Would you recommend PlusNet for non-LLU?

My story:

Currently with UK Online ordinary not LLU (I think it's called ip stream?) and have been for two years.

Initially all was well. I'm semi-rural, 2 miles from the exchange, so i'm not going to get 20mb broadband or anything. For quite a few months I was getting a solid 3-4mb connection, which is the best my line can hope for really.

However, for the last 10 months or so i've been getting a solid 0.7mb broadband with it taking literally 15 seconds to load the BBC Homepage and other such sites. I've contacted support with absolutely no joy at all despite trying everything they threw at me. The only thing left is a problem their end, and from what i've read their non-LLU service is universally regarded to be useless.

Anyway, in summery, I now have my MAC code and i'm looking for a non-LLU provider (my exchange doesn't support it) who can return me to my 3-4mb broadband bliss without connection problems and without the bbc homepage taking 20 seconds to load.

So, would you recommend plusnet, or should I run away and never look back?

Any and all help appreciated!

When I was a customer I was quite happy. Only left because I moved house and there was no BT line here.

You haven't posted your Router stats so I can't tell you whether your speeds are reasonable. However, if you are two miles from your exchange, you should expect well in excess of 0.7Mbps Download rate. PlusNet is also an IPStream product so if the limitation in your speed is from IPStream, it will follow you to whichever IPStream supplier you choose.

PlusNet do what they say on the Tin. But be careful to read the Tin before you buy to be sure that your usage pattern matches the throttling profile of the product you select. I am on a premium profile which gives me prioritised data transfer at all times and on all protocols and I can tell you that I get just that.

If you do NOT use p2p or Usenet and your usage is mainly browsing and email then the Value or Unlimited products may be suitable. If you do use these protocols then you should look at the Pro product.

Note that PlusNet have scrapped their 18 month contracts and from 22 October 2009, all contracts can be terminated with 10 days notice. Be careful to read about DEFERRED charges which apply to Routers, Connection charges etc. that you may select.

As Wheel_Nut says, we need to see your line stats. See here if you need help to find them. They tell us a lot about your line.

The thing is there could be several different reasons for your problem, and if we don't rule out a few then it could follow you wherever you go. Again as he says.

This post was mainly to give you that link.

In reply to a post by Wheel_Nut:

If you do NOT use p2p or Usenet and your usage is mainly browsing and email then the Value or Unlimited products may be suitable. If you do use these protocols then you should look at the Pro product.

When you mentioned Usenet, I can only assume you were referring to binary groups because text groups use sod all bandwidth.

Although text Usenet groups use little bandwidth they are still throttled. I raised a ticket on this a couple of months ago when my text-only nntp was timing out. Apparently PN's monitoring cannot distinguish binary and text groups. I did ask that they update their expected speed pages to reflect this but nothing has happened.

Edited by peteforman (Tue 22-Sep-09 23:13:34)

Hi Pete,

Why not use our text feeds? Is there a group you're looking for that we don't have?

Has that been un-throttled now? It was restricted while the binary groups were accessible on there.

Believe so - Bob had to renegotiate the Giganews contract and complained endlessly about doing so.

I'm happy now using eternal-september as my main feed. Switching to the secure port avoided the throttle.