Best Broadband?

[moonloops]

I've looked very deeply into all the aforementioned companies, bad reviews for all of them. I ended up signing up with a company I had never heard of (IDNet). They are the most reliable ISP I have ever used (and I've been with Freeserve AKA Wanadoo AKA Orange, BT and AOL). Sure I've never used Plusnet or companies like that but I've read bad things about them. IDNet give you free webspace, a free photo gallery and a free blog, and a free backup dial up number with your internet. They also give you several (unlimited?) free email addresses with web access. My speeds are currently at my line's absolute maximum (8mbps, I had tests done and I physically can't get more) but they also now do 40mbps fibre optic internet. I had an issue which turned out to be with BT, but I called IDNet on a Sunday morning (7am), nobody was in yet so I left a message. Just before 8 one of their staff called me back. You don't get service like that, their support line isn't automated - you get through to someone in the UK.

I don't work for them, I was a long suffering victim of AOL (Always Off-Line) and having working broadband after that is a godsend.

Seriously, give them a try or at least go to their website. They are relatively pricy but you get what you pay for!

That's the problem with on-line reviews and comments. People only tend to comment if they have a negative experience. Also the bigger the company the more customers and more complaints IMHO

e.g. IDNET:

"I moved from an LLU provider to Idnet last July as I was looking for that extra speed FTTC offered and while it's generally been a pleasant experience I have been deeply disappointed with the poor level of customer service provided by Idnet.

I could give various examples of the arrogant manner in which simple queries are dismissed by Idnet staff but the real disappointment was the complete absence of any support at all over Christmas. Coming from an LLU provider with 24/7 support I was somewhat shocked to learn Idnet customer service is only available Monday to Friday during business hours but at Christmas they closed completely for over two weeks.

Granted there was an answer machine where you could leave a message if you had no internet access at all but if you were having problems with your email, a DNS issue, a billing issue, or a general connection issue then you had to wait for over a fortnight to resolve it. What other service providing company would close their customer service department completely for a fortnight?!? Not many that took their customer seriously I'd guess.

Customer service aside the connection is much like any other BT Wholesale connection. It has it's "moments" where the connection becomes the victim of congestion but it would obviously be unfair to blame Idnet for that as they're simply reselling the product from BTW.

In conclusion I've probably been spoiled in the past by being an LLU customer and enjoying the benefits that provides. Would I recommend Idnet to friends or family? Probably not. The customer service is just too poor (when they're actually open that is!) "

 

[John]

Swapped to Plusnet a few months back , been excellent so far.

No outages , and when we have had to talk to them , they are easy to get hold of.

I switched to plusnet over a year ago after suffering with both talktalk and sky broadband.

Plusnet was a revelation. They have products to suit most budgets and as their TV adverts "promise" they have good customer services.

I switched to Plusnet quite a long time ago now (late 2009 I think) after I used to be with Nildram.

I switched because I'd heard TalkTalk owned Nildram or were in the process of buying them, and whilst I was with TT for telephone, I was put off when TT's sales department called me to sell me broadband and basically came out with some utter sht. Unfortunately for him, I know a lot about broadband and his claims were complete fiction. Even when I spelt out some of the stuff to get him to confirm, he just agreed.

I couldn't believe what I was hearing - so I switched the whole lot to Plusnet who have been very good since both in price and service.

I considered O2 regular broadband (as I have an O2 P&G mobile and the price was very good if you did have something from them) but they didn't have any equipment at my local exchange so no service.

Soon to get Infinity in December so I hope Plusnet will be offering a service in due course.

 

[Druk]

As has been said "speaking as you find" my BT went down yesterday morning. 2 phonecalls later (pita I must admit cos of their 'push this-push that format) they said an engineer would come out today sometime between 0800 and 1300. He phoned this morning at 0900 to say he was on his way. Checked the cable and found a fault in the street. Fixed that, then found an internal wiring fault. Fixed that. Four hours he was here. Speed has gone up from 4.3mbps to 10mbps. Can't fault their service. Just now had a back-up call from the original fault operator to check all was OK.

to BT for that.

 

[moonloops]

I switched to Plusnet quite a long time ago now (late 2009 I think) after I used to be with Nildram.

I switched because I'd heard TalkTalk owned Nildram or were in the process of buying them, and whilst I was with TT for telephone, I was put off when TT's sales department called me to sell me broadband and basically came out with some utter sht. Unfortunately for him, I know a lot about broadband and his claims were complete fiction. Even when I spelt out some of the stuff to get him to confirm, he just agreed.

I couldn't believe what I was hearing - so I switched the whole lot to Plusnet who have been very good since both in price and service.

I considered O2 regular broadband (as I have an O2 P&G mobile and the price was very good if you did have something from them) but they didn't have any equipment at my local exchange so no service.

Soon to get Infinity in December so I hope Plusnet will be offering a service in due course.

Plusnet do have infinity as I have fibre to the premises part installed. They do internal work next week to finish. Yay to 100+ meg broadband

 

[John]

Strangely, I just got this email through at 12:52 today:

We have good news for you. Your telephone line is in an area that can now benefit from our new broadband network (this is known as 21CN).

We will be switching your service over to this new network and there will be no need to change any settings on your ADSL modem/router or your username and password. You will remain on the same 'up to 8Mbps' speeds that you have currently but are likely to see a better broadband performance.

The change is free of charge and there will be no other changes to your existing broadband account, contract or usage allowance.

We expect this to happen within the next 5 weeks.

There may be a brief drop in connection for about 5 minutes on the day of the switch over and your speeds may fluctuate a little within the first 10 days after reconnection.

Please note: you may receive messages advising on the progress of your order over the next 5 weeks. If you receive a message notifying you that the order has failed, don't worry - you don't need to contact us and your service will continue as normal.

 

[Mr E]

Another "speak as you find" report. No problems with the BT service we have - old exchange in a small village means 6.5-7 mb tops, which is what I get. Service is reliable and I've had one very short outage in nigh-on two years. No problem with the Hub they provide. The one time I had to call (on a Sunday AM) the reply was prompt and the issue sorted.

Having gone through the pain of TalkTalk, I'm very loathe to move from a service I'm happy with. Working mainly from home, I needa reliable connection and that's what BT give me.

 

[flango]

I switched to plusnet over a year ago after suffering with both talktalk and sky broadband.

Plusnet was a revelation. They have products to suit most budgets and as their TV adverts "promise" they have good customer services.

Plusnet is owned by BT and just another smart marketing ploy. All telecom equipment in the UK is routed through BT equipment eventually so you are always dependent upon BT. True they will unplug the copper from the BT rack and plug it into the BE rack but the BE rack is plugged into the BT equipment and all routed through BT networks, the same is true of all mobile communication at some point it has to route through the BT network, no operator with the exception of large companies have their own network which is available to the public.

 

[@MARK]

Plusnet is owned by BT and just another smart marketing ploy. All telecom equipment in the UK is routed through BT equipment eventually so you are always dependent upon BT. True they will unplug the copper from the BT rack and plug it into the BE rack but the BE rack is plugged into the BT equipment and all routed through BT networks, the same is true of all mobile communication at some point it has to route through the BT network, no operator with the exception of large companies have their own network which is available to the public.

The only traffic that will run over BT infrastructure is the bit between your house and the exchange. BT still own the physical copper in the ground.

This then connects into the ISPs kit in the exchange and there is then a large network pipe from the exchange back onto the ISPs core network.

This connection can be provided by a multitude of network providers and doesn't have to be BT.

Likewise with the mobile networks, MOST of them DON'T use BT their GBN (ground based network) which is what connects all the cell towers together and onwards.

 

[BTB 500]

We've briefly lost voice on our BT line a couple of times in the last 5 years, but broadband wasn't affected either time

 

[A-AvantGarde]

I've been with o2 Broadband since they launched as such in the UK a few (4 or 5+ years ago).

Never had any major issues. As other's have said, on the two occassions I've had problems the technical support analysts I got through too were extremley knowledgable and helpful. I've even had call backs a day or so after fault resolution confirming everything is still okay - that's a nice touch!

Highly recommended!

 

[effbee584]

Been with Zen for about 2yrs, no problems at all. Really helpful UK base if needed.

 

[spinaltap]

Over the years I've been with Prestel, Pipex, BT, BE, and currently, o2.

While BE offered 'up to' 24Gb download I was only achieving around 13Gb - so I was paying excessively for a download speed I was never able to achieve. The other problem with BE (at the time, at least) was their customer support was/is in Bulgaria, with all the language complications from less-then-perfect English speakers (at their end).

I've now been with o2 for over two years and I don't intend on jumping ship anytime soon. The price of their 'up to' 20Gb service suits the capabilities of my telephone line admirably. I use my own Netgear router without issue. Plus, as my daughter has an o2 PAYG mobile I pay discounted prices for my broadband.

Incidentally, by changing the telephone wall socket to a filtered socket this doubled my downstream speed.

 

[kamalpatel12448]

Virgin really ticked me off today! Have ordered Infinity and will cancelling Virgin, frequency of outages on the up followed by wrong response to fault!

 

[John]

Incidentally, by changing the telephone wall socket to a filtered socket this doubled my downstream speed.

I did this a couple of years ago as well - when you are talking in and around 1.1 Mbps, you need all the help you can get.

Mine prevented mine from dropping into the low hundreds like it did and has remained in and around 1.1 consistently.

 

[the_boy]

Define broadband, are we talking cable or adsl?

Cable by a country mile (although I have had some problems in the past) is Virgin Media. Luckily I know what I'm doing and managed to get my superhub swapped back for a modem. Currently getting a good 50mb download speeds.

Well to the garden wall anyway!

ADSL I don't know, been a while since I used it. It's never going to be as good as cable though, so you may need to move....

 

[flango]

ADSL I don't know, been a while since I used it. It's never going to be as good as cable though, so you may need to move....

You can push 100 mb down copper ask the people on the BT trial in Glossop & Boston

 

[the_boy]

Speeds may be comparable but not when it comes to reliability.
To be fair I've got 50mb and it's a waste as I never use it to its capacity, the only benefit is that it isn't subject to traffic management policy at the moment.

 

[Antharro]

o2 in London and PlusNet in Bournemouth.

I'm a ways from my local exchange in Bournemouth, and no cable options, so provider doesn't really matter so much. PlusNet tech support have never let me down, although their sales people did lie to me to get me on my current package. That said, I have so many referrals with PlusNet that I'm paying single figures per quarter, so I don't mind.

o2 in London have been great aside from their crap routers. But, no worries, I have my own Netgear router that o2 were happy to help me set up (they gave me the settings, I plumbed them into the router), and I'm happy.

Both PN and o2 have UK based tech support. PN experimented with outsourcing and it was a failed experiement. PN bought out Force9, who were an ISP for techies back in the 90ies days of dial-up - I was a F9 member.

Very strongly recommend against BT / Tiscali / TalkTalk. Abysmal tech support and below average customer service. I've had various clients over the last decade with these companies and I very rarely see anything good from any of the companies. BT took TWO YEARS to fix an broadband problem - terrible support, no idea what they were talking about, had to threaten legal action on several occasions to get anything done.

Zen on the other hand are the mutts nuts. Expensive, but probably the best tech support of any internet provider out there.

 

[Jukie]

+1 for PlusNet. But I do miss the cable connection I had back home in Merseyside....

 

[markjay]

Great experience with BE (they are now part of O2), agree with the recommendation. PlusNet also very good, I believe they are part of Easynet.

Virgin Media and BT Infinity fastest at 30 to 50 mbps, but not available everywhere and some users complain about service issues with both.