Broadband deals

[Ian Price]

Morning all,

I'm going to be changing my broaband provider soon - currently on Orange. I'm looking for a deal that will get me weekend and evening calls for free from my landline and broadband access.

Can anyone recommend any good deals out there? I was looking at Sky Talk and Broadband as it looks like a fairly good deal.

Also, I have two phone lines coming into my house. I plan to get rid of one of them and just have the one number. Probably stupid questions but can you go on broadband and make calls at the same time and is it easy to arrange so I have acccess to the one number all over the house (currently only have it downstairs)?

Apologies for the longish thread - I'm hoping someone more intelligent than me can help!

Cheers,

Ian.

[Johnny Mac]

I use Bt Broadband Ian. Its a fast connection 8mbit, plus you can get BT vision TV package which uses the broadband too for another 8 quid. It's like Sky + and has a huge amount of on demand tv.

The band width is going up next year supposedly to around 20 mbit.

You can have a net phone with the home hub. You need a BT Phone Line though for all this.

[MrBump]

Everyone has a horror story with broadband - mines with Tiscali.  Shocking service, poor provision.

Currently with Freeola, because they were doing some some cracking web hosting deals at the time.

Mark.

[Ian Price]

I use Bt Broadband Ian. Its a fast connection 8mbit, plus you can get BT vision TV package which uses the broadband too for another 8 quid. It's like Sky + and has a huge amount of on demand tv.

The band width is going up next year supposedly to around 20 mbit.

You can have a net phone with the home hub. You need a BT Phone Line though for all this.

Cheers Johnny - I think I'll stay with Sky for a while for TV but will check out BT Broadband.

Not sure I follow the net phone/home hub thing though so will have to do some reading up.

EDIT - Just read up on it so it makes a bit more sense now. Do you pay line rental in addition to the BT Broadband subscription or is it all rolled in together when you go with broadband?

[noodleplugerine]

I recommend Be.

Had no problems, price is good, speed is excellent.

You won't get the free calls, but the speed/money ratio is just awesome.

[horsehead]

Count yourself lucky, over here in Hull we've got Karoo...err well nothing else actually!

[Fourth Feline]

I heartily recommend 'O2' - after being messed around and let down by Orange for ages.

the £12.50 monthly fee drops to £ 7.50 per month, if you are willing top up an O2 enabled mobile with £ 10 every 3 months.

Free phone calls to O2 - 24hrs a day 365 days a year e.t.c. ( including technical ) - which Orange where charging a fortune for , just  for me to repeatedly ask / chase why my line kept dropping from 'slow' to 'extra slow' .   At best orange gave me 1.6 Meg , which dropped ( without appology on their part ) to 1 Meg, then 0.5 Meg.

When cornered, all their technical team could say was " we probaly put something big like a local school on the same exchange " - as if the inadequacy of their infrastructure was my responsibility - and not theirs for expanding capacity / servers!    At one stage, I only got any service from them when a techy mate hammered into some far flung European 'Orange' file servers for me .  They even blamed B.T. phone lines for the dramatic and permanent drop in speed ;   a falacy quickly revealed when O2 pumped 4.2  Meg straight through the same exchange / line a few days later.

For £7.50 a month, O2 is giving me a consistent  4 Meg . Also the 'free to call' and genuinely helpfull  call centres are in Leeds and Glasgow - not someone , somewhere thousands of miles away reading from a script all the time, and being largely hard to understand or be willing to deviate from that script.

I know a local chap who has put his entire Business and personal lines through O2 - and he has found that they have always been great at ( freely ) advising on technical matters and working out nice deals for flexible circumstances.

Orange cost me a fortune in calls and stress.  Just wish I had have opted out sooner.

End of rant.   :)

[Doctor X]

I'm another happy O2 user, they've been great.  However, in my previous place I used Sky and they were just as good - and cheap too. If you've got telly with them then you might as well use them.

[Fourth Feline]

I'm another happy O2 user, they've been great.  However, in my previous place I used Sky and they were just as good - and cheap too. If you've got telly with them then you might as well use them.

Good point / reminder about the alternative options  for  'inclusive package' deals that organisations like Sky and Virgin offer. I know of a 'Virgin' user - and if he has ever asked me to go round and  phone them to set up anything technical for him, ( i.e their Routers  / Modems support M.A.C filtering home network security- which O2 sadly do not ) they ( Virgin ) have been very helpful and swift /slick in assisting.

 In my case I needed to retain an existing B.T. Landline,  for easy contact by an elderly Parent - and I watch little enough T.V. to warrant anything beyond the Freeview Box. 

[Johnny Mac]

I use Bt Broadband Ian. Its a fast connection 8mbit, plus you can get BT vision TV package which uses the broadband too for another 8 quid. It's like Sky + and has a huge amount of on demand tv.

The band width is going up next year supposedly to around 20 mbit.

You can have a net phone with the home hub. You need a BT Phone Line though for all this.

Cheers Johnny - I think I'll stay with Sky for a while for TV but will check out BT Broadband.

Not sure I follow the net phone/home hub thing though so will have to do some reading up.

EDIT - Just read up on it so it makes a bit more sense now. Do you pay line rental in addition to the BT Broadband subscription or is it all rolled in together when you go with broadband?

Not sure about the line rental is its all on DD I never look at the breakdown of the bill. The on demand side of the Bt vision is vast. You never go channel surfing. The sport bit has classic stuff from footy to boxing, motorsport, golf, cricket. All the big production tv series are there on demand for months. Imo it blows sky into the weeds.

[headtheball]

I'd steer well clear of TalkTalk. Awful service, and awful customer service.

[Stevepage]

I've got BT Broadband and its cr@p. We keep getting faults in our line so the internet is incredibly slow. Apparently alot of people in my area have the same problem with BT.

[headtheball]

It's as much to do with your area and the quality of the actual wiring as the provider in the long run, though. The all-round best option is to ask around locally, find out what people are happy with (cable or via phoneline) and go with that, selecting the best provider on price without any glaring, well know issues (like, say, TalkTalk and their magical disappearing DNS).