Broadband speeds

[mr_e]

BT's site estimates my maximum speed as 5 Mb/s, which means in reality I've got no chance of getting this.

Hopefully you'll see some long-term improvements there John, fingers crossed for ya!

[Mike]

BT have announced a free upgrade in speed to all its Broadband customers and the best news is that it is free. Obviously the speed hike only applies if you are close to the exchange capable of providing the service! Apparently there is also a free I-Plate (no it is not a joke) for those households with poor internal wiring (mr_e) and if you pay for the postage it is free and should improve speeds of your internet.

[mr_e]

Mark did mention there was something coming through in the post for us. Sounds suspiciously hopeful, but at least the exchange we're on has the upgrade needed to potentially deliver the speed increase. I'll believe it when I see it.

[mr_e]

Seeing as we're finally back on the internet after a four-and-a-half day hiatus, thought I'd do a test. There is some improvement, hopefully more to follow.

[liz.brownlloyd]

I had a bit of an economy drive a year ago and cancelled my BT line, Virgin internet for a T-mobile Dongle. It's a bit crap but fine for just doing your bank a/c once a week. However I am now looking at wedding things and it crashes all the time during peak times (it disconnects every five minutes or so, sometimes more). Peak times are pretty much every evening and all weekend (except at 8.30am on Sunday morning cos I can't sleep). For example I can only check the forums at work, because (normally) it is just too big for the system to download and run before the system crashes.

I rung T-mobile up last week to be told I'm on a two year seperate contract from my mobile and this should be obvious from the (24) at the end of my contract number. I was never told this when I was sold the product over the phone and so I have written a letter to them, cc to offcom. I have no idea whether I can get out of this and after a bit of a long six months with T-mobile will probably be looking around when my contract is up (thankfully for both parts of my contract in June 2010). It seems a real shame after nine years of good service, where everytime I have wanted something such as a new phone cos the old one has died or a better contract deal cos my use has changed, they've gone no problem we can do this.

[Mike]

The dongles are okay if you are out and about but I don't think anything can beat the landline for internet access. I use O2 Broadband which is about £7.50 a month to O2 customers and £10 a month to non O2 customers. Only downside is you really do need a landline. I suppose overall it cost me about £20 a month which is not too bad.

We did the same economy drive and got a great number of our subscriptions, insurances etc much cheaper. The worst offender was our house and building insurance - that had been creeping upwards in cost for a couple of years and as soon as we changed it halved the yearly cost for better cover! Amazing really.

If we ever find ourselves a bit short it will probably be the end of the website(s) as it is rather expensive to run every year. . . I suppose we all need our little hobbies.

The mobile phones are now the most costly yearly subscription in the house, oh well.

[liz.brownlloyd]

I suppose if push came to shove we could start paying a subscrition for being on the websites. My mobile bill isn't dire (25 plus 15 for internet) and I really couldn't live without it.

It's my maintenance charge that annoys me, 60 per month and they struggle to find their arse with two hands and a map and believe dandelions are a feature plant grrrr.... As I was on my own at the time it made sense, as I would end up paying a gardener anyway (I am truely shocking around plants and someone as accident as me really shouldn't go anywhere near a lawn mower). Now I have someone who would greatly appreciate a garden, actually now I have two inhabitants of my flat who would appreciate a garden (the other being my cat).

[johnriley1uk]

Broadband speeds...subscriptions....maintenance charges on flats...gardens...weeds....cats.....wow! I definitely need faster broadband to keep up with all that!

[mr_e]

If we had videos of the cats you'd certainly need faster broadband.

Worst comes to the worst, we could always come to some arrangement to keep the site running. At the very least I'd want a copy of the backup files to frame on my wall or something.

On topic, my broadband speeds seem to be improving. Yay.

[liz.brownlloyd]

Humm and T-mobile has come back to say tough, its my fault that I didn't know it was a 24 month package. They have reduced me to a 1GB package (£10 per month) and I will probably have to pay for a secondary BT / internet line on top grrr. I will write to offcom and watchdog so other people don't get caught too, however when I told this to T-mobile they tried to encourage me not to write a letter as this would do no good in my individual circumstances.

They have lost me as a customer, my broadband and phone are up June and September next year retrospetively and I will be cancelling / moving. If everyone has had good experience of O2 maybe to an iPhone...

[Mike]

So convinced count thus far. Me, Phil, Lizzie with John and Liz waiting in the wings . . . I should be on comission.

[johnriley1uk]

All week I've been using my Orange Internet Everywhere Mobile broadband. Here it's a GPRS connection and it's quite slow!

[liz.brownlloyd]

Since complaining my internet has got a lot quicker i.e. I can visit Mike's website on an evening, especially a Saturday evening (though it is hot out there). Maybe just coincidance...

[BarcelonAl]

I'm being fooked over by BT. They won't stop taking £25 a month for my connection despite me being a BT employee (and having been told that about 10 times). Still, when I leave Dabs I won't have to pay a bill for about 5 years!

Connection speed is good though...6Mb normally.

[johnriley1uk]

h dear, the performance of the main connection is a bit pathetic just now. It's the first time I've seen the upload speed exceed the download speed!