Moving house and from Demon - HELP!!

[edz]

Hi all

Bit of a long one but bear with me for the background.

I'm presently with Demon internet broadband and have been for at least 5 years. No real issues with the service except that they brought a usage cap which I'm not best pleased about since I use a Home Business account (the cap is 60GB which seems a lot but soon runs out when I'm using it for VPN / ISO work and web site transfer).

I did look into the business account but that runs around £40+VAT.

I'm also less than impressed with the new quality of service over the last year or so and I'm concerned that cable and wireless have now bought Thus out as well.

So, since I'm out of the 12 month contract and I'm moving in February I'm looking around.

O2 Broadband was my first choice but the the line check on the new place (I've had the BT line in already) came back as saying: You're outside the network area that O2 Broadband covers, but all is not lost. We can offer you our O2 Home Broadband Access package.

I ruled that out since (A) I've seen too many bad stories even allowing for the 30 day cashback and (B) the connect option cant offer a fixed IP address (due to BT provision) which rules them out since I need to hook through firewalls and access some VPN / restricted access systems.

I briefly wavered and considered extending my Demon HomeOffice 8000 but when I called up I got an indian gentlement who, over the following 5 minutes, reminded me why I was looking for alternatives in the first place so I said I had to go and went back to the web browser.

I took another look at the local exchange :

Enabled
O2 / Be: Not available Wont be going for connect
C&W / Bulldog: Enabled as of 20/05/2005 Wouldnt touch
Edge Telecom: Not available
Entanet: Not available
Lumison: Not available
NewNet: Not available
Node4: Not available
Orange: Enabled
Pipex: Not available
Sky / Easynet: Enabled as of 28/06/2007 How do you get a cost out of easynet?
Smallworld: Not available
TalkTalk (CPW): Enabled as of 14/10/2006 Another on the no no list
Tiscali: Enabled as of 25/07/2007 Arghhhhh No
Tiscali TV: Not available
WB Internet: Not available
Zen Internet: Not available

Soo the consensus out there among heavy / advanced broadband users seems to be to use ADSL24, since they have a 1 month rolling contract with no lock in and automatically bounce up to the next contract cost if you go over the limits (none of which will get you cut off / auto move you to 128kbits take note Demon)

I'm thinking of the ofice 45 package (45GB peak / 300 GB off peak usage) at £28.75.

ADSL24 Broadband - Home

Then we had the entanet fun with changeover from central recently. So I took a look at UKOnline (LLU easynet unbundled - hopefully around the 14MB mark - they do have a FUP but it talks about using contention - presumably lumping together the heavy users )

And now....I dont know.

I'm waiting for the last occupants tags to be lifted (there's a cease order in progress) but once thats out of the way I'd like to get something ordered.

And now, it's over to you guys.......HELP!!!

 

[accyuklad]

check Broadband - Which? Reviews

 

[edz]

check Broadband - Which? Reviews

Wow fast reply, thanks for that unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a lot of info without signing up which...isnt working for me

Any other help guys

 

[accyuklad]

try this every isp
http://www.ispreview.co.uk/review/top10.php

 

[edz]

Righty O

Looks like its a straight choice between ukonline LLU 16MB (about 14MB at my exchange) or ADSL24.

What if any opinions guys. Dont want an uber speed connection if its going to be throttled / capped up the cazoo - the ADSL24 guys rep is fantastic but entanet aren't helping that decision.

What to do what to do?

money isnt the issue here but ukonline is a 12 month contract and its 50 for the router to start with but it is llu !

 

[accyuklad]

look at fup of ukonline

 

[edz]

look at fup of ukonline

I did take a look at their FUP I saw the business of contention ratios and that they will move heavy downloaders over to the 50? to 1 service. I didnt see anything about caps though, does anyone have personal experience?

 

[accyuklad]

i not a clue best bet ringing but im guessin they will slow you down after a certain time

 

[richard plumb]

did you decide anything? I've finally decided to move from demon for pretty much the same reasons.

Got throttled to 128k for going over the FUP (homeoffice 8000) and it was hell. VPN almost unusable. Moved heavy downloading/uploading to overnight where possible, as demon's warning email mentioned no throttling overnight.

Called them yesterday expecting my 30day period to be over, but they said the overnight 'unthrottled' still counts against my FUP! damn.

I've enjoyed their static IP and relatively ok customer service and speed until recently, but there are now cheaper ADSL2 products on the market.

I was thinking sky as its uncapped and I'm a sky subscriber so its only £10 per month for max. But I've never heard of ADSL24 and they sound pretty good (like the idea of separate peak/offpeak caps)

 

[edz]

Hiya.

Sorry hadnt noticed that someone had replied to this thread. I went with the 16Mb service from UK Online in the end, real speed is 14Mb from my service with 1mb up. cost is £25 per month. Very good service too!

 

[accyuklad]

o2/be/sky llu are very uncapped and unthrottled

but sky you need there max package