1 mile from LLU exchange, limited provider options

RacyRed

Hi, I'd appreciate some advice please.

What preferences would you have in the following circumstances please?

I need at the minimum a 2 mb broadband connection.

I'm moving to a house about a mile from the local exchange, 1.5 miles if the (overhead for the street itself) wiring in the area follows the local roads.

Per SamKnows the exchange I'm on has no cable or wireless connection. SDSL and FTCC status is shown as "not available". The exchange is LLU enabled for the following: -

AOL
O2/BE
Orange
Sky/Easynet
TalkTalk (CPW)
Tiscali
Tiscali TV

The house is currently served by TalkTalk but I've been unable to find out what the broadband speeds are.

If anyone give me the benefit of their experiences with an of the above providers while in similar circumstances I'd really appreciate it. Previously I've always beem very close to the exchange so I'm not sure what to expect. I earn part of my living on the internet.

Thanks


Broadband availability overviewADSL:Yes
SDSL:Yes (Via LLU Operator) LLU services:Yes Cable:No Wireless:No Broadband availability overviewADSL:Yes
SDSL:Yes (Via LLU Operator) LLU services:Yes Cable:No Wireless:No

PeterDuckett

Really and truly you need to know the line length!
Can't you get the phone number and use that instead and put that into the sites that should give you an idea, but saying that im 500m from the exchange or 900m line length I get 18mb from sky. Before i used to live over 5km and got 4mb on O2

If you not having sky TV get O2 they are truly first class and now offer cheap phone too.

Though alot of problems about speed can often be solved by improving the internal wiring of your house:

1. Remove Ring wire from all extensions
2. Get a filtered face plate if possible £12 filter all you extensions on it and plug your modem into this and use your strong signal

mk-donald

Second PeterDuckett's views based on 2.5yrs of using & watching Be/o2 LLU.

You can combine o2 Home Broadband (v.good value) with o2 Home Phone ( okay value) but HOPEFULLY by the time you are ready to signup they would have added some decent £back referral (Quidco/TopCashBack etc) - it has been as high as £75 even for the o2 Standard (modem capped at 8Mbps synch) service but is zilch this week (though you can get 2x£20 Amazon vouchers by referring yourself on o2's website).

o2 services have the benefit of NOT taking you away from the BT telephone infrastructure so if you fall out of love with them in 12m time when your contract commitment(s) are met, you can freely move elsewhere (though if you take both broadband AND phone, you would have to move both as phone is a logical BOLT-ON to broadband). Its when someone takes your PHONE line off to their private non-BT infrastructure network that hassle/time/cost cuts in should you ever wish to leave their private network! (Witness all the whines on postings here!)

Certainly you should do your comparisons including o2 Standard or Premium (o2 readily let you regrade if your line is better/worse than you expected). See my other postings for links.

Speed wise this graph will give you some idea of the distance/speed tradeoffs:
http://surispace.files.wordpress.com/2007/10/internode-adsl2-distance1.jpg
though as you realise telephone wires seldom fly like crows! I've a c5kms line, and c56dB attenuation but manage upto 4.7Mbps on o2 Standard. I've been content with o2 as availability and throughput both consistently VERY high - my 2.5yrs haven't been totally glitch free but I don't blame o2 themselves for any of those.

MKD

RacyRed

Thanks for the replies.

PeterDuckett I don't know the phone number yet but will try to find out. I'll remove the ring wire as suggested (when I work out what that is ) and that is a great tip about the face plate.

mk-donald thanks for the information and the very useful link, I should be able to get a decent connection according to that.

I've used O2 BB before and certainly found them more reliable than most others I've used so I'll be watching the cashback sites. First I'll have to get the phoneline back onto BT from TalkTalk though. Not going to be fun.

spike7451

This will tell you roughly what speed you can get:

http://www.btwholesale.com/pages/static/Community/Broadband_Community/Coverage/ADSL_Availibility_Checker.html#

mk-donald

Good news for you - the £back for o2 Home BB is back to £50 again today = a good extra saving for a new householder. The important think to check with o2 is that they offer you Standard/Premium/Pro LLU ones that 99.xx% would recommend (and NOT the Access product which is a resold traffic-managed and "restrained" unlimited usage).

The only current "known" deadline with o2 Home BB is their current first 3 months free runs to the end of this month - though 3m free is their "normal" level though has been 2 and 0 in the past.

I'm not 100% sure that ALL TalkTalk phones are on their own phone network, ie you MIGHT be lucky that it's still a BT based one that TalkTalk are charging rental for (as I know TalkTalk have inherited a host of brands/arrangements/firms under their brand). If you CAN find out the current number the o2 website should instantly say if they can provide Std/Prem/Pro on that number, or if it's "non-BT" and hence ineligible. Otherwise you'll find some offers elsewhere on MSE of BT offering to take a line back for c£30 with a 18m commitment to some rental packages (instead of c£100 more!) though of course other firms offer other offers - eg Post Office Home Phone etc. In which case it will tend to take 24-48hrs from line being back live on BT infrastructure for the database to update so o2's system says you CAN order (make sure you clear those cookies etc and go via your preferred £back site).

MKD