Which FTTP ISP should I consider? Gaming

Howdy!

I've a fair few ISPs available to me. I've narrowed it down to a few but just can't decide!

I've had enough of 1Gbps VM latency spikes, having to use ISP + ASUS router been told the other ISPs below can be "ditched" and just use your own directly.

ISP - Speed - Price
Zen - 900Mbps - £55
Onestream - 900Mbps - £43.95
Vodafone Pro II Full Fibre - 900Mbps - £48
Vodafone Business Pro II Full Fibre - £28 (12 months) £56 thereafter
Cuckoo - 900Mbps - £55
BT - 900Mbps - £0 (3 months) £50 thereafter
EE- 900Mbps - £0 (3 months) £50 thereafter (EE Unlimited Data added to my Mobile Sim)
EE- 1.6Gbps - £0 (3 months) £69 thereafter (EE Unlimited Data added to my Mobile Sim)
Aquiss - 900Mbps - £37.50 (6 months) £55 thereafter

Don't think anyone is really doing Black Friday lol.

Any personal recommendations? Good for gaming? Tips?

Kent based.

Thanks!

Don't think anyone is really doing Black Friday lol.

It's still pretty early to say that - ISPs may wait at least until the week of black friday or even the day itself before they start doing offers. Seems black friday starts at the beginning of November now.

Is LightSpeed Broadband available to you?

In reply to a post by ian72:

Don't think anyone is really doing Black Friday lol.

It's still pretty early to say that - ISPs may wait at least until the week of black friday or even the day itself before they start doing offers. Seems black friday starts at the beginning of November now.

True, but they doing BF mobile deals so would've assumed they'd do broadband at the same time?

Had EE/BT go door to door today and I wasn't home told my housemate they upgrading phone lines on the poles removing the old ones and switching them to the new tech and claims he can do a better deal for 1.6Gbps than EE website.

BT/Openreach van, EE/BT logo shirt said he will be back between 6-8pm today. WIll see!

In reply to a post by hypertony:

Is LightSpeed Broadband available to you?

Doesn't seem like it! We live in an old build 1950s and currently no fibre is here other than VM as they deliver it via a different way. EE/BT (plus other providers above) already said they'll need to send Openreach and route the fibre outside if I sign up.

https://cityfibre.com/news/sittingbourne-set-for-ful...

Not here yet though postal code checker says "no plans to do my area" so I'm confused now but company CS said it's planned and waiting for roadwork permit to dig lol.


LightSpeed Broadband:
We’re sorry!
We don't currently have plans to connect your area.

We may connect your area in future - leave your details and be the first to know if LightSpeed becomes available where you are.

Remember if you go for 1.6gbit, you'll need to buy a 3rd party router to get >1gbit (£175ish). Also prolly a new nic for your PC (£25ish).

Edited by arfster (Mon 13-Nov-23 17:50:45)

In reply to a post by arfster:

Remember if you go for 1.6gbit, you'll need to buy a 3rd party router to get >1gbit (£175ish). Also prolly a new nic for your PC (£25ish).

Thanks! My current router is the ASUS GT-AXE16000 running Asuswrt-Merlin.

Has 2.5G WAN but think that's only with 2 lines-in aggregation? Could be mistaken!

My current PC has a PCIe 2.5 gigabit that should be sweet ready to go, I think?

Isn't that a 10gbit router? If so just needs a new nic and you're sorted.

I guess this really doesn't matter too much for gaming, 1gbit or 1.6gbit will perform exactly the same. Maybe downloads a bit quicker, but maybe not even that (downloads often do 500/600 mbit or so).

Edited by arfster (Mon 13-Nov-23 21:12:23)

You can allocate one of the 10Gbe ports for wan if you like (or any of the ports). I'm on a 1.6GB service and use the 2.5Gb port for my service - which sync's at 2.5gb to the ONT, I get the full speed. I also use another port for a backup ISP so basically if I encounter a failure It will automatically failover, and failback when service is resumed. It hasn't happened yet - but I cannot function without internet.

In reply to a post by MashedPotato:

Thanks! My current router is the ASUS GT-AXE16000 running Asuswrt-Merlin.

Has 2.5G WAN but think that's only with 2 lines-in aggregation? Could be mistaken!

My current PC has a PCIe 2.5 gigabit that should be sweet ready to go, I think?

Please consider that more speed does not necessarily mean lower latency. I managed very well on a BT 80/20 line for some years streaming games from Stadia and GeforceNow.

I don't see any noticeable change since moving to 1gbit (at the same price) as I was managing the FttC connection with QoS and SQM.