Another "which ISP?" post

Hi,

All being well, I will be moving to a new house come July around half a km from this exchange >> http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange/SSCHU <<

As you can see, there's almost nothing fancy on this exchange other than a sad old ADSL Max on 20CN. I am currently with BE at my current place getting around 6Mbit, which is just about enough, so it's nice to see that most checkers say I will get up to 7.5Mbit at the new place.

Now, I've had experiences with a number of ISP providers, including PlusNet and Virgin and BE are by far the best as far as customer service is concerned. Virgin kept falling over every couple of weeks and while my parents have had PlusNet for nearly 10 years, I find that they do too much traffic shaping for my liking (they get around 12Mbit down with 1Mbit upload).

I work from home a lot so must have a reliable connection for VPNs and VOIPs. I watch IPTV, YouTube and the usual iPlayer content along with occasional Usenet and P2P downloads.

Being on 20CN limits my options quite a bit, but the following are my requirements from an ISP:

1) Generous usage caps - 50-60Gb should be enough with preferably unlimited during off-peak
2) Must have 832kbps upload
2) No traffic shaping at any time of the day
3) Lowest latency possible - I notice PN's latency is almost double what I get with BE
4) Customer service who know what they are doing (i.e. not monkeys like they have at Virgin)
5) Prefer static IP but not essential
6) Up to around £25-£30 per month

I do not want to go with Sky or TalkTalk since they don't offer LLU on my exchange anyway and I don't want to go along with the masses.

My geeky friend is with BT on their "unlimited" package and seems relatively happy with them - but that's going with the masses

What "smaller" ISPs are decent? I've looked at adsl24, Xilo and such like but do any stand out? NewNet has an awful website with no prices on there - none that I can find, so that's putting me off them already....

Cheers!
Alex

With no LLU avoid at all costs in no particular order

Virgin Media
Sky
TalkTalk

Orange will probably want to charge you more for being outside their lo-cost area and similar for Plusnet.

BT is a reasonable large provider choice but they don't do 832Kbps upload and is getting harder to find the option with the others like IDNet, Zen, looked at the Entanet resellers?

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

Orange will probably want to charge you more for being outside their lo-cost area

Confirmed, as Churchill Exchange was never Orange LLU.

ask in the 3rd party forum. What about some of the entanet resellers, e.g. vivaciti.net

Thanks for the replies so far. But what is Entanet and how is it better than BTw resellers?

Entanet is a major business wholesale supplier that also has a SOHO operation. It doesn't sell the SOHO side direct to the public, using instead a large number of resellers. That SOHO operation is BT Wholesale based, but with a backhaul network picking up at all twenty WBC nodes and all ten IPSC nodes.

A pretty good reputation, as have most of its resellers around here. Those resellers also tend to have LLU products from O2 Wholesale, C & W and TalkTalk, which often compare favourably with the native products of O2 and TT. (C & W don't retail).

Thanks for the informative reply. Is there is a list of Enta resellers preferably good ones? Vivacity is one of them but any other good ones?

I notice Eclipse and Zen from the early days are still around. Are they as good as they were back then on non-LLU network?

Entanet resellers (alphabetically) off the top of my head - Aquiss; Freeola; vivaciti. Aquiss and vivaciti are active here, Freeola rarely. UKFSN I don't recommend.

Been having a chat with Aquiss support and looks like I'll be going for a business 45 package deal.

What kind of router can I use for this? I have an old Solwise 110 from PlusNet from 2003(!) which still working but it doesn't have wireless - though I do have a DD-WRT switch I can put in front of it.

Are there any nice decently priced routers available? I know NetGear 834 has quite favourable reviews but, again, it's getting on a bit. Basically, I want something reliable, which Solwise was but it's very old - maybe something I can put DD-WRT software on?

Not my field really.

Looking at BT Wholesale site, looks like that exchange will be 21CN enabled at the end of November - hoping for decent speeds considering I will be half a kilometre away from the exchange

What's PlusNet like on Business tariff 20CN exchange compared to EntaNet? My parents have been with them for nearly 10 years now on a 21CN exchange (they get around 15Mbit down and 1Mbit up) with few issues on a home product, though, in my experience they occasionally suffered from latency issues.

Why the sudden interest in "Business" connections? You didn't have one at Be.

Business packages are the only ones that offer increased 832kbps upload speeds on 20CN exchanges... generally.

We can offer Max Premium for £7.83 per month on a residential connection, it's not something that's pushed on our website but it is still available.

Thanks Chris. I thought there was an option of some kind, though I am a little nervous of various traffic management procedures listed on your site.

Like I said, when working at my parents, I do notice slowdowns (latency especially) on some bespoke work applications, something I don't get on my slower connection with Be.

What apps? Also what product are they on?

They are on Home Extra with 60Gb allowance.

How much does that cost them?

11.49 I think

In reply to a post by chrisparr:

We can offer Max Premium for £7.83 per month on a residential connection, it's not something that's pushed on our website but it is still available.

Market 1?

Ok. Extra has some rate limiting at peak on P2P/Usenet and External FTP. Our current Unlimited product doesn't.

http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/products/archi...


(edited "traffic shaping" to "rate limiting" as it is more accurate)

Edited by deleted (Fri 14-Jun-13 16:10:47)

Max Premium isn't charged by market area, it's a flat additional fee on to the bill.

Ah - I read it as that was the cost! Not an additional cost . I thought it was cheap, hence the question.

Welp, am now connected with Vivaciti! A relatively painless process but had some troubles signing up - sorted by Enta.

Bought a second hand ST585v6 modem for 99p and flashed it 6.2T version of the firmware. Been connected over an hour and here are my stats:

Link Information
Uptime: 0 days, 1:35:20
Modulation: G.992.1 annex A
Bandwidth (Up/Down) [kbps/kbps]: 832 / 8,128
Data Transferred (Sent/Received) [MB/MB]: 34.62 / 335.43
Output Power (Up/Down) [dBm]: 10.0 / 19.5
Line Attenuation (Up/Down) [dB]: 7.0 / 15.0
SN Margin (Up/Down) [dB]: 15.0 / 13.5
Vendor ID (Local/Remote): TMMB / IFTN
Loss of Framing (Local/Remote): 0 / 0
Loss of Signal (Local/Remote): 0 / 0
Loss of Power (Local/Remote): 0 / 0
Loss of Link (Remote): 0
Error Seconds (Local/Remote): 0 / 0
FEC Errors (Up/Down): 0 / 0
CRC Errors (Up/Down): 0 / 4
HEC Errors (Up/Down): 0 / 2

I know it doesn't matter in this case as I am syncing at maximum possible speed but why is my SNR margin so high?

Can't wait till November now for my exchange to be upgraded to 21CN! I should get decent speeds, right?

Edited by deleted (Fri 12-Jul-13 17:20:38)

In reply to a post by CaptainJack:

Welp, am now connected with Vivaciti!
Bought a second hand ST585v6 modem for 99p and flashed it 6.2T version of the firmware.

Out of curiosity, as I am considering leaving O2, which package with Vivaciti are you on, as your on ADSL1, and what made you choose them? Aquiss are also on my list. Vivaciti have a package with O2 Wholesale LLU for £18, same as Aquiss, when I spoke to both of them they reckoned my line wouldn't even be touched in exch. as it would be the O2/BE gear I'm already on, just a software disconnect to be put thru Entas' backhaul.

On 20CN ADSL which that is, once you sync at the 8128kbp maximum the noise margin rises to what it would need to be to bring it down to 8128Mbps if it wasn't capped. Perfectly normal .

On 21CN (WBC is a better term) you should get around 20Mbps with that attenuation. I haven't done the arithmetic but have a feeling your SNRM should be even higher than it is. In which case you may have poor wiring at home.

Edited by RobertoS (Fri 12-Jul-13 17:59:19)

Yeah, I usually plug it into master socket but since this is the maximum I can get, I won't bother here. It's plugged into the main socket but there are extensions running from it - probably with a ring wire as well!

Will have a closer gander when I get WBC.

I am on Office 45, which gives me a higher upload speed and shorter "peak periods"

I looked at Aquiss and it looked pretty much the same as Vivacity but was around £4 more expensive - so I went with Vivaciti.

In reply to a post by CaptainJack:

I am on Office 45, which gives me a higher upload speed and shorter "peak periods"

I looked at Aquiss and it looked pretty much the same as Vivacity but was around £4 more expensive - so I went with Vivaciti.

Ah right, I'm looking at the 'up to 12 mb' on O2

Another question, where did you get that firmware for the 585v6 from? Thats what I have as a spare, flashed it with BE firmware back 2007 to work on O2 as backup, but since did factory reset and no longer works on O2 and lost the BE ISO. Many thanks

dave

I assume you know O2 landline broadband now belongs to Sky? All users to be migrated to Sky starting this autumn but already transferred as customers.

I got it here. You need to download Thomson's upgrade wizard as well from the same link.

The only reason I flashed mine is because it had Tiscali's branding on there so I just wanted a generic one. Apparently, it's also the most stable firmware.

In reply to a post by CaptainJack:

I got it here. You need to download Thomson's upgrade wizard as well from the same link.

The only reason I flashed mine is because it had Tiscali's branding on there so I just wanted a generic one. Apparently, it's also the most stable firmware.

Cheers all sorted for if and when

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

I assume you know O2 landline broadband now belongs to Sky? .....but already transferred as customers.

of course, see my other posts. Not yet all billing queries still with O2, only with SKY if need MAC code, whole things a mess. Just a paranoid being who after 5.75 happy yrs with O2 cannot get to grips with thought of going back on a DLM system whether with SKY or BT.

dave
edit: spelling

Edited by deleted (Fri 12-Jul-13 20:02:35)