Spooner Row Message Board

Date: Mar 5, 2016

RE: Slow Broadband? (this topic has a second page)

Date: Mar 5, 2016

Hi Steven, I have been thinking about getting satellite broadband myself. The costs seem to be coming down all the time and it looks like some companies (Europasat) will provide the hardware for free anyway as long as you commit to a 2 year pay monthly (£14.99) contract which I personally would be prepared to do (and pay even more if necessary). Not sure how worthwhile the £350 voucher really is! The evidence seems to be that satellite broadband technology is poor and erratic. I haven't found a single good review. Read the reviewer from rural Norfolk who was with Bentley Walker - the ISP provider with the 'best' ratings!

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/review/categories/5.html/1

If you do go ahead with your plans and it works well, do please let us all know on here!! Good luck. The Government needs to step in here much more and put up some cash. Companies won't make enough profit supplying the likes of Spooner Row with decent broadband.

Date: Mar 9, 2016

i have just been connected to broadband with EE and my speed test shows speeds circa 1mbps. This after 1 month of complaints to EE about their failure to connect us. It is absolutely shocking in 2016 to have to endure such awful service. i have been put off satellite so the only remaining option is a 4g iPhone 6 on o2 with a big data allowance!

Date: Mar 9, 2016

What about WiSpire? if enough people register an interest they will connect Spooner Row. 19 have registered, you probably need about 50 to get them to install.

Your alternative is still ThinkingWisp, there seem to have been mixed reviews. 4G will be quite expensive on a 02 Iphone deal will be quite expensive I imagine, but remember other smaller providers offer 4g locally and you can buy one of those 4g hub things which does not tie up your phone

Date: Jul 14, 2016

Hi All,

I'm intending on moving to Spooner Row in the coming months and the Internet issue is worrying me. I work from home so poor speeds mean no work(!) I just wanted to gauge whether anything had improved since the last post?

ThinkingWisp is £32 for unlimited 8mbit speed...I'm going to ring them for actuals but hypothetically 8mb would probably be ok. Then possibly tethering off a 4g dongle when it's struggling.

Is anyone having any success with the above or anything else? Also, is 4g coverage consistent in the area?

Thank you!

Jon

Date: Jul 15, 2016

Hi Jon

I have ThinkingWisp and although not fantastic, it is a better alternative to the extremely poor BT coverage. I have the home+ package which is about £23 and get speeds of about 8.5megs (I check regularly using the BT wholesale speed test, just to make sure all is working ok).

The only problem I have some months is the 250GB 'fair usage' download maximum, which means my kids have to limit which game updates they download.

I haven't tried streaming services like Netflix yet, so not sure how well they perform.

Cheers

Toby

Date: Jul 29, 2016

Thanks Toby,

Appreciate the information. I've submitted my desktop survey for ThinkingWisp and they think that they'll be able to install. Even if we only get 25% of their maximum output it sounds like it will be better than BT!

Having driven around the area a couple of times now I've noticed the executive development going up behind the pub (along with the masses of houses going up in Wymondham) - got to assume that these increase the likelihood of more cabinets sooner, here's to hoping!

Really looking forward to moving area.

Cheers,

Jon

Date: Aug 2, 2016

I confess to being a bit of a dinosaur where IT/broadband issues are concerned so would appreciate any suggestions/advice.

Believing part of my problem was a 8 or 9 year old desktop still running XP and Office 2003, I replaced it with a new laptop running Windows 10 and Office 2016 but in spite of running all the driver updates I am still only getting 0.25Mb running a broadband speed test today.

In the mornings and through to early afternoon the connection is constantly dropping out which is making doing my online voluntary job a complete nightmare

Before I phone my ISP (TalkTalk) is there anything else I should try?

Our phone lines are likely ancient but I can't get any appreciable difference whichever phone socket I connect the router to.

Date: Aug 3, 2016

Hi Julie

There are some techy experts on here so they may be better placed to answer this. But my understanding is that TalkTalk use BT's copper wires into the houses, so you will always be restricted by their poor village coverage.

Not sure where you live but here in Chapel Road we are pretty much at the end of the line from the Wymondham BT exchange, so I would imagine most of Spooner Row is in the same boat.

With the poor service the village gets from BT, I don't think any laptop change will help the fundamental problem.

Toby

Date: Aug 3, 2016

Thanks Toby, it's helpful to know it's not just me ... don't the tech people describe that as pebkac "problem exists between keyboard and chair"? So far today things have been a bit better, fewer drop outs.

If anyone has improved their connection by having their house cables/wires/sockets replaced I'd be interested to know. We've been here in Queen Street 16 years and never done anything so they are that age and some.

Date: Aug 3, 2016

0.25 is a bit low even for Spooner Row.

I would first check any extension phone lines in the house as these can cause interference (this is the first test TalkTalk will ask you to perform when you call them to complain). Make sure your modem/router is connected to the telephone point at which the line enters the house ( the master socket ). Check if there is any improvement. You may need to contact TalkTalk to start the process of getting a fault identified. They will take you through a long script of checks and perhaps even send an engineer ( you will be warned that if the fault is in your house you will be charged, which is fair enough, most errors are caused by poor wiring, extension devices including Sky boxes etc. or dodgy ADSL filters. remember every phone device in your home including the sky box if you have one needs a filter)

After you have been through all this you will need to ask them to reset your line speed ( also known as Reset IP profile or Line profile) this needs to be done by them. If your line has had a fault for a long time, they restrict the speed you can achieve to stop you receiving loads of errors, problem is, if you fix the line, the speed doesn't change because of the restriction. It may then start quite fast and gradually drop down and hopefully settle around 1.5 - 2 mbps, if it goes straight back to 0.25 you still have a fault.

Hope this helps.

Date: Aug 4, 2016

It does, Matt, thank you. I will try the other phone socket today. Only need two filters (no Sky box or anything like that) so it's easy to swap them around and back to make sure the problem isn't with either of them.

Date: Aug 4, 2016

I'm with Fuel Broadband and have a relatively constant download speed of 2.5Mbs - 3.0Mbs which enables me to watch streaming services (Netflix, Amazon etc.) with relatively little buffering even with the other half hammering Facebook on her phone!

To achieve this I have removed all extension cabling from the master socket (with the cabling in place I would lose 1meg instantly) and, after a lot of complaining and three engineer visits, managed to get Openreach to redo the cabling where it comes into my house as it was probably as old as the house! I only have one phone connected to it, one of those base station ones with handsets linked to it, and my broadband router. I use a Draytek router rather than the one provided by my ISP. As the master socket is in my porch, I've also had to add a more robust antenna to boost the WiFi around the house.

Admittedly, I am a network engineer by profession so I'm probably a bit more "techy" than most folk (my house is fully networked up) but, if anyone in the village would like me to have a quick look and see if I can help in anyway, I'm more than happy to.

Also, it may be worthwhile spreading the word and casting a vote for this 4G service, https://www1.relish.net/athome, simply click on Check Coverage and type in your postcode.

Mal

Date: Aug 4, 2016

After switching phone sockets I'm up to between 0.33Mb and 0.35Mb. So this is much better than 0.25Mb. Going to monitor and keep notes on drop-outs, speeds and any other problems. Even though this speed is still slow, so long as I get continuous connection I can get my voluntary job done without too much frustration.

Can't remember if I said I also changed my browser. Windows 10 came with Microsoft Edge. AWFUL! So back to Firefox and even that simple change seems to make a difference, especially as I connect to shared documents on Google Drive. I hear any of the Google apps work best with Chrome but I'll stick with what I know for now.

So thanks guys. Really helpful. And I also know what to say to TalkTalk when that day comes.

Date: Aug 5, 2016

0.33 still rubbish, I would log a call and prepare myself for the torture of TalkTalk support. You will have to fight them but it will be worth it in the end. I would almost guarantee (without checking your equipment myself remember) there is a fault with your wiring somewhere, problem is it might be inside your house which makes it your responsibility to pay to fix or it might be outside which makes it TalkTalk's issue.

If you are not in contract, you could swap provider to someone like BT or PlusNet ( there are some very good Quidco cashback offers for swapping http://www.quidco.com £135 for swapping to plusnet and free broadband for example). PlusNet are the least rubbish i have experienced, but it would seem Fuel ( as mentioned by Mal below) also seem to be pretty good. I would also second all advice from him as he is much more qualified than I am in this area.