Sky Broadband - Part 2

[Steve Jackson]

My current situation, I'm still on my original Pipex contract going back to when the wholesale ADSL costs dropped however many years ago. I pay £23.44 for a 1mb service with webspace, 10 email address, 10gb Usenet allowance and no problems to date with the amount I download (max probably 60gb in a month on the odd occasion). Despite what others have said, I have never had any problems with the service. It has been unavailable on about three occasions over the last 5 or so years, and then only for a brief period in the early hours of the morning, and I was given plenty of notice via email before hand. I have never had any unannounced downtime at all. This makes me a little reluctant to leave but Sky seems to offer me so much more, and financially would allow me to keep my Sky subscription too. I would like to go on the Max service, I'm only 640m from my exchange and can get the 16x Max service I have a few questions that need answering to help me make my decision. I apologise if these have already been asked but there are simply too many posts for me to read through over the two threads. Anyway, he goes:

Have many people experienced times when the service is unavailable?

What is the CS like? If there are any problems are they quick to get something sorted out?

What brand is the supplied router? It looks like a rebadged Netgear. Would it is be possible to use my current Netgear router instead? It's a DG834G, would I even want to use it instead of the Sky router?

Would I have any problems connecting my Wii, 360 and DSs to the router?

What is the limit on the "unlimited" Max service? Would I be ok with downloading up to 60gb of TV series via Bit Torrent and Market Place demos from Xbox Live in a month on it? I assume so given that the Mid service offers as much as 40gb.

Although I installed my current router myself with no problems, would I still be better off going for the install service, as I see it is free with the Max service anyway?

Thanks in advance.

[Nebiroth]

I can only answer a few of those - the router is indeed a rebadged Netgear - it's their DG834GT model. It comes with custom Sky firmware.

Whilst you can use a different router - there's no real technical reason why you shouldn't, the contract specifies that you use the router that Sky provide. I guess they're trying to simplify their support job by standardising the hardware as much as possible.

I self-installed, and it's extremely simple - the router comes pre-configured so it's really just a matter of plugging it in and setting up the settings on the PC wireless end (assuming you're using wireless, you can of course use a wired connection if you want).

However, given that the installation is free with a Max package, why not take advantage of it - espescially as you have a lot of stuff?

The only fiddles I had were getting my wireless card talking to the router properly. After much cursing, fiddling around with settings and stuff it turned out to be a channel conflict.

The router comes pre-configured with WPA-PSK encryption - they supply a card with the SSD and WPA key. But of course, you can access the router and change the settings as you wish.

I seem to recall reading that some game consoles don't support WPA, but insist on the weaker WEP instead.

[anephric]

Just to answer the service unavailable thing, I have the Mid package (for about 3 weeks now) and there have been at least a dozen times when the router would not sign in (I'm assuming crappy Sky firmware prob) or my dl speed simply choked down to non-existence. It also likes to dropout and then not be able to log back in (without reboot) quite frequently.

I'm convinced these are all crap proprietary Sky firmware problems (allegedly there's an upgrade on the way) and could be fixed if I could flash the router with half-decent firmware.

[DM]

I've lost connection 2 times in the last fortnight. One time was for a whole day. I called and they said there was a problem at my local switch.

[Alan b]

Only 2 times, I guess you are lucky. I lost my connection for a couple of hours last Saturday and have lost my connection 4 times yesterday and once today. Basically with Sky is that you get what you are paying for.

[mjb1975]

I must admit, while Sky took 3 months to actually connect me, I've only lost the connection twice - both times quite late at night and for quite a short period.

[splobber]

I'm moving house at the end of the month and Sky Woman said that I have to cancel my existing Sky Max contract and make an new order when BT activate my phone line (it's a new property). She said it can take up to 14 days to activate, but has never seen anyone wait this long (yeah right)

Anyone done this with Sky and can share their experience with moving home? I'm half tempted to nob them off and go with someone else given they can take an age to acknowledge, let alone, rectify problems. I need my connection for work as well as the forums so any downtime is a major inconvenience for me so even if I have to pay more then I will do so. An unlimited connection is also a must as pictures of goats get bigger all the time.

Also, the silly mare I was speaking to originally was cancelling my broadband connection from now, but luckily another operator clocked it and came on the phone to check with me as it didn't seem right to her.

[riz1]

my connection was crap for the first month or 2 but then settled down. I did have another little spazz-attack from the router for 2 days a month ago but nil since.

[Highlander]

I quite often lose my connection, especially late at night. It'll drop and reconnect about 30 secs later, and will do it for 5 mins or so, and then stable. It'll be alright for a few weeks, and then it'll happen for a couple of days, and then it'll be fine again.

[snowball]

Originally Posted by Highlander

I quite often lose my connection, especially late at night. It'll drop and reconnect about 30 secs later, and will do it for 5 mins or so, and then stable. It'll be alright for a few weeks, and then it'll happen for a couple of days, and then it'll be fine again.

same here. Not a big issue for me at the moment. Got my billing issues with them sorted out though which was the big problem.

[Alan b]

I have had that issue from day one and again it doesn't really bother me as I can usually get back in more or less straight away. I did have some downtime last weekend due to some network issue and my speeds were almost at a crawl all last week but things seem back to normal this week.

[DM]

Originally Posted by splobber

I'm moving house at the end of the month and Sky Woman said that I have to cancel my existing Sky Max contract and make an new order when BT activate my phone line (it's a new property). She said it can take up to 14 days to activate, but has never seen anyone wait this long (yeah rig

I just ordered my bt line and sky bb two weeks early. It was a nightmare try to explain to them that I didn't mind paying early. Also an empty house so it was easier. I was without bb for a whole day. I didn't have to cancel though so that's a bit strange. Perhaps just get your mrs to start it off.

[Nebiroth]

Have you folks with problems turned off UPnP on the router?

Apparently this can cause a lot of discnnect troubles if it's left on - which is the default.

[Alan b]

Yes mine has been turned off since almost day one.

[splobber]

Originally Posted by DM

I just ordered my bt line and sky bb two weeks early. It was a nightmare try to explain to them that I didn't mind paying early. Also an empty house so it was easier. I was without bb for a whole day. I didn't have to cancel though so that's a bit strange. Perhaps just get your mrs to start it off.

I just rang Sky up to place a new order and they can't do anything because BT have only just allocated me a phone number yesterday and it won't show on their checker. I have an engineer coming round to the property (it's a new build) on the 25th to connect it all up. I just tried calling the new phone number and it appears to be OK in that it is ringing.

I may just go with BT Broadband and then switch to Sky in a years time. I guess they can sort it out quicker then.

[DM]

Originally Posted by splobber

I just rang Sky up to place a new order and they can't do anything because BT have only just allocated me a phone number yesterday and it won't show on their checker.

Try again today. Mine took about 2 days for that bit.

[riz1]

Originally Posted by Nebiroth

Have you folks with problems turned off UPnP on the router?

Apparently this can cause a lot of discnnect troubles if it's left on - which is the default.

probably not the time or place, but seen as you mention it, could you please explain what UPNP does and what the pros/cons of turning it off are?
I have just turned it off now without realy understanding why

[Nebiroth]

It stands for Universal Plug'n'Play.

It helps networks automatically configure themselves - ie work in a "plug'n'play" fashion so that they are easy to set up.

The pro on Sky broadband seems to be that it helps to prevent persistent disconnect problems if it is disabled.

I don't know of any cons.

[bonsaiguy]

I am now fully hooked up on Sky BB. No problems at all so far.

Is there any way of seeing how much bandwidth you have used?

[Alan b]

Originally Posted by bonsaiguy

Is there any way of seeing how much bandwidth you have used?

Only by installing a third part app, something like Net Meter for example.