Non LLU ISP Recommendation- Moving from Orange

Orange. Worst ISP.

Been stuck with them too long want to move and have requested a MAC code.

I'm looking for lowest latency as I like to play games online. Live about 50m from my exchange and have good line stats. Being rural can only get up to 8mb on ADSL Max.

I've been looking at PlusNet for a while but recently have seen lots of complaints!?

Just went on:
http://www.ispreview.co.uk/review/top10.php

Seems like the "top rated" on there are ISPs that are relativley unheard of in the UK to the average consumer (maybe this is a good thing?)

The top 2 on there seem to be Fast.co.uk and XILO.

Not a very heavy user but mum likes to watch Iplayer so possibly a 20GB policy to avoid any costly extra charges.

Who would you guys recommend?

Cheers

Could you give us a link to what samknows says about your exchange please? Just to confirm you aren't mis-reading anything, and it also lets us check elsewhere for exchange congestion.

What's your budget, and is that for line and broadband or just the broadband?

http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange/WNCRE

Budget maxes out at the low £20's as only want a Usage of about 20GB and 8Mb spoeeds, just want reliable, consistent and low latency connection.

Have been thinking fast.co.uk after reading reviews of them. Also I have good line stats and live about 50m from the exchange

Exchange looks OK.

Fast do seem to have a good reputation, as you say. We don't hear much about them on these forums fro some reason.

Another good one in your range is IDNet. Make sure when navigating their site that you don't end up looking at the (better) ADSL2+ packages which you can't get.

It sounds like Plusnet Pro would be an ideal choice for you with 20GB usage and prioritised traffic at all times.

Whilst there have been complaints about our service, hopefully the way that we respond to those complaints will show that we can provide good service.

Edited by deleted (Tue 07-Sep-10 13:08:41)

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

Being rural can only get up to 8mb on ADSL Max.

Hence Orange is bad for you and so will any other ISP in your area. You could well end up taking your problems with you. The grass is always greener ...

Post your router stats and we can see if they can be improved w/out moving.

Edited by XRaySpeX (Tue 07-Sep-10 17:42:46)

As of 20.53 on Tuesday 7th September:

ADSL Link Downstream Upstream
Connection Speed 8128 kbps 448 kbps
Line Attenuation 7.0 db 3.0 db
Noise Margin 11.9 db 21.0 db

I think its an Orange routing problem/traffic throttling as download speeds dip and pings go up (usually in the evening) and have done for the past year or so. I think my line stats are ok (seen above) and it seems other people on Orange are having the same problem as me so hopefully it won't carry over with me:

http://www.orangeproblems.co.uk/phpBB2/viewtopic.php...

Bump, does anyone else think I have a line (rather than ISP) related fault? I thought my line stats were fine and its just Orange's [censored] routing which is giving my low pings to some servers and high to others and at other times massive jumping? I've read other people on Orange having the same problem so would have though a switch to a company such as fast.co.uk/plusNet/IDNet etc would be a massive improvement in quality of connection.

I agree with you probably just ISP congestion, though it would be a good idea to check your exchange at both the following:-

http://usertools.plus.net/exchanges/
http://www.nildram.net/support/tools/congestion_chec...

Thinking a bit further than earlier, are you sure 20GB is enough, as although your gaming in itself doesn't use much, how many games/updates do you download?

Plusnet claim the Pro product priorises things like gaming though I would expect the other two to be similar on their standard products. Importantly though, if you exceed the 20GB on Plusnet you get charged £5 per block of 5GB, and I think there is no carry-over to the next month of any unused of the 5GB.