UK Broadband Suppliers
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arachnoid wrote:
Can anyone recommend their broadband supplier or are they all as bad as each other.
I use Demon Internet. Slightly more pricey than others but excellent service.
Michael CP Blog [^] Development Blog [^]
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i've decided to go with demon. I used to have a dial up account with them in the mid 90s. I'd totally forgotten about them. Thanks everyone for your comments, should a decent ISP up and running in about 15 days. Russell
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I use Zen internet - It is one of the more expensive networks, but you get what you pay for - Excellent service!
Upcoming events: * Glasgow Geek Dinner (5th March) * Glasgow: Tell us what you want to see in 2007 My: Website | Blog | Photos
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I use BT, have done for years and haven't had a single problem. I have a MaxDSL connection (I get about 6Mbps, sometimes 6.5Mbps) for £26 a month (plus POP email accounts, web space, etc. etc.). My company pays £12,50 towards this a month, so I am only really paying about £15. I have no usage cap either, and I do a fair amount of BitTorrenting. Now, I know some people have had bad experiences with BT, but not me personally - the service has been 100% reliable. I have my own hardware (a SpeedTouch 585 which is a bloody brilliant wireless router). I know some people who have switched supplier to knock a few quid off their bill and have regretted it. Plenty of choice though - check out Think Broadband[^] for some ISP comparison, etc. It is a great site for people looking for a UK ISP.
Pipex - on the occasions i had to call their help desk they were above par and the QOS was very good.
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We've used BT at work and pay alot for the line. They were great whilst there was no problem but now we have a problem with uploading and they seem incapable of anything beyond "are you using the router we supplied?", they've even hung up on us multiple times when we've been nothing but patient and helfpul!
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Newsgroups and now contraints, my last time I looked you were limited to 2mb but that may of changed.
We made the buttons on the screen look so good you'll want to lick them. Steve Jobs
norm .net wrote:
you were limited to 2mb but that may of changed
It most certainly has, had a free 8mb upgrade back in october :) With the upgrade came a pretty vague FUP (which most ISP's have in place) but it doesn't look like they actually inforce it too much as since the upgrade i've downloaded *a lot* of stuff and they've never imposed any limits... yet :)
Gavin Taylor w: http://www.gavspace.com
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Zen are bsed in Rochdale, nice building right next to a garden center well out of the town center, looks a bit out of place.:rolleyes:
We made the buttons on the screen look so good you'll want to lick them. Steve Jobs
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Pipex - on the occasions i had to call their help desk they were above par and the QOS was very good.
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I've just cancelled my Tiscali contract after less than a month as they are incapable of providing me with an internet connection that goes beyond SMTP POP and http/https. After nearly 3 weeks of next to useless connection the connection stopped working entirely on Tuesday. Fortunately the guy on the phone last night agreed with my comment that it was an unacceptable service so I won't be paying the full years subscription. My biggest issue is that they had blocked / port throttled 3389 and that the default IMAP port wasn't connecting properly. Second issue is that BitTorrent doesn't work so I can't receive my Linux updates by my preferred method. The really annoying thing is that these ports worked first thing in the morning or after midnight but they still tell me that my router configuration is to blame. I play a few games, occasionally run to maybe 10GB per month, use a wireless router and live in the countryside so Cable/NTL etc aren't available. Can anyone recommend their broadband supplier or are they all as bad as each other. Thanks, Russell
I'm with Talk Talk £21 per month, inc line rental all phone calls and 2Mb broadband. Its only failed once in the last year and only for an hour or so. I suspect the customer service is poor, but I never had to call the. I suspect the route to most BB moans is the exchange, if the exchange is very busy or quite poor you will have issues most BB providers as its all going through the same cabling (Unless you have NTL cable and I wouldn't wish that on anyone).
Blog Have I http:\\www.frankkerrigan.com
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I'm with Talk Talk £21 per month, inc line rental all phone calls and 2Mb broadband. Its only failed once in the last year and only for an hour or so. I suspect the customer service is poor, but I never had to call the. I suspect the route to most BB moans is the exchange, if the exchange is very busy or quite poor you will have issues most BB providers as its all going through the same cabling (Unless you have NTL cable and I wouldn't wish that on anyone).
Blog Have I http:\\www.frankkerrigan.com
I'm with TalkTalk too. If you can bear the wait for broadband to be connected (they have to do some re-plumbing at the BT exchanges...) and are prepared to risk the customer service, then the actual performance / price ratio is very good. Plus you get free local / national / international calls. I had one problem early on and their customer service was dreadful, until I finally got through to someone who was prepared to take the time to listen. Then they had the problem fixed within 24 hours.
Matt
if ( ! pMatt->isEnjoying("Sales") )
{
pMatt->retrain("Computer Science");
pMatt->getNewJob("Developer");
} -
I've just cancelled my Tiscali contract after less than a month as they are incapable of providing me with an internet connection that goes beyond SMTP POP and http/https. After nearly 3 weeks of next to useless connection the connection stopped working entirely on Tuesday. Fortunately the guy on the phone last night agreed with my comment that it was an unacceptable service so I won't be paying the full years subscription. My biggest issue is that they had blocked / port throttled 3389 and that the default IMAP port wasn't connecting properly. Second issue is that BitTorrent doesn't work so I can't receive my Linux updates by my preferred method. The really annoying thing is that these ports worked first thing in the morning or after midnight but they still tell me that my router configuration is to blame. I play a few games, occasionally run to maybe 10GB per month, use a wireless router and live in the countryside so Cable/NTL etc aren't available. Can anyone recommend their broadband supplier or are they all as bad as each other. Thanks, Russell
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I went with Zen because of their customer service reputation and they have never failed me. They've always been very quick to respond and very helpful.
originSH wrote:
I went with Zen because of their customer service reputation and they have never failed me. They've always been very quick to respond and very helpful.
Absolutely - The only time anything fouled up when I've been with Zen turned out to be BT's fault. BT also claimed that I'd not get anything over 2Mb on my line because I was too far from the exchange (I'm roughly 10 metres from my exchange in the X/Y axises and 25 metres the Z-axis - i.e. my exchange is in the basement of my appartment building). I've had a wonderful 8Mb service since I was connected up.
Upcoming events: * Glasgow Geek Dinner (5th March) * Glasgow: Tell us what you want to see in 2007 My: Website | Blog | Photos
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norm .net wrote:
you were limited to 2mb but that may of changed
It most certainly has, had a free 8mb upgrade back in october :) With the upgrade came a pretty vague FUP (which most ISP's have in place) but it doesn't look like they actually inforce it too much as since the upgrade i've downloaded *a lot* of stuff and they've never imposed any limits... yet :)
Gavin Taylor w: http://www.gavspace.com
I'd forgotten about that. Think I downloaded about 2GB over BitTorrent quite recently but haven't been cut off or limited yet. The most annoying thing with Demon at the moment is that they don't seem to want to be paid! When I switched from dial-up to broadband I also switched from paying by continuous credit card to direct debit (I was changing banks), but something got messed up. About two months ago I got a surprise invoice from a company collecting on Demon's behalf, for nearly £500, or about 18 months' unpaid bills. They'd not been collecting the direct debit, and I hadn't noticed. My bank claims they never received the debit requests. I need to phone them up again because it's still not being paid.
Stability. What an interesting concept. -- Chris Maunder
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I've just cancelled my Tiscali contract after less than a month as they are incapable of providing me with an internet connection that goes beyond SMTP POP and http/https. After nearly 3 weeks of next to useless connection the connection stopped working entirely on Tuesday. Fortunately the guy on the phone last night agreed with my comment that it was an unacceptable service so I won't be paying the full years subscription. My biggest issue is that they had blocked / port throttled 3389 and that the default IMAP port wasn't connecting properly. Second issue is that BitTorrent doesn't work so I can't receive my Linux updates by my preferred method. The really annoying thing is that these ports worked first thing in the morning or after midnight but they still tell me that my router configuration is to blame. I play a few games, occasionally run to maybe 10GB per month, use a wireless router and live in the countryside so Cable/NTL etc aren't available. Can anyone recommend their broadband supplier or are they all as bad as each other. Thanks, Russell
I've used Demon for dial-up and then broadband for several years. They're not cheap (around £20/month), but I get ADSL Max (as I live so far from the exchange, I only get 2Mbps), unlimited email accounts (don't use them, though - I use gmail) and (most importantly) a reliable connection. I've had very few cases where I've had connection issues that could be blamed on their network.
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originSH wrote:
I went with Zen because of their customer service reputation and they have never failed me. They've always been very quick to respond and very helpful.
Absolutely - The only time anything fouled up when I've been with Zen turned out to be BT's fault. BT also claimed that I'd not get anything over 2Mb on my line because I was too far from the exchange (I'm roughly 10 metres from my exchange in the X/Y axises and 25 metres the Z-axis - i.e. my exchange is in the basement of my appartment building). I've had a wonderful 8Mb service since I was connected up.
Upcoming events: * Glasgow Geek Dinner (5th March) * Glasgow: Tell us what you want to see in 2007 My: Website | Blog | Photos
As my line length from the exchange is about 6 miles, I can only get 2Mbps - with current technology. In 2001, I was too far away from the exchange to get broadband at all, then in 2002 I could get 512kbps tops, then with ADSL Max I'm up to 2Mbps. My fault for living somewhere that's pretty much equidistant from two exchanges...