CityFibre - TalkTalk vs Zen

I quite like the idea of getting the Eero 6 Pro with TalkTalk but Zen give you a Fritz!box 7530 AX which isn't too shabby either (only dual band vs the try-band of the Eero)

I currently have a set of Eero Pros (non-6) which work well and I am going for the 500Mbps package so not sure I should worry too much about wifi 6 really.

Would you go with Zen or TalkTalk. Zen always had a good reputation but keep reading it has gone downhill.

I've been with TT for years and not had issues. I'm on FTTP with them and the eero 6 pro is excellent giving much better coverage than the old Sagem's we had off them before. Rock solid connection, absolutely no complaints.

Edited by neo_wales (Thu 04-Aug-22 01:03:27)

I didn't think I'd ever say this but it would be TalkTalk for me.

The CityFibre side will be identical but Zen use PPPoE, TalkTalk use IPoE/DHCP.
CPE TalkTalk are looking better, you might see a bit faster wifi with them if you have WiFi 6 devices.

Personal experience in 18 months on Zen I had speed/packet loss issues due to capacity issues in their network twice on a FTTC service, same line never had issues with any other ISP.

I actually went with Zen in the end as TT couldn’t offer me a voice line apparently. it’s been great tbh, the fritz!box router is really good and I picked up an AX fritz mesh repeater for about 70 quid. all working brilliantly.

In reply to a post by badsimian:

I actually went with Zen in the end as TT couldn’t offer me a voice line apparently. it’s been great tbh, the fritz!box router is really good and I picked up an AX fritz mesh repeater for about 70 quid. all working brilliantly.

You could have gone for VoIP, something like Sipgate, sadly getting a voice line will be more difficult and everyone will be on some sort of digital voice.
But to be honest, I think you made the better choice anyway.

It is VOIP I think, didn’t really investigate doing it myself. Zen transferred the number and my existing phones just plug into the router. It was all very straight forward.

I went TT Future Fibre 500 to start with and with 13 months on my old contract so they installed full fibre and left the landline in place free for the 13 months. I later upgraded to FF 900 and scraped the landline; it was simply very very rarely used.

I've always been keen to keep a landline but in all honesty I can't think of anyone we talk to who use a landline. I got £35 from selling my dect handsets. The FF500 gave me speeds of 470-520 down and 68-75 up the FF900 gives me pretty much 900 on the dot and up speeds or 85-90

The only problem with the install was OR only sent one fella to run the cable and the cable comes down over open ground on a very steep embankment so he took one look and said "oops, need a bit of help with this one". This was 09:00, he was back with two other engineers at 14:00 and the install took about two hours so no complaints from me.

Daughter moved house 2nd week of Dec and her TT fibre was knocked off on the Tuesday and on at the new house on the Thursday so TT/OR are getting better these days.

In reply to a post by badsimian:

It is VOIP I think, didn’t really investigate doing it myself. Zen transferred the number and my existing phones just plug into the router. It was all very straight forward.

That is certainly VoIP or digital voice as they call it. I have had VoIP for years, I use sipgate., I got it when I went to a wireless broadband service and I needed a home phone, so my Dad could phone me, also a friend at the time would not use a mobile.
I keep it because it is here now, saying that I still use it, and it is the only number my work has, I will not give them my mobile number.

If I went to zzoomm they have no landline, they can supply VoIP via something called KIT. And no it has nothing to do with a talking car , anyway that has an extra T on.
Kit has a £9.99 a month rental, so I certainly would not bother with it, Sipgate I just top it up and for the amount of time I use it, it is fine.

i hope Zen works out for you, they are a bit too expensive for me to be honest.

Zen were fairly price competitive for a cityfibre install. I’m paying 37/month for 500 up and down and another 7 for the landline with loads of minutes included to land ok and and mobile (my mother in law uses it a lot)

TT weren’t much cheaper and offered no line.

£37 a month just for broadband, I know I was paying over that when ADSL first came out for 500Kb/s, so compared to that it is cheap.

I hate paying £23 a month just for broadband.


You should look at VoIP, it may save you a bit of money, I use sipgate, it costs me nothing unless I use it,

I presume the landline is not a landline anyway that Zen supplies but a digital voice.


TT is not as cheap as they used to be, they used to be the budget provider, and it used to show, now they are no cheaper than some others and still near the top of list for complaints, saying that I know a couple of people who are using it, and they are fine, even if Talk Talk did put someone on ADSL instead of FTTC and it took over 30 minutes of chatting to them to explain what they have done.
sometimes it is like talking to a brick wall. At least Zen should hopefully have better customer service.