The Nice People Thread, No.16: A Universe of Niceness.

Pyxis

PasturesNew wrote: »

Sooo common.

I just heard a big manly scream/shout and feared there were drunks in the street fighting... so upstairs I trotted... nothing out front, nothing out the back, then I heard it again ....

I do dislike the necessity for people to shout so loudly over "just a game"....

It's disconcerting.

I can't currently decide if I'm living two doors from the type of mindless thug that shouts out while having windows/doors wide open and the telly so loud I can hear it, or if it's from nine doors away.

I'm amazed at the total lack of jubilant car horns this evening. Not heard one. Not a single one, even driving home from AmDram.

PasturesNew

Pyxis wrote: »

...but if you don't want to use the internet very often, it might be an option.

LOL .... my entire life is online... 24/7 I've got the PC running.... 24/7.

Not massive on data (who would be at 1.3MB) ... but it's on ... tinkering away, searching, reading, looking, seeing....

If the telly's on and I'm watching a Carry On film I'll be using wikipedia in the background to see "how many of the cast are still alive"...

I'll google stuff all day every day ... just because I want to know things of no consequence.



I've used those dongles in the past, I had a "good deal" that I gave up when I moved here; I thought BT broadband would be better than a Three dongle (£15/month) ... I was soooo wrong

PasturesNew

Pyxis wrote: »

I'm amazed at the total lack of jubilant car horns this evening. Not heard one. Not a single one.

I don't even know what game it was, nor do I care.

I'm sure the law abiding citizens of England wouldn't beep their horn in contravention of the law! The Highway Code does not conclude with legal use of the horn as being "when your favourite football team won a game".

GDB2222

Pyxis wrote: »

Pastures, when I've been somewhere where there's no landline connection, I've used a PAYG thing called "BT-wifi-with-FON".

It's dependantt on there being one of their hotspots nearby, but you can pay for one hour £4.99, one day £7.99, 5 days £17.99, or 30 days £39, or you can mix and match. Sometimes they have special offers.

It's usually used for a temporary thing, though, but if you don't want to use the internet very often, it might be an option.

I think PN is with BT, so is that service free? So, if her neighbour is on fibre she should be able to get a good speed increase using Fon without it costing.

PN do you have a cable to connect your PC direct to the router without WiFi? If so, it might be worth repeating the speed test.

GDB2222

Answered my own question. Yes it's free. This page explains how to log on to Fon.

https://www.btwifi.co.uk/what-is-bt-wi-fi/index.jsp

About halfway down.

Pyxis

GDB2222 wrote: »

I think PN is with BT, so is that service free? So, if her neighbour is on fibre she should be able to get a good speed increase using Fon without it costing.

I think you may be right about it being free for BT customers, and more secure, too.

I suppose I was thinking of it being a complete alternative to her current set-up, so saving the £50 a month, if she doesn't use it a lot, but she does. However, even for a month it is £30. There might be a catch, though.

I must admit, I only used it on the odd occasion when I was somewhere without a landline, but it was jolly useful.

PasturesNew

GDB2222 wrote: »

I think PN is with BT, so is that service free? So, if her neighbour is on fibre she should be able to get a good speed increase using Fon without it costing.

PN do you have a cable to connect your PC direct to the router without WiFi? If so, it might be worth repeating the speed test.

I am with BT.
I think the wifi hotspot thing is a BT customer thing - I've never looked into it as it was all about faffery from my phone. I have tried to use my phone a couple of times while out for Internet browsing, to see what happened - sometimes I had a signal, sometimes I didn't - and BT wifi hotspots crossed my mind, but it seemed a lot of hassle to find out how that works, bearing in mind a phone is actually way too small to be of any use on the Internet (especially as you get "mobile" sites which are often not what I'm after....

I do have a cable .... packed just 3-4 weeks ago, they'll be in one of the boxes marked "misc electrical stuff & wires"
I guess I COULD ... go and drag one out now.

EDIT: OK, that quick. First box I opened, there was one on the top.
Connecting in the next 1-2 minutes.

EDIT: Right, connected. Now need to wonder if I need to reboot or if it'll automatically spot that I did that.

I guess a speed test might help, if it showed anything significantly different - and is just as fast as googling to see if it's spotted the cable automatically. I suspect I have to go and pick the connection from somewhere though...

EDIT: That's showing:
1.52 Mbps download
0.34 Mbps upload
Latency: 338 ms

So doesn't prove a thing.

Maybe it improved it by 0.2 .... or maybe it's time of the day .... or maybe it's still on wireless.

The wireless system is a little PCB I fitted into my PC years ago that has a 4" long "aerial" sticking out from the back of the PC (less than 6" from the router). It's always been OK.... but maybe it's tired.... or needs dusting

According to the Connect information, it knows it's connected by a lead and the figures are changing (indicating data packets are moving about).

EDIT: I got round to disconnecting the wireless, just to be sure ... and the new speed test results, on lead only, show:
1.52 Mbps download
0.34 Mbps upload
Latency: 338 ms

Pyxis

BT-wifi-with-FON is for anyone, but I think it's free if you're already with BT.

I'm not, so I paid for a day each time, or several hours, can't remember. But I paid.

PasturesNew

Pyxis wrote: »

I think you may be right about it being free for BT customers, and more secure, too.

I suppose I was thinking of it being a complete alternative to her current set-up, so saving the £50 a month, if she doesn't use it a lot, but she does. However, even for a month it is £30. There might be a catch, though.

I must admit, I only used it on the odd occasion when I was somewhere without a landline, but it was jolly useful.

The £50 includes calls.
If I remove just the broadband and retain the landline, it's £15/month - so that gives £35 available for an alternative that's better.

One of the issues though is "what could be better"?

Physical: Even BT's site don't say my house is 1.5MB, using my postcode and picking my address tells me I can get 10MB as their "standard broadband"

Mobiles are even flakier at being able to tell you what you'll get - and you have to wander round your house to find the best signal. I might get, say, 0.8MB in the living room ... and discover if I stand up a ladder in the bathroom near the window I can get 5MB ... but you can't do much Internet work up a ladder in the bathroom by the window

Fact is: You have to enter a contract - and only THEN do you find out what you actually get ... and you can't withdraw as you signed a contract.

Catch 22 no matter which route you pick.

PasturesNew

New twist, just for humour. 1.7MB is defined as "Good"

So, I decided to give the BT broadband speed checker another chance. I'd tried it yesterday 3-4x but it never worked for me.

Most of these things, online/randomly from sites, are instant... not with BT.

First you have to login and go to it.
Then you're asked: "What would you like to do?" so you pick "Test my Broadband Speed"
Then it advises: "We just need to run a few more checks to get an accurate result". OK fair enough, but why does the next bit say ...
"We're ready to run the test" and you have to say Yes again.
Then you get "We're just getting your speed test results ready" and you eventually get to "Click on Results"
But not yet as you then have to click on "Continue to my Result"

So what did I get?

"Can't fetch results" - for some unfathomable reason, having spent about 8-10 minutes pressing the above buttons, it was unable to deliver my results. What it MEANT, I think, was that it couldn't see my wifi, so couldn't give that result (because I'd turned it off/they never pointed that out at the start).

However, GOOD NEWS, because they then proceed to tell me that
"Your broadband speed is good"

Really? "Good".... I'd hate to see you on a bad day then.

I allegedly get 1.7MB between their server and my hub ... (allegedly, you can't trust them can you).