thinking about them. I decided against at the time, but haven't ruled them out long-term. My landline is with them).

Interesting -- is that really how the pure reseller contracts work? Or is that only if the ISP has its own backhaul?

I started on this journey at posts about Uno, but got frustrated by various niggles. I then went to find all the other TTB resellers and narrowed it down to Pulse8, based on the service they provided, the responsiveness, and the no-contract element. I'm sure your experience was helpful, thanks.

Have to remember aswell their are ISP's on TTB LLU and ISP's that use the TTB network. Uno for example use the TT LLU exchange equitment but have their own backhaul with Daisy i believe.

Pulse8 use Talk Talk for everything.

Interesting; thanks. What does the Post Office do?

Post Office is solid TTB, as is Pulse8. Pulse8 gives you a TalkTalk IP address, as apparently you need over 20,000 customers for them to let you have your own. (How true that is I don't know, but is what I've been told).

Given the ADSL only capping PostOffice (particularly upload speeds) use I'd exclude them from any comparisons from the beginning

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

(I bet you picked up on Pulse8 due to the posts by prof and myself, which led adslmax into thinking about them. I decided against at the time, but haven't ruled them out long-term. My landline is with them).

Hello Bob - I am still playing around with the idea of going to P8.

Was the reason for dropping P8 the TT ip address. I haven't yet worked out the disadvantages of this. Is that you are lumped on the general TT backhaul and do not have any real control over it?

No, it was very much a toss-up between them and AAISP.

In the end it came down to two main things. One, there was uncertainty as to whether or not they could migrate FTTC >> FTTC, instead of FTTC >> ADSL2+ then upgrade a week or two later. I think this may still be a problem.

Second, I simply felt like seeing if AAISP was as super-duper-the-most-wonderful-ISP-in-the-country as we are led to believe.

The cost difference between the two is about £5-£6pm, though the Pulse8 is unlimited and the AAISP at that price is 100GB.

Of course, the main test is what happens if you have a fault. I hope never to find out! I know a week and a half ago I went away for a week, turning off my router but leaving the OR modem running. Just before I actually went out of the door I got a text from them telling me the connection was down! Another one sent within minutes of me turning it back on when I got home, saying it was now online.

They don't seem able to organise my morning cup of tea in bed .

Thanks - hope they work out ok for you. I will keep P8 on the list for now. Keep hoping something else will come up but on the back burner for now as I have a big Vet's bill to cope with.