help - watching programmes on laptop

frankie1star

Phantom_Flan_Flinger wrote: »

.49 means you're getting less than ½ a meg download.

Do you know what you're paying for? Is it a 512K connection or an up to 8 meg connection?

I saw on the Primus website that they have different products. I presume it's a business connection?

I pay for line rental with them and their lowest tariff, as we cant get higher on broadband than that, cant remember the actual amount think its £12.99. Its home use and not business use.

Is there anything I can do to boost it?

frankie1star

ringo_24601 wrote: »

Use the BBC download service rather than trying to watch them with streaming.

Watching IPlayer is no better, and some programmes I watch are on channel 4 so I dont think that's an option is it?

I dont really understand about streaming

[Deleted User]

What other broadband providers are in your area? you can find them here: http://www.samknows.com/broadband/checker2.php

Look for those with 'LLU', These are the fastest. I'm with O2, paying £7.50 for 8mb/s (actual is 6mb/s). That seems fast enough to stream TV

[Deleted User]

Frankie - are you watching them through a web-browser, or using the iPlayer download application and watching them after they've finished?

Streaming is the term for watching video over the net without downloading the whole thing first.. it downloads chunks - if you can't get one chunk before another one stops playing then it will stop every so often

frankie1star

ringo_24601 wrote: »

What other broadband providers are in your area? you can find them here: http://www.samknows.com/broadband/checker2.php

Look for those with 'LLU', These are the fastest. I'm with O2, paying £7.50 for 8mb/s (actual is 6mb/s). That seems fast enough to stream TV

I used to be with virgin, (mentioned my problems sometime ago here) their reasoning for such poor performance broadband is that we are too far from the exchange, so we will never receive a good broadband (signal ahem is that what you call it)

A_Nice_Englishman

To be honest, a TV recorder would probably be the way to go. Either a USB stick for the computer or a box to plug into the telly. Either way, you'll need a decent aerial signal of course

Phantom_Flan_Flinger

frankie1star wrote: »

we cant get higher on broadband than that

Is there anything I can do to boost it?

How do you know that's as high as you can get?

If 512K is your limit, there's probably not much more you can do.

frankie1star

ringo_24601 wrote: »

Frankie - are you watching them through a web-browser, or using the iPlayer download application and watching them after they've finished?

Streaming is the term for watching video over the net without downloading the whole thing first.. it downloads chunks - if you can't get one chunk before another one stops playing then it will stop every so often

ringo I watch it through either the BBC I player or Channel 4 on demand am not entirely sure what you mean. I believe BBC iplayer lets you have the option to either stream or download, where are Channel 4 on demand doesnt seem to have that option. You can tell I have a very limited knowledge of what I am talking about!!

frankie1star

Phantom_Flan_Flinger wrote: »

How do you know that's as high as you can get?

If 512K is your limit, there's probably not much more you can do.

Hi Flinger, that's what I have been told previously by virgin, as had numerous problems with their service and that's why I switched to primus

A_Nice_Englishman

frankie1star wrote: »

Hi Flinger, that's what I have been told previously by virgin, as had numerous problems with their service and that's why I switched to primus

Whichever ISP you use, you will be using the same telephone line and the same equipment at the exchange so the speed you get will be the same. The only exception is an LLU operator as suggested by ringo. They have their own equipment at the exchange rather than using BT's so may offer better performance.