Broadband speed

[Para Handy]

Firth

 

http://www.speedtest.net/result/765153397.png

[killingpingu]

I'm looking to go over to Plusnet premium, being fed up with O2's and BT's throttling and capping.

 

Plusnet say their premium package has a cap of 80GB during peak hours and unlimited from midnight to 8am. Is it really unlimited with no fair usage policy in place?

 

Secondly, whilst throttling serivces such as binary newsgroups and P2P during the day, they claim that you should be able to stream at your line speed pretty much 24/7.

 

Can anyone on the Plusnet premium package confirm or deny the above?

 

Thanks.

[DizzyKipper]

I'm on Plusnet Premium, it seems to run exactly as they say. You get a useful web tool thing which shows your break down every day/week/month of your paid for and free data used. There is some stuff at below line speed at certain times of day, but it's not really stuff I use, like P2P, so it was great for me.

 

http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/download_speeds.shtml#premiumSpeeds

 

Surfing, gaming, Youtube, updates, etc, I'm nowhere need 80Gb. Last month I used less than 8Gb.

 

If there should be congestion, data is prioritised like this http://www.plus.net/support/broadband/speed_guide/traffic_prioritisation.shtml.

 

I have only been with them a month and a half though. I have had no problems, my ping is about 60ms, great speed (may be iplate helping this), no disconnections. I'm very happy

 

If you have any concerns I'd ring the sales enquiry line, or the other means of support they have.

 

BTW if you DO decide to go with them and don't already have a referrer, you could use my code for it, I will PM it to you, I'll get a reduction in my bill

 

Oh and you can do a month trial for it so if you don't like it you are not tied it to a long contract.

[Ghostrider]

^^ How efficient were PlusNet in activating your connection? What I mean is, were you given a connection date, and they stuck to it, and the line was perfect from the start?

 

I'm going to have to switch ISPs, and have pretty much decided it'll be PlusNet I go with. The only thing that's making me hesitate at the moment is knowing whether I can rely on a fast slick change over or not, the thing I do not want is to be stuck for days or longer between my present one no longer being active and my new one either postponed the connection date or the line isn't working properly. I rely on my connection for several things, and trying to get by with a PAYG dial up as a stop gap just isn't an option, it couldn't cope.

 

I'm about 3 miles or so from the Sumburgh exchange, so your experience should be a reasonably good pointer as to what I can expect.

 

This is Tiscali at their very best, they're having a good night tonight, but as short ago as last weekend they were diabolical. Tortoise speeds and continual line drops.

 

http://www.speedtest.net/result/774931386.png

 

I put up with it at their old pricing structure, but now that TalkTalk have hiked the charges, its time to be gone. If I'm going to have to pay 30% more, I'm going with whoever gives the best deal for the. same money.

 

Speed, so long as its no slower than Tiscali is not a major issue, around 3.00 Mb/s is okay for what I'm doing, as long as its reasonably consistent. Tiscali's killer is having random day(s) without warning when it drops to under 1.00 Mb/s. Ping is not a major issue either, so long as its reasonable. Its reliability that I'm mostly after, dropped lines 4 or 5 times in 30 mins or a dozen times in a day gets old very quick.

[DizzyKipper]

The change over I'm afraid I can't help with as much. I was with Pipex down south, which had to be terminated when I moved. Was a little while before setting up Plusnet here, so I don't know how seamless it would be.

 

I set it up over the phone, as, obviously, I had no net connection. I got a text message telling me the date it would be activated. The other details were sent by email, which for me was really helpful, since I had no connection to get the details for the router etc. A call to tech support got me the details and it was indeed activated on the day they promised; and there were several emails waiting from Plusnet about the new account too.

 

As for consistency from the start, I was expecting 2 weeks of disruption... I had no disconnections and never noticed any problems when using it. My ping was higher for the first week or so, but has now dropped by 20ms, I'm not sure whether this is the line stabilising or the iplate working.

 

I have to say, again, that the line check at my number was 4Mb, at 2 miles road length from Sumburgh exchange building. After the iplate was fitted it went to 7Mb. Speedtest measures a consistent 6Mb. Might be worth you getting an iplate too, especially as it fixes other line problems as well as stabilising the connection enough to get better speeds.

 

One last thing, I emailed them a good while before moving, to ask about their service here. This is the relevant part of the reply:

 

I am not aware of any particular problems is Shetland affecting broadband connections as a whole but it is always possible to get faults affecting lines. We cannot stop that happening but we do pride ourselves at being particulary good at resolving them.

 

Hope that helps.

[khitajrah]

The fella switched us over to PlusNet last night and everything still seems to be in working order.

[Ghostrider]

@DizzyKipper: Thanks for that, its sounds like they're at least on the ball and trying to get things done quickly and efficiently, which is more than I could ever have said for Tiscali once they were assured of your money.

[Siffy]

Ghostrider - I changed from Pipex to Plusnet about 6 months ago, the change over was seamless, plusnet do it all for you, no need to actually cancel your current isp, just put in the plusnet username and password when the day comes that your current connection stops working, although it took a week longer than they said it would.

They are quick at problem solving, not that i've had many problems, but the few i did have were resolved efficiently.

Connection is far more stable, and pings dont spike upto 300 at peak gaming hours, like it did with pipex.

Top Class isp IMO.

[Pooks]

I have praised PlusNet a good few times on here and have recommended them to many people. They are a real ISP, opposed to many of the others that are just rebranded hellery.

 

If you do have a problem then they have a real call centre with real people, which happens to be based in the UK which is a bonus.

 

They have a very active forum where actual...wait for it...real employees respond to queries.

 

They are honest and open about any outages which they may have had whether it be their own fault or whether it be beyond their control. They have added extra capacity to the network as they have grown and offer some of the best pricing available.

 

Anybody would think that I work for them...I don't. I am an ex-customer who would be happy to recommend them to anybody.

 

They also launched a 'Phone' side of things a few years back which I never tried but I believe it is also very good value for money.

[khitajrah]

^ Why are you an ex-customer? Have you found something better?

[Pooks]

Yep, it's called New Zealand.

[khitajrah]

 

I completely forgot you were over there. Sorry.

[Pooks]

Not a problem. The Shetlink Mod Team had a review one night and realised that to reduce the amount of trolling on the forums we would require somebody in each time zone. I unfortunately drew the short straw...

[DizzyKipper]

If you do have a problem then they have a real call centre with real people, which happens to be based in the UK which is a bonus.

 

I don't think so, might have been at one time but not now. Part of the email I sent to them (a year or so ago now) was regarding call centres and they said it was in South Africa...

 

The sales line I called was UK which was great, but when I rang customer services and tech support to get router settings they both sounded (very) Indian. Still very helpful and sorted want I wanted quickly, mind.

[ArabiaTerra]

Not a problem. The Shetlink Mod Team had a review one night and realised that to reduce the amount of trolling on the forums we would require somebody in each time zone. I unfortunately drew the short straw...

Now that's dedication. Above and beyond....