Upgrading to fibre broadband

[Jim B]

Currently on just normal broadband, getting about 14 Mbps, and just under 1 Mbps upload. Residential user, paying about £10 for unlimited broadband, and £19 for line rental. No idea if thats competitive?

Thinking of upgrading to fibre broadband with estimated speeds of minimum 34 Mbps but up to 40 Mbps and upload of 7-9 Mbps.

Obviously more expensive at £22.50 a month for unlimited fibre. Frustratingly my provider advertises free line rental for the 18 month contract to new customers, but not to existing customers. The free line rental deal seems to be similar for other providers.

So should I change provider (even though quite happy with my current one), to get the free line rental, and then change every time the contract runs out? What does everyone else do?

 

[Mur Huwcun]

Yes, change every 18 months, play them at their own game!! Out of interest why do you want to upgrade? When we first moved here we had a 0.5mb broadband for few months before fibre to the cabinet thankfully became available!! Were on around the 12-15mb now but have peaked up to 25. The difference from the 0.5 is night and day and we seem to manage perfectly now

 

[Jim B]

Because now I’ve got used to 4G speeds on phone and at work we have 4G internet!

Also I upload a bit from time to time and it’s painfully slow!

 

[suffolksmallholder]

Openreach blew in a four-core fibreoptic with compressed air at work. The contraption for joining the cables was interesting, laser controlled & autoguided. Major road closure for four days to get the job done mind. Some tech boys will have to do 'magic' things on the mainframe but it seemed to be a success.
SS

 

[J B]

Out of interest why do you want to upgrade?

My thoughts too

When we first moved here we had a 0.5mb broadband for few months before fibre to the cabinet thankfully became available!! Were on around the 12-15mb now but have peaked up to 25. The difference from the 0.5 is night and day and we seem to manage perfectly now

Our standard Broadband chugs along at about 2½ up and ½ down.
I asked my new ISP for a speed estimate for Fibre and they said "about 5 meg!!"
We declined their offer!

 

[Steevo]

My thoughts too


Our standard Broadband chugs along at about 2½ up and ½ down.
I asked my new ISP for a speed estimate for Fibre and they said "about 5 meg!!"
We declined their offer!

Sure you don’t mean 2.5 down and 0.5 up?

 

[phillipe]

Currently on just normal broadband, getting about 14 Mbps, and just under 1 Mbps upload. Residential user, paying about £10 for unlimited broadband, and £19 for line rental. No idea if thats competitive?

Thinking of upgrading to fibre broadband with estimated speeds of minimum 34 Mbps but up to 40 Mbps and upload of 7-9 Mbps.

Obviously more expensive at £22.50 a month for unlimited fibre. Frustratingly my provider advertises free line rental for the 18 month contract to new customers, but not to existing customers. The free line rental deal seems to be similar for other providers.

So should I change provider (even though quite happy with my current one), to get the free line rental, and then change every time the contract runs out? What does everyone else do?

Put it in your partners name

 

[J B]

Sure you don’t mean 2.5 down and 0.5 up?

Of course I do!!!

 

[joe soapy]

i got fibre, up 50 meg.
its worse than 4 meg copper, the ping is 368 today
its like a bloke with a stutter

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

i got fibre, up 50 meg.
its worse than 4 meg copper, the ping is 368 today
its like a bloke with a stutter

That’s pathetic. I get about a 20ms ping using my EE 4G broadband.

Copper/Aluminium for broadband is junk...best place for it is the scrappy.

 

[joe soapy]

within 2 years fixed lines will be finished for most people.
Already mobile can be got for less than £10 for all calls and texts and some internet

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

within 2 years fixed lines will be finished for most people.
Already mobile can be got for less than £10 for all calls and texts and some internet

Once upon a time I really thought that fibre was the answer, however the barstewardised implementation of fibre to the curb/cab (FTTC) and then copper to the house/premises is a pure garbage solution - designed to keep the accountants happy, but technically and practically utter sh!t.

I tend to agree about wireless and 5G looks extremely promising. Certainly my experience with 4G has been impressive. The carriers learnt a lot from their mistakes with 3G which was mostly a tosh implementation.

On the whole 4G is very impressive. 5G will basically build on the foundation of 4G - the speeds/bandwidths being talked about would leave most copper FTTC solutions in the dirt.

 

[joe soapy]

256 ms 53.95 Mb/s 9.51 Mb/s

the ping is very frustrating, when first installed it was below 30.

the only benifit from fibre so far is that it has not dropped out

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

256 ms 53.95 Mb/s 9.51 Mb/s

the ping is very frustrating, when first installed it was below 30.

the only benifit from fibre so far is that it has not dropped out

How long have you had it installed?

I honestly cannot recall the last time I had a network issue on my 4G service, in the last 4 years. Even when there was an EE fudge up a few months ago one morning it kept motoring along fine.

During that time I had still kept a BT line (now gone...but actually broken again) which was fudged for probably well over two weeks due to actual physical line faults and Openreach general incompetence.

Categorically the 4G has been way more reliable.

 

[joe soapy]

we been having issues eversince broadband was installed, kept dropping out, and having to reset router each time.
bt, after spending all day here blamed poor earth and stray voltage, insisting there was 4.6 at the pole

we think we was connected to a faulty d slam

 

[Pheasant Surprise]

we been having issues eversince broadband was installed, kept dropping out, and having to reset router each time.
bt, after spending all day here blamed poor earth and stray voltage, insisting there was 4.6 at the pole

we think we was connected to a faulty d slam

Your ping time is simply excessive. Ping is not just a performance measure, it is basically a reflection of the state of health of the entire link. A huge ping time indicates that something is getting dropped, lost, or there is too much noise which at a higher level equates to data packets getting discarded and/or retransmitted.

Basic translation: There is a fault and something is broken big time.

Anything with a wired connection ought to be well less than 50ms ping to any major site hosted in the UK.

 

[Hesston4860s]

Made the switch to fibre about a year ago, well pleased with it. Currently doing 70 down and just short of 10 up.
4g is a bit crap here sometimes works but mostly only get 3G !.

 

[joe soapy]

Ping Download Upload
417 ms 29.73 Mb/s 9.33 Mb/s

 

[joe soapy]

Ping Download Upload
251 ms 40.86 Mb/s 9.41 Mb/s

 

[George from SJM Planning]

Those pings are ridiculous, we found that our pings were that high with poor internal wiring. Is that FTTP (Fibre to the property) or FTTC (Fibre to the cabinet). If FTTC, test to see if it is your internal wiring by plugging it directly into the master socket (inside the main socket)