Broadband advice

bry_3

Just a mention about Broadband. For many years I have been paying £9.99 a month for a "free" evenings and weekends dial-up service from Clara.net. No complaints about that, but when I decided to research Broadband, - what a minefield!!!
Found ADSLGuide.org.uk very useful for comparing prices/contracts/limits/speeds/no of pc's allowed/etc.
In the end I chose freedom2surf.net and I can recommend them for the following reasons.
They require only a one month contract, - many ask you to sign up for 12 months!!
They allow connection of multiple PC's, - many don't!
They provide a 2Mb connection speed (most still only 512Kb!), with a monthly download limit of 2GB.
They are supposed to give you a warning if you are nearing the limit and ask if you want to buy another Gb for £1.50, but I have exceeded the
limit several times and they have not asked for more money - (yet).
You can choose to choose and buy your own modem from a cheaper source (or you can buy one of theirs).
They don't take any money from you until the actual connection date and check the line for compatibility first anyway.
I was connected on the day promised and everything went fine. Just needed to phone their technical support (good reviews in comparison tables), to query how to configure my email program, - which turned out to be very easy - just clicking on a link on the members web page and download a mini setup program.
The best bit is the price - only £14.99 a month - and I have 4 PC's networked to the Internet now.
Also be wary of wireless. It is not necessarily the all singing all dancing set-up expected. Had my house tested for signal strength through walls, etc and it wasn't good, so wired the network instead. Much faster than wireless anyway.

BRY

Talon_Karrde

i can't believe you're getting 2mbs for less than 15 quid? i just asked tiscali for an upgrade to 1mbs for 15.99 with a 2gb limit!
yeegads i say!

MarkR_2

That offer sounds good to me Bry.
I have been trying to get my head around all the different Broadband offers too; headache or what trying to work it all out.
Do they charge any sort of connection charge initialy? From what I can gather a lot do unless you migrate from another ADSL service.
I am currently on the NTL slow broadband (narrowband ?! ) service at £18 a month, this is through a cable feed though and not ADSL. When its working its OK, but has spells of poor or no connection. I would like to connect a couple of PCs on a network so a faster connection for less money is exactly what im after. This usage capping thingy worries me too, I dont download music or films, but cant get my head around how much "normal" surfing 2Gb a month translates too.

Anyone else got good or bad to say about this or any other cheap broadband?

Talon_Karrde

Having done some research, i don't think, for most users, the 2gb cap will be much of an issue. I have just checked my usage with tiscali for Jan this year, and i DO download say half a dozen songs a month, but not movies (which are significantly larger) and i only got up to around 50mb of download and 20 of upload, 2 gb gives you 1000mb!!
Also, i was sent this by a friend
http://www.efhbroadband.com/migrations.asp
cheap monthly, but it is £80 or so for set up, still, 9.99 for 512kbps!?

gary38uk

50 gig last month for me............

Talon_Karrde

50 GIG!!??? what are you doing, downloading entire blockbuster back catalogues??

btw that should be 1000mb for 1GB so a 2gb cap is 2000mb!

bosey

MarkR wrote:

This usage capping thingy worries me too, I dont download music or films, but cant get my head around how much "normal" surfing 2Gb a month translates too.

if its just web pages you're loading then do you really need a 2 meg connection? even a 1/2 meg would serve 2 machines well if thats all your doing. Caps should only be something worn on the head. the whole point of a fast connection is to transfer large amounts of data - if you've got a 2 gig cap (absolutely nothing in the world of multimedia) then you've got a ferrari with a eggcup for a petrol tank. waste of time!

i'm with central point 1 meg for 26 quid a month and have had no glitches with service whatsoever (except to have my connection jump to 2 meg for the last 3 weeks!), *no caps* & ive been with them for around a year.

80gig this month and rising...

MarkR_2

Thanks Talon and Bosey.
I have looked at freedom2surfs website and its pretty helpful.
Reading another thread on here I think my biggest problems would be canceling NTL ! so will look into that first (who knows they may even offer me a discount to stay ) .

robnye

have a look here,

this website lists all available isp/broadband connections and the t's and c's

http://www.adslguide.org.uk/

m00nie

mark was you aware NTL are doing free upgrades which is due to start in march.

if you are on the 300k 17.99 package you can upgrade free to 1.5mb (think its 3gb limit on this tho)

the 750k is going to 2mb

and the top one is going to 3mb

the limits on these 2 i think i read are 30gb but cant remeber off hand

Talon_Karrde

bosey wrote:

if its just web pages you're loading then do you really need a 2 meg connection? even a 1/2 meg would serve 2 machines well if thats all your doing. Caps should only be something worn on the head. the whole point of a fast connection is to transfer large amounts of data - if you've got a 2 gig cap (absolutely nothing in the world of multimedia) then you've got a ferrari with a eggcup for a petrol tank. waste of time!

i'm with central point 1 meg for 26 quid a month and have had no glitches with service whatsoever (except to have my connection jump to 2 meg for the last 3 weeks!), *no caps* & ive been with them for around a year.

80gig this month and rising...

This is true, but if tiscali are offering 1mbs connection for the price i am paying for a 256kbps one, and i don't download too much (ie between 100 and 500 MB) then might aswell have the faster connection if i can get it!!?