Broadband Suggestions

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FactualFrank
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Broadband Suggestions

Post by FactualFrank » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:07 am

So I'm currently with TalkTalk and been paying around £25 a month. Speeds of around 30-35 Mbps. My contract has run out, so they've upped the price to £35 a month, until I either leave or renew.

I've tried the comparison sites and one that shows up is Vodafone Superfast 2 - 63Mb average speed, and cheaper at £21.50.

Has anybody used the Vodafone Superfast 2?

Bigvince
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by Bigvince » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:18 am

I’m with plusnet, £25 for 64mb broadband £30.99 including landline. Speed and reliability has been really good
They also do a cheaper package of 32mb

ClaretDiver
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by ClaretDiver » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:24 am

When you are looking to get your broadband look for a 'speed guarantee' all providers use the same network (apart from Virgin) so the things you need to consider is the tech service on the back of who you go with. Question for you? Are you with Sky for TV and do you have multiscreen? If so, if you go with Sky BB Superfast then your mini boxes become wifi hotspots in your house.....

ClaretDiver
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by ClaretDiver » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:26 am

To add to that, I hate comparison sites sometimes as they are not always accurate....we get customers call saying they can get this and that for this price and it is usually wildly inaccurate...

FactualFrank
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by FactualFrank » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:36 am

ClaretDiver wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:24 am
Question for you? Are you with Sky for TV and do you have multiscreen? If so, if you go with Sky BB Superfast then your mini boxes become wifi hotspots in your house.....
I am with Sky but I don't have multiscreen. I have the one box in the main living area, and I use Magic Eye with a cable running through the wall to my bedroom to watch at night. The Sky broadband deals don't look any better than TalkTalk though.

Red Fox Rocks Socks
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by Red Fox Rocks Socks » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:46 am

ClaretDiver wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:24 am
When you are looking to get your broadband look for a 'speed guarantee' all providers use the same network (apart from Virgin) so the things you need to consider is the tech service on the back of who you go with. Question for you? Are you with Sky for TV and do you have multiscreen? If so, if you go with Sky BB Superfast then your mini boxes become wifi hotspots in your house.....
Do you need to do anything for the boxes to become hotspots or is it automatic?

superdimitri
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by superdimitri » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:47 am

If you are happy with talk talk you'll be happy with anyone they are about as bad as you get as a provider. All the usual big providers throttle speeds at peak times, have slow downs- more in some areas than others.
The maximum speed you get and the price you pay depends on your market. If you live in a town you usually get good prices compared to a village. All depends on your area so someone saying they pay X amount will only be the same for you if you happen to use the same market as them.

I'd suggest paying extra for a bespoke provider that doesn't throttle speeds.
https://www.ispreview.co.uk is a good resource.

In towns and cities where companies have their own hardware in local exchanges the service can be okay depending but it can also be over subscribed so it's worth checking local statistics if you've had an issue with speed before.
This user liked this post: Jakubclaret

ClaretDiver
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by ClaretDiver » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:49 am

Red Fox Rocks Socks wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:46 am
Do you need to do anything for the boxes to become hotspots or is it automatic?
Should be automatic....
This user liked this post: Red Fox Rocks Socks

ClaretDiver
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by ClaretDiver » Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:50 am

FactualFrank wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:36 am
I am with Sky but I don't have multiscreen. I have the one box in the main living area, and I use Magic Eye with a cable running through the wall to my bedroom to watch at night. The Sky broadband deals don't look any better than TalkTalk though.
Ah sorry, thought you were on Q....the BB BF offer is £25 per month with the Anytime call package FOC.....

pompeyclaret
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by pompeyclaret » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:02 am

We have plusnet, but as we live in a village, that's expanded faster than the network, its pretty slow.

We live in a new estate, with other new estates around us. They all had virgin installed, we did not, so this isn't even an option. Like others have said, everything comes through the same BT wires.

An alternative we're looking at is '3' home broadband - £17 a month (2 year contract), bypasses BT wires and comes via 4G into a router. We are with 3 for mobiles, and currently turn of WiFi at home to use our mobile data, so certainly seems feasible.

If anyone has done this, would be good to get feedback

huw.Y.WattfromWare
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by huw.Y.WattfromWare » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:05 am

ClaretDiver wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 10:26 am
To add to that, I hate comparison sites sometimes as they are not always accurate.
As proved by the £17m fine for Comparethemarket, yesterday.

Fretters
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by Fretters » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:05 am

Check if you can get Virgin.

I pay £33.99 for their basic TV package and 200MB broadband (which I get too).

bfccrazy
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by bfccrazy » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:06 am

Posted this the other day which could help you save/get a bit of money back whoever you decide to go with mate.

Tip for anyone wanting to switch provider.

The cash back sites (Quidco/top cashback etc..) always have offers with the big players....

We switched to TalkTalk on an 18 month contract for £23 a month. This was the deal we were going to go for anyway when we shopped around. Did it through TopCashback and got £125 back after 3/4 months.

So for the deal we would have taken anyway we got a decent bit of money back for just going on their site and clicking their link to sign up instead of going direct for the same deal.

(If any of you do shop online a lot then definitely check it out and you’ll save a fortune for stuff you’d buy anyway from the same places you’d buy them. We average about £3/400 a year back for the sake of clicking through the link instead of going through google to find the sites we shop on).

https://www.topcashback.co.uk/ref/member1181278662844

https://www.quidco.com/raf/4565948/

if you do choose to sign up then maybe go through my link and we both get a hit back as a bonus.

FactualFrank
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by FactualFrank » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:10 am

pompeyclaret wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:02 am
An alternative we're looking at is '3' home broadband - £17 a month (2 year contract), bypasses BT wires and comes via 4G into a router. We are with 3 for mobiles, and currently turn of WiFi at home to use our mobile data, so certainly seems feasible.
Interesting. I use the connection on my mobile via 4G quite a lot and sometimes use my mobile as a hotspot for the laptop to connect to. But my 3 mobile connection is less than half the speed of the TalkTalk connection (around 14-15 Mbps), so will need to look into the speeds. 5G isn't currently available in my area.

It says here 50 Mbps for £17 a month: http://www.three.co.uk/store/broadband/ ... ebroadband

Unless there's some small print I've not yet read, that would be quicker than my current TalkTalk connection, and about £8 a month cheaper.

Dyched
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by Dyched » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:14 am

Figure out what you need the broadband for. Don’t be reeled in by fast speeds if you don’t need it.

I pay £17 with NowTv, not sure on the speed. I know it’s not the fastest but fine for streaming everything I want.

FactualFrank
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by FactualFrank » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:15 am

Dyched wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:14 am
Figure out what you need the broadband for. Don’t be reeled in by fast speeds if you don’t need it.

I pay £17 with NowTv, not sure on the speed. I know it’s not the fastest but fine for streaming everything I want.
I'm currently trying to get faster AND cheaper :)

Dyched
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by Dyched » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:17 am

FactualFrank wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:15 am
I'm currently trying to get faster AND cheaper :)
Of course frank, try and get the best you can. All I’m saying is think what you need it for first. Getting advice on here is all good of course, but you have no idea how many people are in each household, what the broadband is used for etc etc.

FactualFrank
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by FactualFrank » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:24 am

Fretters wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:05 am
Check if you can get Virgin.

I pay £33.99 for their basic TV package and 200MB broadband (which I get too).
I was with them when I lived in Burnley and found them to be brilliant. Not available where I live though.

FactualFrank
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by FactualFrank » Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:25 am

pompeyclaret wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:02 am
An alternative we're looking at is '3' home broadband - £17 a month (2 year contract), bypasses BT wires and comes via 4G into a router. We are with 3 for mobiles, and currently turn of WiFi at home to use our mobile data, so certainly seems feasible.
Poor reviews here:
https://www.broadband.co.uk/mobile-broa ... e/reviews/
https://uk.trustpilot.com/review/www.th ... band.co.uk

ClaretDiver
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by ClaretDiver » Fri Nov 20, 2020 12:23 pm

pompeyclaret wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 11:02 am
We have plusnet, but as we live in a village, that's expanded faster than the network, its pretty slow.

We live in a new estate, with other new estates around us. They all had virgin installed, we did not, so this isn't even an option. Like others have said, everything comes through the same BT wires.

An alternative we're looking at is '3' home broadband - £17 a month (2 year contract), bypasses BT wires and comes via 4G into a router. We are with 3 for mobiles, and currently turn of WiFi at home to use our mobile data, so certainly seems feasible.

If anyone has done this, would be good to get feedback
Be careful with the 4G bb offerings, they will not guarantee your speeds and you are reliant on the wifi resilience. If you lock yourself into a 2 year contract then you could be faced with hefty ETA' if it does not live up to it's speeds....

FactualFrank
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by FactualFrank » Fri Nov 20, 2020 12:37 pm

Ok, well I've decided to stick with TalkTalk. They've actually been pretty good for me, only dropping connection a handful of times over the last 18 months or so. They claim I've gone up in speed with their Fibre 65 offer, at £26.00 a month, and free for the first 3 months, but I'm not expecting any increase in speed; will be a bonus if there is.

Their online chat is rather annoying though. After telling them I had no interest in extras, they tried to sell me extras. No different to every other company on the planet though - annoying customer service.

JarrowClaret
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by JarrowClaret » Fri Nov 20, 2020 12:39 pm

I am with BT and haven’t had an issue with them apart from WIFI issues with having 3 kids trying to use 3 PlayStation’s/ Computers at once. Bought some Cat7 cables for them and that was resolved. I found when having virgin you were told you could get these amazing speeds but in reality when I ever did a speed check I was getting much less that was mentioned.

ClaretDiver
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by ClaretDiver » Fri Nov 20, 2020 1:24 pm

JarrowClaret wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 12:39 pm
. I found when having virgin you were told you could get these amazing speeds but in reality when I ever did a speed check I was getting much less that was mentioned.
Standard with Virgin, I had a customer during lockdown 1.0 that was in contract with Virgin for another 8 months but changed to us and paid out his Virgin contract rather than stay with them.....says it all really!

pompeyclaret
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by pompeyclaret » Fri Nov 20, 2020 3:44 pm

Based on those reviews FactualFrank don't think will be switching to 3 Broadband anytime soon!

Also would recommend the cashback sites - have earnt over £6k through these, for basically doing nothing, over many years.

FactualFrank
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by FactualFrank » Fri Nov 20, 2020 3:48 pm

pompeyclaret wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 3:44 pm
Based on those reviews FactualFrank don't think will be switching to 3 Broadband anytime soon!

Also would recommend the cashback sites - have earnt over £6k through these, for basically doing nothing, over many years.
I did try one of the top cashback site a few years ago as it was taking off - they failed to give me what they owed, so I sacked it off. I know it's worth using, only if you were going to spend the money anyway, but they are dodgy af if they can get away with it.

Jakubclaret
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by Jakubclaret » Fri Nov 20, 2020 5:24 pm

FactualFrank wrote:
Fri Nov 20, 2020 3:48 pm
I did try one of the top cashback site a few years ago as it was taking off - they failed to give me what they owed, so I sacked it off. I know it's worth using, only if you were going to spend the money anyway, but they are dodgy af if they can get away with it.
Them cashback redemptions & friend referrals etc it’s always wise to study the small print, it’s not unusual for plenty of obstacles to be in way preventing you from the qualifying, I’ve been reeled in a few times with some eye catching offers to be disappointed after, when something sounds too good to be true it usually is.

tarkys_ears
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Re: Broadband Suggestions

Post by tarkys_ears » Fri Nov 20, 2020 6:02 pm

I've only ever used BT - yeah it's expensive but I don't believe I've had an outage over 15 years at 2 properties (ADSL, ADSL2, FTTC and FTTP) and have never received even a meg below what I'm paying for.

I don't think I'd change.

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