Coming back to the UK - best ISP at the moment for ping/contention ratio during peak times?

crinkleshoes

crinkleshoes

crinkleshoes

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Hey,

Looks like the wife and I are coming back to the UK and my wife's sister's boyfriend has a house we can rent for the first year.

It's in Bedford, not our first choice of place to live - but it's a decent house in one of the nicer areas + we're getting a good deal on it - so why not? :)

It has Virgin, but from what I've heard they have a very high contention ratio in that area which can severely impact performance at peak times - so I'm avoiding them on this occasion even though I've used them for the last few places we lived before we left.

FTTC is enabled on the area and I'm wondering which ISP has the best backbone?

It looks like FTTP on-demand is available, but seems that would be very expensive to install, even though I would like it having been on 500/50 connection while I'm here in Switzerland.

I'd like to maximise speeds and minimise pings at peak times as much as possible.

Back in the days of ADSL/ADSL2, Zen and Eclipse were some of the best and the likes of BT/Sky/Plusnet/TalkTalk were usually quite over-subscribed.

Who is the best to go with at the minute please?

I'm most bothered about ping as even a slow data rate connection feels faster with a good ping.

If any of them offer a decent router, that would be good too as all of the ones I have at the moment are ADSL2+/cable and I would need to buy a new VDSL router. I'm not averse to buying a new router, but if any of them offer a good router as part of the package - that would be a plus.

Thanks
 
BT are good, plenty of decent new customer offers with TopCashback etc on top and you can usually get 12 month contracts which sounds like it'd be ideal for you.
 
BT have optimised the network (for now) relatively recently with a lot less hops and lower latency than of old so not much difference between the providers on FTTC currently in that regard aslong as you stay away from the lowest end ones.
 
Fair enough.

The bigger packages they offer seem decent value.

Top level broadband backage + full BT TV for £36/month + £18.99 line rental.

(£6 extra for TV, so why not?)

£9/month for mobile sim with 2GB, 500mins and unlimited texts.

Then £160 cashback from quidco... so nearly 3 months free.
 
MissChief said:
Sky's core network is running at around 40% capacity at peak times.
Click to expand...

Sky only seem to offer a 40mbit package though? Or am I missing something on their site?

Also I have some friends on Sky in Bedford and they are reporting slow speeds at peak times. I'm not sure where the issue is though, with Sky or BT.
 
Although it looks like Virgin are starting to offer a 300mbit service... darn... that's tempting over the 80mbit from VDSL.

Especially after being on a 500/50 connection and getting used to it...

But if that 300mbit service has a high contention ratio at peak times, then it won't be worth it.
 
Had great experience in terms of fast speeds, low pings, minimal/no dropouts with BT and Plusnet myself. A lot of people rate Sky's FTTC broadband too.
 
It looks as though the house owner would prefer to keep all the bills in his name and we pay him directly rather than taking them over.

He'll be moving back there in a bit over a year, so I suppose he thinks it would be less hassle.

If that idea continues... looks like we'll be getting the 300mbit Virgin service.
 
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