No 'telephone' cable - what would you do for internet?

WIAWSNB

Hi.
Old building, divided into flats, with this one fifth up, near t'top. No existing telephone line.
What would you do for decent BB? Enough for general use, Zooming, and movie streaming - say 75Mbps or up.
Get fibre in? Or go 'air'?
Ta. 

Ayr_Rage

Unless there is already fibre into the building then getting "fibre in" to just one flat may not be as simple as you think.

Firstly, ask your neighbours what provision they have.

WIAWSNB

So, physical 'fibre' if possible? 

He knows the cove in flat 6, so will ask them.

Cheers.

Rodders53

Getting a new landline or more likely fibre installed may need Landlord/Freeholder/Building Management approval and routing agreed.  Being 'high up' may make the install more difficult (safe access), too.

Check if mobile phone company 4g/5g internet is good in the flat as they can be as cost-effective in some circumstances.

Frozen_up_north

Check out Scancom on Amazon for data SIM cards, no contract and around half the cost of fibre broadband. I use EE as they have solid 5G here, plenty good enough for TV streaming. Limit is typically 500 GB per month on "unlimited". They say "business use only", whatever that means.

Obviously depends on coverage and how many others are watching cat videos, and you will need to buy a suitable modem which isn't particularly cheap.

WIAWSNB

Frozen_up_north said:

Check out Scancom on Amazon for data SIM cards, no contract and around half the cost of fibre broadband. I use EE as they have solid 5G here, plenty good enough for TV streaming. Limit is typically 500 GB per month on "unlimited". They say "business use only", whatever that means.

Obviously depends on coverage and how many others are watching cat videos, and you will need to buy a suitable modem which isn't particularly cheap.

Thank you.

It looks as tho' there's at least two 4/5G options - EE and '3'. Both are very reasonable at just over £20pm. 

Can you explain - what is needed in addition to these wee boxes? These boxes only capture the 'G' signal, but don't 'WiFi' it to the house?

I'll also check out the data SIM cards. How would this be used to provide WiFi to a flat? What type of router takes a SIM card?

Cheers

QrizB

WIAWSNB said:

It looks as tho' there's at least two 4/5G options - EE and '3'. Both are very reasonable at just over £20pm. 

If you go direct to a mobile phone connection, they'll sell you a data SIM contract including a suitable router. The router will provide WiFi and may also have a wired network port on the back.

But that's not always the Moneysaving option, and this is MSE.

Frozen_up_north said:

Check out Scancom on Amazon for data SIM cards, no contract and around half the cost of fibre broadband.

You can buy a data SIM separately, and a mobile router to put it in (just like putting a SIM into a mobile phone).

An example router would be this one (there are many other options):

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/285185066956

This way you're paying £40 or so for the router but the data SIM might only be £75 for 22 months like this:

https://www.scancom.co.uk/collections/three-preloaded/products/three-500gb-preloaded-data-per-month-exp-8th-aug-2025?variant=55227246051703

That's a total of £115 for 22 months, just over £5 a month on average (and cheaper than a £20/mo contract after 6 months).

outtatune

I use Three's 5G home broadband with the modem on a window sill. Currently getting around 350Mbs download on unlimited data though only about 20Mbs upload.
https://www.three.co.uk/broadband/home-broadband

Frozen_up_north

I have a couple of TP-Link NX200 routers, these take a nano SIM and have WiFi and RJ45 Ethernet sockets. They are 5G and "just work" with SIM cards from Scancom/Amazon. As QrizB mentioned, the costs can be very low compared to fibre, we are on our 4th SIM from Scancom. We use the EE SIMs, one for 50 GB/month works out to the equivalent of £6 per month, the other is "unlimited" but costs around £14 per month (paid up front, chuck the SIM when it stops working). The 50 GB/month one is in a second home and is only used occasionally, plus alarm monitoring.

The Three SIMs from them are cheaper, but here the EE signal is much better and doesn't fail at the slightest glitch in the mains supply (our local Three site has no battery backup).

Incidentally, with the older version 1 NX200 router an EE sim needs the NAT setting turned on, otherwise it won't work. Not sure about using one with a Three SIM, nor whether later NX200 routers need the same setting turned on, see image.

WIAWSNB

His builder apparently got him this:

https://ee.co.uk/broadband/pay-monthly-mobile-broadband-gallery/4g-wifi-details

Seems to not be a particularly good option for the money? It's only 2.4GHz for a start.

WIAWSNB

Frozen_up_north said:

I have a couple of TP-Link NX200 routers, these take a nano SIM and have WiFi and RJ45 Ethernet sockets. They are 5G and "just work" with SIM cards from Scancom/Amazon. As QrizB mentioned, the costs can be very low compared to fibre, we are on our 4th SIM from Scancom. We use the EE SIMs, one for 50 GB/month works out to the equivalent of £6 per month, the other is "unlimited" but costs around £14 per month (paid up front, chuck the SIM when it stops working). The 50 GB/month one is in a second home and is only used occasionally, plus alarm monitoring.

The Three SIMs from them are cheaper, but here the EE signal is much better and doesn't fail at the slightest glitch in the mains supply (our local Three site has no battery backup).

Incidentally, with the older version 1 NX200 router an EE sim needs the NAT setting turned on, otherwise it won't work. Not sure about using one with a Three SIM, nor whether later NX200 routers need the same setting turned on, see image.

Blimey. Expensive routers, but I guess they are 5G. Silly-fast, and way more than what's required here.

I guess 4G is ok? (~75+Mbps+)