Virgin

[marinyork]

It's good news. I had already checked that, but cheers.

Ah, well in that case I'm a bit puzzled by the leaflets. They sell 10Mb, 20Mb and 50Mb. I have 10Mb and get about 6.5Mbs off them. You don't have to have a phone line any more with virgin which used to annoy the hell out of a lot of potential customers.

 

[HeyWayne]

Ah, well in that case I'm a bit puzzled by the leaflets. They sell 10Mb, 20Mb and 50Mb. I have 10Mb and get about 6.5Mbs off them. You don't have to have a phone line any more with virgin which used to annoy the hell out of a lot of potential customers.

I think we're severing all ties with BT - surely the cable thing is Virgin only, so the best we can get with the BT line is what we're getting?

 

[marinyork]

I think we're severing all ties with BT - surely the cable thing is Virgin only, so the best we can get with the BT line is what we're getting?

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here. The best you'll get with BT may well get better in 2011/12/13.

Virgin's fibre optic network is virgin only. I'm not sure whether they come and install a separate phone line like they did in the old days was what I was getting at.

 

[HeyWayne]

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here. The best you'll get with BT may well get better in 2011/12/13.

Virgin's fibre optic network is virgin only. I'm not sure whether they come and install a separate phone line like they did in the old days was what I was getting at.

Oh, I see. I'm not bothered if they do to be honest - I've no need for a BT line. We only use the phone occasionally, and I'm sure Virgin's landline will be just as good as the BT one - possibly better.

As it stands, I can't see any reason to keep anything BT.

Using the two companies' sites as reference:

BT: £14.49 per month + £11.54 line rental - current speed 0.256MB (£26.03)
Virgin: £12.50 per month + £11.99 line rental - expected speed 2.5MB (£24.49)

It's a no brainer surely?

BT may well get better in 2011/12/13 - but with all due respect, that's a long time off, and we need a better connection now.

 

[marinyork]

Oh, I see. I'm not bothered if they do to be honest - I've no need for a BT line. We only use the phone occasionally, and I'm sure Virgin's landline will be just as good as the BT one - possibly better.

As it stands, I can't see any reason to keep anything BT.

Using the two companies' sites as reference:

BT: £14.49 per month + £11.54 line rental - current speed 0.256MB (£26.03)
Virgin: £12.50 per month + £11.99 line rental - expected speed 2.5MB (£24.49)

It's a no brainer surely?

BT may well get better in 2011/12/13 - but with all due respect, that's a long time off, and we need a better connection now.

Erm well I agree you probably should get virgin if you are in a fibre optic area but I'm a bit concerned about this 2.5Mbs expected speed business. Where did that come from?

The only two other things I would say is that virgin media phone lines in various respects are slightly more expensive than BT but it's fiddly details and the other thing I would say is that virgin media tends to get the best for the bundles but that's not for everyone.

As for BT much of the UK will be getting significantly higher speeds through ADSL in the future but it is not on the time scales people usually think about.

 

[Coco]

Space travel of course.

What do you want to know?

 

[punkypossum]

I switched to O2, it's miles better than BT!!!

 

[rikki]

Some of us have lost both

It's painful, so we're making the switch.

amusing juxtaposition of posts

[sorry Fnaar, I'm not taking your job away]

 

[MacB]

Virgin here, previously NTL, have had combined tv, telephone and broadband since they were dialup. Full cable so just the one line in/out and no issues at all.

 

[HeyWayne]

Erm well I agree you probably should get virgin if you are in a fibre optic area but I'm a bit concerned about this 2.5Mbs expected speed business. Where did that come from?

Here; http://www.broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk/broadband_speed_in_my_area.aspx

 

[HeyWayne]

What do you want to know?

If you fart in space, will anyone hear you scream?

 

[Coco]

I never scream when I fart. Other people though...

 

[marinyork]

Here; http://www.broadbandspeedchecker.co.uk/broadband_speed_in_my_area.aspx

Weird, well if it's definitely fibre optic then I'd get it - if not then no. Some of the tests for virgin are run during traffic management times, so I'd bet a fair number of the lower numbers are because they've had their speed capped. I also found near me there were quite a few people still on the 2Mb package (not sold to new customers but existing ones can keep it). That site tells you what you'd pretty much expect some pretty fast speeds for Be and virgin, some pretty slow ones for the really bad ones like orange and some decenty middle ones.

 

[mark i]

I would agree with most of the comments. I had some dreadful experiences with BT (such as diagnosing a line fault as being at my property, threatening me with all sorts of charges if I am not there when they turn up, then missing their slot by 2 hours! Obviously no charges apply the other way). I went to Telewest and they were brilliant. Virgin have made a couple of errors recently, but have rectified when notified and they were quite trivial. Go Virgin!

 

[MacB]

My Virgin broadband is so fast now that when there's a slowdown in service it's still fast enough that I don't notice.

Agreed, I even get a bit impatient if a web page doesn't ping up instantly Yet I used to sit there watching the screen chug down slowly on the dialup speeds.