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thePurpleGiant · Sep 28, 2004, 01:07 AM

My sister is off to live in the UK for two years (work related) and would like to have a broadband connection while over there. She will be staying somewhere around the London area if that makes a difference.

Just wondering who you UK guys use for broadband? Over here she is getting 512/128kbs ADSL with a 4GB limit before traffic is shaped, for $50AU per month (~�19). Would she be able to get something similar in the UK? Is it more or less expensive?

She has a 12" Powerbook, with an Airport Express. So I guess she'd just want a place that can give her an Ethernet modem (hopefully for free), and a decent service. Who do you recommend?

mdc · Sep 28, 2004, 01:16 AM

a friend of mine recently (last month) signed up with homechoice, which gives him a 512k line and on demand tv. he said he is paying around �25 per month. he is very happy with it. he said he gets about 100kps downloads. they set up everything for him and gave him a tv box that handles his internet, and that is plugged into his airport extreme basestation.
he mentioned that he has a daily bandwidth limit of 1 gig. i am not sure if this is download only or upload and download combined.

this gives him tv and internet. i am not sure if homechoice has separate services, only tv, only internet.

i have another friend who is using bt broadband. i will ask her tomorrow what she is paying per month for that. her downloads max out at around 50kps.

edit. both of my friends are in the london area

nath · Sep 28, 2004, 02:02 AM

Originally posted by thePurpleGiant:
My sister is off to live in the UK for two years (work related) and would like to have a broadband connection while over there. She will be staying somewhere around the London area if that makes a difference.

Just wondering who you UK guys use for broadband? Over here she is getting 512/128kbs ADSL with a 4GB limit before traffic is shaped, for $50AU per month (~�19). Would she be able to get something similar in the UK? Is it more or less expensive?

She has a 12" Powerbook, with an Airport Express. So I guess she'd just want a place that can give her an Ethernet modem (hopefully for free), and a decent service. Who do you recommend?

i live in london. your sister's basic choices will be between using British Telecom's broadband offerings (or one of the hundreds of companies that use BT's exchanges to offer similar services) or using a cable broadband service from NTL, Telewest, Homechoice or Blue Yonder, which is what I have. There's not too much difference in price between them - for a 512k connection you will probably be looking at between �21 and �25. The BT option requires you to have a BT line connected to the property (if there isn't one there you would pay about �120 for a new connection). NTL (which I have) is 512/128kps and I've never hit a limit although I believe there is one. Their installation is �50 and you get a set-top box with an ethernet output.

One thing you may find is that UK ISPs are often useless when it comes to Mac. BT are known for trying to push USB modems on people, and NTL aren't much better. The most important thing is to speak to whoever's doing the installation and make it repeatedly clear that you only want an ethernet connection.

One ISP that are highly rated is Bulldog (a company that use BT's exchanges). They are definitely Mac friendly and have a system where bandwidth varies depending on the time of day. I will probably be switching to them soon.

http://www.bulldogbroadband.com/flash.asp

jimsmac · Sep 28, 2004, 03:01 AM

I've been using Plusnet for a while, and they are very good IMHO.

www.plus.net

lil'babykitten · Sep 28, 2004, 04:02 AM

Check out http://www.bt.com/broadband/

It's a good service.

Diggory Laycock · Sep 28, 2004, 04:54 AM

BT is not good.

Go for BullDog.

moodymonster · Sep 28, 2004, 05:34 AM

I'm with a company called ndo

http://ndo.com/

they also tech support macs, although I've not have reason to find out - been with them for nearly a year, slowed down once or twice and disconnected (briefly), but 99% of the time its fine, good fast connection.

Pipex are also supposed to be good:

http://www.solo.pipex.net/

See here for more info on UK broadband

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

Telewest look good but I'm not in a telewest area - also bulldog offer up to 8MB speed depending on area (only central London).

hope this helps

milkmanchris · Sep 28, 2004, 06:01 AM

Avoid wanadoo.....

period

Chris O'Brien · Sep 28, 2004, 06:28 AM

I'm on Pipex, which have been very good over the past two years. It was 23 quid for a 512k line, I think - I've just upgraded to 1meg.

They support Macs quite well too, which is nice

They did push a USB modem, unfortunately, but there's mac software that comes with it, so it wasn't too bad. I bought a cheap router though, since the connection needed to be shared. I think there is a limit for downloading, but there's 7 people in this house downloading constantly and we've never been stopped, so....

drive-thru · Sep 28, 2004, 06:53 AM

I've used Telewest for the past 4 years. I think they're probably more expensivefor broadband alone, but I get my phone line and digital TV through them as well which makes it a bit cheaper & generally less hassle.

http://www.telewest.co.uk/html/internet/internet.htm <-Shows pricing, a 750k connection is �27.99 alone. I don't think there's a download limit, connection is through a cable modem (ethernet) rather than USB and they have become increasingly mac-friendly lately.
As I said, probably not the best for price for the connection alone.

bamburg dunes · Sep 28, 2004, 06:56 AM

I'm in the UK just now for a few months and just been setting up a broadband connection for my parents. After doing a bit of research, and asking people, I went for Bulldog, very good service, and is about �22 a month.

I recommend them highly.

http://www.bulldogdsl.com

Parky · Sep 28, 2004, 06:58 AM

NTL have increased the speeds of their service in the UK but have kept the same prices.

So for the price of the old 512 you now get 750, and the 1MB has gone up to 1.5MB

Ian

Mastrap · Sep 28, 2004, 07:35 AM

Bulldog is getting excellent reviews.
BT Internet is what we use for our business. No data limits, good support and we never had any downtime. They offer a package where they install a wireless router ready to go that was great value for money.
I personally had bad experiences with NTL, specifically with the customer service. Never again. Others on this board (philzilla) are happy with NTL.

Nivag · Sep 28, 2004, 10:24 AM

this site has a good list of various UK ISPs with readers reviews and comments.
http://ispreview.co.uk/

i'm thinking of going with this ISP V21 they got reported on El Reg as being the cheapest and no bandwidth limits.

sambeau · Sep 28, 2004, 06:59 PM

http://www.aaisp.net.uk/aa/

Andrews & Arnold are the choice of the discerning british geek.. I just wish I'd discovered them before signing up to a year with demon.net

thePurpleGiant · Sep 28, 2004, 08:39 PM

Cheers guys, Bulldog seemed to get the highest praise in this thread, although I am checking them all out now. Maybe I'm not looking hard enough though - because I can't seem to find details of their plans including prices, speeds and downloads per month??

Diggory Laycock · Sep 29, 2004, 05:01 AM

http://www.bulldogbroadband.com/resi...P/NP/index.asp

bamburg dunes · Sep 29, 2004, 05:32 AM

Originally posted by thePurpleGiant:
Cheers guys, Bulldog seemed to get the highest praise in this thread, although I am checking them all out now. Maybe I'm not looking hard enough though - because I can't seem to find details of their plans including prices, speeds and downloads per month??

I got my folks the 512k alltime 500 service from Bulldog. There's no monthly download limit, the connection seems to be constant so far (been a few months already) and they pay, I think, �22.

I was pretty surprised by their services, really been stellar and no probs with a Mac.