[ Date Index ] [ Thread Index ] [ <= Previous by date / thread ] [ Next by date / thread => ]
On Thu, 29 Oct 2009, Terry Hill wrote:
Sorry to trawl this old gem up again, but I'm moving in a couple of weeks and it's time to sort the broadband out. I've been with Tiscali for the last couple of years, and they're fine until you have a problem, then they become worse than useless. The support is overseas and the support people read off a crib sheet of some sort, seemingly with only a cursory knowledge of what they are doing. So who do you use at the moment, whats the support like and have you found the holy grail of an unlimited connection without paying a fortune? Right now I'm considering heading to BT, although their unlimited package is quite expensive imo...
I'm biased because I'm an Entanet Reseller...I mostly deal with businesses though, so have little experience of the residential offerings (but I do have a few friends/relations on Enta residential packages)
I think what it boils down to is your own expectation... If you want an ISP that has good support, a good un-contended network (and by this I mean the ISPs own internal network, not the BT Wholesale network which is generally very good) and a general all-round higher levels of competence, then you generally need to pay a little bit more for it.
Also remember - you can never "only get BT" ... If someone tells you this, then what they really mean is that you only have the BT Wholesale network to work with - this is reasonably good IME - the issues come when BT hand it over to the retail ISP (and BT retail is just one of over 100 ISPs at this point). You then have the ISPs own network to contend with and their connections to the global Internet.
LLU ISPs have their own equipment in the exchange and then have a private/leased line of some sorts from the exchange back to their own HQ, and from there onto the global Internet - it's these private lines that's the grey area for me - how contended are they - what speed, etc. This is information that the LLU operators are keeping close to themselves... (Due to the highly competitive nature of that part of the market, I guess)
Personally (and having just witnessed the phone co-op's incompetence), I'm of the opinion that you should keep line rental with BT, but use someone else for Internet and (possibly) Phone calls. It does mean more bills, and probably more expense though - the holy grail is for a company to offer an all-service package on one bill - phone, line, broadband, TV, mobile, utilities... Eggs and Baskets come to mind here ...
So you probably know your own line stats - how far you are away from the exchange, what max. speed, etc. to expect, and if there are any LLU operators in your exchange. (The LLU ones are a bit of an unknown quantity for me at present - I'd have to resort to forum postings, etc. to get an idea of what's what)
And there is no such thing as unlimited. Everything has a data cap of some sort - it is not economically fesable to provide a truly unlimited service for everyone. (OK - In theory you can have unlimited with Entanet, but it'll cost you dearly - £100's a month!)
My suggestion would be to get a bog-standard BT line installed. It's worth paying for the caller-id extra if you need it - you can get it for free with one of the privacy options, but you need to make 3 (or 5?) billable calls a month to keep it "free".
If the times and rates of calls via BT work out for you, then get the BT package for that - but beware - they'll give you "free" calls if you sign up for a rolling one-year contract... So read the small print.
Get your Internet from a reliable source - and be prepared to pay a little more if you want "quality". Get suggestions from others as I'm obviously biased, but look at Zen, AAISP, and maybe Plusnet for their prices and offerings to get an idea. A Basic enta service is £18.95 a month for a 30GB peak-time (8am to midnight) cap, unlimited at other times.
Then consider using VoIP to make cheaper calls than BT.However if budget is tight, then look for the bundles, but do read the small-print and keep on-top of installation, etc.
I pay BT about £12 a month for the line + caller ID, my business pays for a business-grade broadband (£25.75+VAT a month, 8Mb in, 830Kb out, 45GB cap) and my home phone bills which are all via VoIP are under a fiver a month if I were to actually bill myself...
Gordon
-- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/linux_adm/list-faq.html