Orange LLU now WBC

societys_child

had an email from orange a few weeks ago, to let me know they were upgrading my connection . . to give me a new "internet experience"

rant:

A new experience is an understatement . . . or should I say, not new at all. I remember a similar experience before the days of LLU and ADSL2+

I should point out I'm at the end of a very long (0.5MB) copper line but LLU increased this to 1MB and ADSL2+ increased it to about 1.7MB. Not fast but stable and the speed was always the same no matter what time of day. And not had any problems with Orange, till now.

At first I noticed my IP address was a totally different range, router was syncing faster and D/L speeds increased (slightly) over the next few days.

pingtest.net reorted a grade A line .. wow. Then it all went wrong, sync speed dropped, D/L speed dropped and pingtest.net now shows I have a grade D line. Lag is dreadful . . little spinning arrows and "connecting" on everything I click :mad:

Just been searching and what orange have done is dump the LLU in my (not so) local exchange and switched to WBC (BT Wholesale Broadband Connect) This is a slow, oversubscribed, high contention, absolute piece of BT junk.

I guessing the reason the line quality initially increased is, I was one of the first to be switched, then it went downhill . .

I wondered why I'd been getting sales calls from Orange over the past few months offering to reduce the cost etc - it involved a new 18 month contract of course. Didn't take 'em up on their offer. /rant

So, BT infinity is available to me now -34Mb (extra cost tho') .. hummm, not sure, I really didn't want to go to BT . . .

pcombo

Then get a MAC and go to another ISP.

macman

Orange are abandoning their LLU network, so you won't be alone in your suffering...

Mark_In_Hampshire

Orange gave in, decided they couldn't be bothered any more (it's probably a little more detailed than that, but that's the effect) and sold their kit back to BT. So as far as I know, "Orange LLU" does not exist any more except as a "legacy package".

So you want the Fibre to the Cabinet service, and it's available to you - so pick your supplier and get a MAC code!

http://www.robertos.me.uk/html/isps_offering_fttc.html

asbokid

That's terrible news about Orange LLU. Not so much because it's Orange (all fur coat and no knickers), but from the loss of competition. Orange had pretty extensive coverage.

societys_child

Mark_In_Hampshire wrote: »

Orange gave in, decided they couldn't be bothered any more (it's probably a little more detailed than that, but that's the effect) and sold their kit back to BT. So as far as I know, "Orange LLU" does not exist any more except as a "legacy package".

So you want the Fibre to the Cabinet service, and it's available to you - so pick your supplier and get a MAC code!

http://www.robertos.me.uk/html/isps_offering_fttc.html

Thanks for the link, was thinking about plusnet as they offer FTTC in the area, but I notice their getting a bit of stick for poor customer service since becoming part of BT. None of the others on the list are in my exchange. Broadband Britain :rotfl: . . . everythings a gamble

macman

So what are your other LLU options?

asbokid

macman wrote: »

So what are your other LLU options?

http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange_search

steveE2

societys_child wrote: »

Thanks for the link, was thinking about plusnet as they offer FTTC in the area, but I notice their getting a bit of stick for poor customer service since becoming part of BT. None of the others on the list are in my exchange. Broadband Britain :rotfl: . . . everythings a gamble

All on the list are available if BT Infinity is available as they all use BT Wholesale Fibre.
For instance try your number here
http://www.adsl24.co.uk/broadband/fibre/
OR
http://www.zen.co.uk/home-office/broadband/fibre-broadband.aspx

Because the majority of those ISP are independents they don't get listed as main suppliers

societys_child

macman wrote: »

So what are your other LLU options?

LLU options are

AOL . . .(erm . . )
02/Be . . . (sorry not available in your area - don't want to disappoint you ):T
C&W/ Bulldog . . .. (now Talk Talk)
Orange . . . . (not any more)
Sky/ Easynet . . . (we estimate you'll get 1Mb)
Talktalk / CPW . . . (We estimate 1.9Mb - sorry an error has ocured):rotfl:
Tiscali . . . (TalkTalk)

Just registered "an Interest" with plusnet who are offering FTTC from April 19th . . I'll see what they say . .

societys_child

steveE2 wrote: »

All on the list are available if BT Infinity is available as they all use BT Wholesale Fibre.
For instance try your number here
http://www.adsl24.co.uk/broadband/fibre/
OR
http://www.zen.co.uk/home-office/broadband/fibre-broadband.aspx

Because the majority of those ISP are independents they don't get listed as main suppliers

Thanks, (for the wake up call ) I'll look around.

[edit] The sun must have gone to head yesterday . . .

got so used to checking samknows to see who offers LLU etc, I totally lost the plot regarding FTTC and that other options were available. :doh:
Was also (wrongly?) under the impression that BT were resisting calls to allow other ISPs re-sell to their FTTC product.

This is obviously not to case but none of the major ISPs are offering it for some reason?

Bearing in mind that this is MSE, I've not found a good fibre+line rental+calls deal . . yet, still looking.