Broadband recommendations?

[Chris]

So my Plusnet contract renewal is coming up and although I've been a
happy, longterm customer I'm open to alternative suggestions.

I know Zen and A&A are very good, however, I don't see the benefit of
the additional cost when my line is very reliable - now see it crumble...

I'm on a good stable line getting 34/10 on whatever the lowest tier of
fibre is called. Despite being a family with teenagers and lots of
streaming we've never noticed the speed to be a limitation. A faster
*up*load would be nice, but I again I only occasionally notice it.

I'd pay for the top tier FTTC if it's only a small additional cost. FTTP
is not available.

I do need a landline as I have relatives abroad and calling on mobile is
extortionate. Facetime/WhatsApp are a little out of their comfort zone
need to traditional telephony.

Given all the above caveats are there any other ISPs I should consder?

[Tweed]

I’m afraid you do pay more for A&A as an insurance policy for when things
do go wrong. A colleague has Plusnet. Something went wrong in the FTTC
cabinet and he was without service for over two weeks. Plusnet went through
all the idiocy of send a new router etc, then OR failed to turn up etc etc.

[Woody]

If you read their details you will find that Zen fix your price from day
one and guarantee never to increase it - or at least they did.

Per the calls abroad as you note WhatsApp (Android user so can't speak
for Facetime) is effective and free, but if those abroad have a computer
of any sort have you considered trying Zoom?

The final option is to set up a free VoIP account with one of the UK
organisations and use that to call their landline number. Sipgate will
charge you 1.9p/min for most of Europe to a landline, Voipcheap have
many destination countries - mainly Europe but some others - that are
free to lnadlines subject to a total of 200 minutes in any week (not
sure if that is a calendar week or 7 days rolling.) If your overseas
relatives have Interweb access you should use Sipgate as
Sipgate-to-Sipgate calls wherever they are are always free. I use it
from my mobile when caravanning in Europe and have access to free wi-fi.
Most VSP's - certainly Sipgate - give you a standard UK landline number
straight off that will accept incoming calls from anyone anywhere.

For VoIP you need either a analogue telephone adapter (ATA) into which
you plug a bog standard UK (DTMF) phone, or you get a SIPphone, either
off eBay, which you programme up. If you can find one a Cisco/Linksys
PAP2T (not the n suffix version) - note branded, not a Chinese copy -
they are very reliable and quite easy to set up. The Cisco SPA122 is
effectively the same thing. Grandstream area also effective. If by
chance you have a Gigaset DECT phone system using a G0-Box 100 base
station unit, that box can handle both landline connection and VoIP but
takes a little more setting up. There is loads of on-line help in
setting them up.
For a SIPphone look at Grandstream and Yealink as two of the most
commonly available. Panasonic also make them - I have a redundant one
here that I got for my late f-in-l. Just beware that as many of these
are 'system' phones they often expect to get their power supply up the
Ethernet cable (known as Power over Etherenet or PoE) which would
necessitate buying a small PoE power supply but there are dozens on eBay
for less than a tenner.

[Graham J]

No.

See other thread about VoIP. You can port your landline number so
incoming conventional calls from abroad will work the same way; and you
might get better pricing for outgoing international calls.

Beware that VoIP does need a good reliable internet connection. I have
(for historical reasons) a Plusnet ADSL conenction as a backup. Right
now this shows an up-time of 1047 hours (the last failure occurred
during a summer thunderstorm), and this is on a 6km line to the
exchange. But I've heard horror stories of Plusnet not being able to
fix frequent faults on FTTC connections, so your decision depends on
your knowledge of the local Openreach infrastructure. If it's been
reliable and you see no roadworks or tree problems then it might
continue to be reliable.

In due course FTTP will be forced upon you, so you may have to plan for
a flavour of VoIP that suits you.


--
Graham J

[Brian Gregory]

On 05/11/2021 14:52, Chris wrote:
> I know Zen and A&A are very good, however, I don't see the benefit of
> the additional cost when my line is very reliable - now see it crumble...

IMHO Zen isn't too expensive and they never increase your price so you
don't have to mess around pretending you want to leave every time your
contract expires in order to get a good price.

--
Brian Gregory (in England).

[Roderick Stewart]

If you're happy with the reliability of what you already have, then
you'll lose nothing by changing nothing.

Regarding speed, my router can show a graph of actual usage, and
maximum downstream rarely peaks above about 18, which doesn't stress
my 26/5 service at all. That's with practically all my TV viewing
being streaming at 1920x1080. If your 34/10 service is not stressed
by the viewing habits of your teenagers, it's unlikely you'd notice
any difference if you increased it.

Rod.

[Chris]

On 05/11/2021 16:11, Woody wrote:
> On Fri 05/11/2021 14:52, Chris wrote:
>>
>> So my Plusnet contract renewal is coming up and although I've been a
>> happy, longterm customer I'm open to alternative suggestions.
>>
>> I know Zen and A&A are very good, however, I don't see the benefit of
>> the additional cost when my line is very reliable - now see it crumble...
>>
>> I'm on a good stable line getting 34/10 on whatever the lowest tier of
>> fibre is called. Despite being a family with teenagers and lots of
>> streaming we've never noticed the speed to be a limitation. A faster
>> *up*load would be nice, but I again I only occasionally notice it.
>>
>> I'd pay for the top tier FTTC if it's only a small additional cost.
>> FTTP is not available.
>>
>> I do need a landline as I have relatives abroad and calling on mobile
>> is extortionate. Facetime/WhatsApp are a little out of their comfort
>> zone need to traditional telephony.
>>
>> Given all the above caveats are there any other ISPs I should consder?
>
> If you read their details you will find that Zen fix your price from day
> one and guarantee never to increase it - or at least they did.

They are almost 50% more expensive that PN which I can't really justify.

> Per the calls abroad as you note WhatsApp (Android user so can't speak
> for Facetime) is effective and free, but if those abroad have a computer
> of any sort have you considered trying Zoom?

Yeah with some success, but tech isn't their strong point. I don't
really want to start every call with 10 minutes of faffing and
complaints about how things are so much more difficult than they used to be.

> The final option is to set up a free VoIP account with one of the UK
> organisations and use that to call their landline number. Sipgate will
> charge you 1.9p/min for most of Europe to a landline, Voipcheap have
> many destination countries - mainly Europe but some others - that are
> free to lnadlines subject to a total of 200 minutes in any week (not
> sure if that is a calendar week or 7 days rolling.) If your overseas
> relatives have Interweb access you should use Sipgate as
> Sipgate-to-Sipgate calls wherever they are are always free. I use it
> from my mobile when caravanning in Europe and have access to free wi-fi.
> Most VSP's - certainly Sipgate - give you a standard UK landline number
> straight off that will accept incoming calls from anyone anywhere.

Thanks for that. I did use the MobileVOIP app for a bit. Might try that
again and skip the international bundle. I'm not really using it enough
to justify it.

>
> For VoIP you need either a analogue telephone adapter (ATA) into which
> you plug a bog standard UK (DTMF) phone, or you get a SIPphone, either
> off eBay, which you programme up. If you can find one a Cisco/Linksys
> PAP2T (not the n suffix version) - note branded, not a Chinese copy -
> they are very reliable and quite easy to set up. The Cisco SPA122 is
> effectively the same thing. Grandstream area also effective. If by
> chance you have a Gigaset DECT phone system using a G0-Box 100 base
> station unit, that box can handle both landline connection and VoIP but
> takes a little more setting up. There is loads of on-line help in
> setting them up.
> For a SIPphone look at Grandstream and Yealink as two of the most
> commonly available. Panasonic also make them - I have a redundant one
> here that I got for my late f-in-l. Just beware that as many of these
> are 'system' phones they often expect to get their power supply up the
> Ethernet cable (known as Power over Etherenet or PoE) which would
> necessitate buying a small PoE power supply but there are dozens on eBay
> for less than a tenner.

Thanks for the info. Useful to know, but given that I need a landline
for broadband still, I'll wait until next time in 18-24 months. Naked bb
may be available then.

[Chris]

At ~20 quid more a month that's quite an insurance policy. I did have a
failure for about 2 days this year and I just tethered with a mobile
dongle. Service wasn't great but good enough to work and light video calls.

[Chris]

No sign of FTTP here yet. Not sure they can force it onto me unless it
is a free upgrade.

[Chris]

Yeah, my thoughts too.

Looks like there's little reason to move and the market hasn't changed
significantly in the last 18 months. Will revisit in another 18 months
or so.

Cheers to all!!

[Tweed]

It rather depends on how important your home Internet connection is to you.

[notya...@gmail.com]

No you don't you can run Voip on your mobile, met up with a mate from France in a Yorkshire hotel once and he needed to phone his wife. So I lent him my mobile and made the call out on Voipfone. He spent 20 minutes talking to her and it cost me 30p. It cost him a pint.

[www.GymRatZ.co.uk]

On 05/11/2021 14:52, Chris wrote:
>
> So my Plusnet contract renewal is coming up and although I've been a
> happy, longterm customer I'm open to alternative suggestions.
>
> I know Zen and A&A are very good, however, I don't see the benefit of
> the additional cost when my line is very reliable - now see it crumble...

<snip>

> I do need a landline as I have relatives abroad and calling on mobile is
> extortionate. Facetime/WhatsApp are a little out of their comfort zone
> need to traditional telephony.
>
> Given all the above caveats are there any other ISPs I should consder?

As much as I love Zen and have been with them for years and years with 3
x telephone lines, 1 x FTTC and 1 X ADSL2 if you went with them and took
a line with them be warned that call costs have jumped up extortionately
last month I think. Not that I ever make POTS calls but be warned.
But their support "guys" are intelligent and easily adapt to the
experience and knowledge of the customer without forcing you to re-do
everything you've already checked. Never had a scripted conversation
with anyone there.

Betamax VOiP rates for international calling... might be a touch out of
date but will give you an idea.
http://backsla.sh/betamax
You can set up your mobile to call out with the Betamax softphone thing
if you find one of the providers that gives you free calls to that
country and even set it to present your landline Caller I.D. rather than
your mobile number after a simple verification check.

I've been running a combination of Betamax (voipcheap.co.uk) and
voipfone at business & home for between 15 and 20 years and 2 years ago
set up both to give my mother a telephone in her care home using a
Vodafone 3GB data dongle . Haven't had the landlines connected for years
as they just get telepests.

You can port your current landline over to voipfone or any other
provider so no hassle with telling anyone about a new number and set a
dial plan to call free things like 999, 111, 0500, 0800 etc via voipfone
as they're free numbers but the Betamax clones don't recognise them as
such (if at all).

The flexibility of VoIP offerings is excellent with additions like call
blocking etc.

Cheers - Pete