What would you do?

Amraam

Amraam

Amraam

Soldato
Joined
5 Jan 2009
Posts
4,760
I just can't decide which ISP to go for. Currently with Sky 17Mbps at my girlfriend's house (I've moved in about 3 months ago) and the contract is up for renewal. I've never been impressed with them - the CS was poor, we had dropouts, speed was often down to 2Mbps or less.

I was going to go for VM superfast 50, but now the FTTC services that the likes of BT and Plusnet are offering have caught my eye. My local cabinet is ~200m from our house and is FTTC enabled according to the openreach site, however I have no idea if it is vector enabled. 38Mbps is fine for me but I'm concerned that it'll drop over time when more and more people sign up with BT being more and more popular for broadband.

Both VM and BT have plans for gigabit connections in the coming years, and everyone is raving about how VM is going to be amazing when they go to DOCSIS3.1... Are we talking within 5-10 years, or next year? If the latter, would I be best investing in the company that's going to have faster, more reliable connections long term, or just go FTTC now?

VM is more expensive overall but on paper it's faster. BT is technically slower but many are saying that a decent FTTC connection is better than more bandwidth.

Random question, but do any reputable ISPs have affordable FTTH/P services yet?

Thanks!
 
I would go for BT. I have spoken to a few people with Virgin and they say the ping is worse, traffic shaping is bad & I'm not sure if it's even truly unlimited yet.

With BT, I get a 10ms ping (sometimes lower), solid 38Mbps or so down, 12Mbps up, never goes down, it is truly unlimited (they didn't complain when I uploaded a 3TB backup over a few weeks).

Virgin's customer service however, does sound a lot better.

Maybe PlusNet? Their customer service is supposed to be good plus they use BT lines anyway don't they?
 
I've had BT infinity since shortly after it came out and it hasnt dropped in speed at all so i wouldnt worry about that, its still giving me 9-10MB a sec download and about 2-3 up. Your cabinet is a bit further than mine but i cant imagine it would be too much slower. The ping is always good with BT, and the conection is solid but they are pricey. Youll be paying 45 a month for their unlimited package with line rental.
 
BluD said:
I've had BT infinity since shortly after it came out and it hasnt dropped in speed at all so i wouldnt worry about that, its still giving me 9-10MB a sec download and about 2-3 up. Your cabinet is a bit further than mine but i cant imagine it would be too much slower. The ping is always good with BT, and the conection is solid but they are pricey. Youll be paying 45 a month for their unlimited package with line rental.
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£45? Maybe after the initial 12 months?

Currently, it's £12.50 + £18.99 (or £17.99, I forget which) LR. However I can pay the LR up front for £194.

Which package are you on that gives 10Mbps?
 
If you think Sky's CS is poor then good luck with most other ISP's. I'm not claiming they're the best, but they are a lot better than most of the others. As far as speed goes it has and always will depend on what and how you are downloading and/or what you are testing that speed with.

DOCSIS 3.1 is already part of the SH3 and that started being installed a few months back, it's white, has VoIP connections on the rear and seemingly works better than the SH2 and, well lets be honest almost everything worked better than the SH1(t). If you want the largest healdine speed and aren't bothered about upload then look at VM. We're not at the limit of DOCSIS 3 yet so 3.1 isn't needed. VDSL is a more stable and consistent product than cable, that said cable will offer higher speeds now and until FTTP gets rolled out by BTOR - that will be a game changer.

Look at the available deals, haggle, compare the cash back, get the best deal for you, but don't fall into the trap of focusing outright on the speed VM will provide you with, the reality is it can be a lot less if you're in a congested area, VDSL essentially does what it says on the tin more or less.
 
If you're considering Virgin be sure to do a search on your post code on their forums, that will give you an idea if there are congestion issues or not. BT's FTTC network seems to handle congestion a lot better, I haven't noticed any slow downs or latency issues during peak times. However seeing as you're 200m away from the cabinet, don't expect full speeds, but it should still be a lot faster than what you have now.

Plusnet gets my vote for CS and price but I think BT is doing a special offer at the moment?
 
Orcvader said:
Plusnet gets my vote for CS and price but I think BT is doing a special offer at the moment?
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Not to let the cat out of the bag but BT are like SCS... they always have a sale on. They also reduce the cash back deal as the month goes on depending on how close to the new acquisition target they are, so generally the best deals are at the start of the traditionally poor months for them.
 
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