Dial up or Broadband?

[Lynn]

I work partly at the office and partly at home so I have both broadband and dial up depending on where I am - at home its dial up (must get broadband!). Just curious as to what other forumites are using? Are you on broadband or dial up?

[philsmove]

[quote=Lynn]I work partly at the office and partly at home on broadband QUOTE]

[same here


Thanks to BT grrr I have been without broadband at the office for the past 3 weeks

Thankfully I have cable home

[Lynn]

Originally Posted by philsmove

Thanks to BT grrr I have been without broadband at the office for the past 3 weeks

You wouldn't recommend BT then for getting broadband?

[baldrick]

Dail up for me, don't have the usage to make up for the extra cost of broardband. Just improved speed and response by ditching mikysoft IE and switching to Opera.

[Dreadful Scathe]

I wouldn't get broadband from BT, heard too many horror stories Its bad enough that you have to use their phone lines. Luckily I am in a Telewest area.

www.net4nowt.com

[djtrev]

I am on Broadband with Freeserve.No complaints.
I used to be dial up but what am I classed as now-I am occassionally asked this on the internet and usually say "dial up" as I am not sure what Broadband is classed as.

[ToeTrampler]

Originally Posted by Lynn

You wouldn't recommend BT then for getting broadband?

I've had broadband at home from BT since the early days (when it was still known as ADSL) and have had no trouble with it at all, in fact the service has been superb. I did manage to crush the supplied ADSL modem under a large desk while moving furniture and so have now replaced it with a newer ADSL router; but other than that the whole thing has been zero maintenance.
It is more expensive than dial-up packages available but for me the benefits outweigh the extra cost. What swings it for me it is even although I do not spend that much time online (at least I didn't until I discovered the bl**dy forum ) it is now much easier to keep all the software on my machine up to date (virus checkers, windows service packs, critical updates etc) because it just takes a few seconds or minutes instead of the hours it did on dial-up.

So in terms of Broadband: I come to praise BT, not to bury them.

Now in terms of their 'normal' telephone service and line rental charges: Grrrr, somebody had me that dagger!

[Dreadful Scathe]

Broadband used to be defined UK wide as having a download speed of 512k or above or "10 times the speed of a modem", however, some companies realising that there was no actual official definition decided to apply the term broadband to slower packages to make them more appealing - NTL were one of the first to do this that I remember but there have been several jumping on that bandwagon, AOL offer a "silver broadband" package that is only 256k. For a "true" broadband speed of 512k or above you're looking at £20+ a month for an always on, limit free* connection. ADSL is just one type of broadband; cable, satellite and wireless connections are others. Heres a decent explanation!


* some broadband packages offer you a cheaper connection but cap your downloads so they either cut you off or charge you more if you go past this limit. Watch out for this and make sure you want it.

[ToeTrampler]

Originally Posted by Dreadful Scathe

* some broadband packages offer you a cheaper connection but cap your downloads so they either cut you off or charge you more if you go past this limit. Watch out for this and make sure you want it.

The BT 512k service currently has no monthly download cap on it for £19.99 per month but this is set to change in early 2005 with a monthly download cap of 15GB being introduced (30 GB if you go for the 1Mb £29.99 per month service). Additional download capacity is likely to be at a cost of £2 per GB.

[Lynn]

This is all useful stuff, broadband is still a bit of a mystery to me. For what I use, its probably still a bit cheaper for me with dial up (though I am online a lot more now - wonder why?!) but I get very frustrated with my dial up hanging up. (Yes, I've tried changing the settings, but it still does it, esp when someone tries to phone me). Esp when its halfway through a virus update download etc.

I also like the idea of having the phone line free while the internet is connected - is this an extra feature with broadband or standard?

[Penfold]

Originally Posted by Lynn

I also like the idea of having the phone line free while the internet is connected - is this an extra feature with broadband or standard?

With ADSL 'broadband' being able to use the phone at the same time is a standard feature. The below site has a lot of info on adsl, ISP's offering the product etc...

http://www.adslguide.org.uk/

[ToeTrampler]

Originally Posted by Lynn

I get very frustrated with my dial up hanging up. (Yes, I've tried changing the settings, but it still does it, esp when someone tries to phone me).

Don't know if you use this feature (or if you have already tried the solution) but if you have a call waiting service on your phone, the click it produces when someone calls will usually cause your modem to disconnect. This can be avoided by disabling call waiting before going on line (press #43# if it's BT on the handset or add it into your dial up settings). After you are finished *43# on the handset enables call waiting again.

[Lynn]

Originally Posted by ToeTrampler

Don't know if you use this feature (or if you have already tried the solution) but if you have a call waiting service on your phone, the click it produces when someone calls will usually cause your modem to disconnect. This can be avoided by disabling call waiting before going on line (press #43# if it's BT on the handset or add it into your dial up settings). After you are finished *43# on the handset enables call waiting again.

Thanks, but I don't have call waiting, and I have tried various combinations of the settings for the modem on the PC - but it still hangs up and pops up a message telling me I have an incoming call. No idea why!

[stewart38]

Originally Posted by Lynn

This is all useful stuff, broadband is still a bit of a mystery to me. For what I use, its probably still a bit cheaper for me with dial up (though I am online a lot more now - wonder why?!) but I get very frustrated with my dial up hanging up. (Yes, I've tried changing the settings, but it still does it, esp when someone tries to phone me). Esp when its halfway through a virus update download etc.

I also like the idea of having the phone line free while the internet is connected - is this an extra feature with broadband or standard?

Im so fed up with dial up its so slow, so what is best package ? Im on AOL at present

[drathzel]

Dial up at home
Broadband at work

I def opt for broadband!

[ToeTrampler]

Originally Posted by stewart38

Im so fed up with dial up its so slow, so what is best package ? Im on AOL at present

The following link lets you check broadband availability in your area and shows which providers offer you the service(s) available to you

http://www.broadbandchecker.co.uk/?G...GTKW=broadband

[Dan Hudson]

I'm with Virgin broadband... fabulous can't fault it in any way... am online 24hrs a day.. got both business email addressess landing there and it takes seconds to download virus updates etc and to send out block Ceroc emails etc.

I buy a lot of music from the net and the download time is excellent. This was the main reason for switching..

and the wife can still gas on the phone to her mother while I am online!!

[Will]

I've got a 2 Meg pipe from Bulldog. Fortunately my job pays for that so I can "Work from Home", otherwise it would be out of my price range.

[ChrisA]

Originally Posted by Will

I've got a 2 Meg pipe from Bulldog. Fortunately my job pays for that so I can "Work from Home", otherwise it would be out of my price range.

I had a thing through the door today from Bulldog... I noticed they are now offering static IP addresses (for an extra fiver a month ), which, when they didn't, ruled them out of my ISP short list before.

I've also looked through their T&C and AUP, and I can't find any reference to banning locally hosted servers any more either, which ISTR they did before.

Do you know if

(a) they do ban running servers
(b) they have a policy of blocking any ports

??

If not, they might be a pretty good next upgrade for me when I can afford it, especially since they do a faster upstream rate too.

At the moment, I'm Ok with a 512/256 service from Zen - it's pretty quick compared with my previous ADSL supplier which was pants.

Chris

[Whitebeard]

Originally Posted by Lynn

...... but it still hangs up and pops up a message telling me I have an incoming call.

I had this problem some months ago now. In my case the problem lay with the Smartlink modem fitted to my machine (though the fact that I'm on AOL might have been a contributory factor). This is a so-called Winmodem which is cheaper because, I believe, some functions are carried out by software rather than hardware.

Just how, or why, I don't know, but this started out as an occasional annoyance which gradually got worse and worse until even when I could get a connection it was rarely maintained for more than a few minutes. It got to the stage where I was preparing to rip out the Hayes modem from my previous machine. But then I was alerted to the fact that there was a driver update for the Smartmodem on their website (can't remember the URL but Google would get there). After eventually downloading and applying this the problem was fixed.