Hi, i'm a student moving into my first house in manchester, and i was wondering if anyone has any advice or links for service providers who are good for providing the speed they promise, and for providers who dont bottleneck certain types of traffic too. We don't have the option of fibre-optic Thanks a lot for any help!
First thing to do is goto http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange_search and see what LLU providers will be available to you. Once you know that then post them here and we'll be able to give you a better idea of who to look at.
I second this Plusnet are bang on. Customer Support is in the U.K as well not in some Bangladeshi (can't understand what they say) Call Centre! And Plusnet have a brilliant forum with dedicated staff. I can't recommend them highly enough.
I did BeUnlimited then O2 at Uni (when they got bought) and was never throttled due to high usage. Did the job.
BeUnlimited/O2 are excellent, in 4 years we've only had one downtime (30 mins) and speeds are never throttled and with a truly unlimited monthly usage it is a good ISP. In addition if you already have an O2 contract on your mobile phone you might be able to get a discount from the O2 store (we got a £7.50/mo discount). However, being in a student house, will you be in the house over Summer? Most ISP's require a year's contract so PlusNet would be good for it's monthly contract but there is a £25 activation charge. However, are you planning on spending for a phone line rental? Virgin Media would require no phone line, but their service isn't that great. Finally, go to www.topcashback.co.uk, register and purchase your broadband via them to get some cashback. To date I have received over £400 in cashback over 3 years, not bad eh!
Be do a 3 month contract, I have used them alongside my cable provider and they are second to none for ADSL in the UK. TSB
Utility warehouse are good providers and the customer service is excellent. They dont really advertise but are in Which magazine with excellent reviews.
Had 02 in an old house and they were excellent. Gave an accurate line speed estimate BEFORE I had joined, excellent customer services too. Don't know if they still do it but you got discounts if you had a mobile with them too. Now on Sky Unlimited an they've been very good too. Slight delay in setup due to old tennant moving their Sky account but other than that no probs at all. Again I got an accurate line speed estimate from them and I've never had any throttling, disconnect or downtime issues with them. There was an interesting article about which IPs throttle in MicroMart about 6 months ago but I can't remember which ones it says did
it's always best to see what llu providers are available in your area sam knows if there are non, then they will be providing a resale bt product.
Since no one has already mentioned it yet, please don't go with BT, for your own sake, they are unreliable and well just don't do as they advertise, it is up to you so do whatever you like but i say BT is a no no
I can very much recommend O2. They're very reliable, never have problems and they give unlimited download.
I wouldn't take too much notice of sam knows its completely wrong with my area sam knows reckons my exchange is LLU with 3 or more ISPs and I checked and none of them are Talk Talk said they was then when I questioned it they admitted it wasn't thats Talk Talk for you lie just to get you to sign up. As I only have a BT line I'm with plusnet not got any complaints with them constant 6.4mg, If you want the best try fast.co.uk
I use bt for both business and home broadband, and have probably a 99% uptime --- I am here: http://maps.google.com/maps?ll=52.996630,-0.412565
