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British Broadband (Finally) Jumps 146

Posted by timothy from the net-meters-replace-gas-meters dept.
seldo writes: "The BBC is reporting that BT's previously-announced cuts in broadband prices are having a rapid effect, and demand for broadband in the UK is suddenly taking off. Finally!"
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British Broadband (Finally) Jumps More

British Broadband (Finally) Jumps

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  • Microsoft gambles a lot on winning the console-war with the online-capabilities of the Xbox. Clearly this is a case where Microsoft is using its cash to sponsor BT ... ;)

  • Wow! Oh no... (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    WOW! I'm so glad. This means I can go get broadband from BT.

    Of course, it would mean getting rid of this Telewest Cable Modem which I've had for a year and a half, and only pay £25 a month for. Still, if BT says it, it must be so!

    • Re:Wow! Oh no... (Score:2, Informative)

      by Jay Cornwall ( 525499 )
      BT's ADSL service gives you 256kbps upstream, which is twice that offered by Telewest and NTL, and at only £5/month more. The extra bandwidth comes in very handy if you want to run a small server on your system.

      It's just a shame they don't offer more upstream bandwidth at a higher price, as I (and quite a few other people I know) would be willing to pay an extra £10-15/month for 512kbps upstream.

      • BT's ADSL service gives you 256kbps upstream, which is twice that offered by Telewest and NTL, and at only £5/month more

        From tomorrow (coincidentally enough) 256kbps upstream will be available. I think it's 50 GBP per month though.
      • And NTHell are going down the toilet, big-style. See this BBC news announcement here [bbc.co.uk].

        You can hear the sound of the flush, it's only bcos NTHell are such a big turd that they're putting up resistance. ;-)

        Grab.
    • Do they offer service in the States? My local Bell sucks eggs...

  • Belgian version (Score:5, Informative)

    by selderrr ( 523988 ) on Sunday April 14, 2002 @05:20AM (#3338438) Journal
    Broadband in belgium also experienced heavy price cuts, with increasing subscribers as result, but decreasing bandwidth and increasing problems also.

    I have 2 DSL connections from different providers, and both of them are worsening rapidly as theyr user base is growing : I used to have Q3 ping times around 40 to most uk and nl servers, but this has dropped to 130 in the past few months. After some HW upgrades, things are back to 75, which is still a shame for a 38EUR/month subscription.

    Cable modem is a whole other story, with some clusters experiencing insane drops ( ping times over 300, ftp speeds below 25KB/sec) for months and months. Depending on the block and city one lives in, speeds range from the above mentioned 25KB/sec to a whopping 750KB/sec (KB yes indeeed !!) but with outages varying from monthly to daily and peaks of hourly !

    The customers are ready for it now that the price is dropping, but are the telcos ? Belgacom (the belgian telco) is definitely not : their servers are cracking every day (last month the user webserver, the month before the SMTP server...) and telenet (biggest cable provider) has administration issues (my neigbour didn't pay the first 6 months because they forgot him. Then he received an invoice for 2 years)

    Both have customer tech support that I wouldn't even let my dog piss at.

    • Re:Belgian version (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Similar things happened in Canada a few years ago when we had our broadband "goldrush". ISPs had a hard time keeping up with the sudden increase demand. But now that things have settled down, service quality has increased. Expect a year or two of crap service.

      • Re:Belgian version (Score:3, Informative)

        by selderrr ( 523988 )
        err... it's been like this for 4 years now...(ecept for the price that is : we're at approx 40EUro /month, which used to be 80 2 year ago)

        Belgian national Telco is one of the biggest fuckups in the country. I really really hope they go pucky-up like sabena, the national airline.
        We were all hoping that, with the liberalisation of the european telco market, other companies would invest in belgium and create some competition, but that happened only on the level of big corporations: those can get pretty good deals by playing the telcos against each other. For jan modaal (joe average as u dudes call him wrongly :-) nothing changed much, except more snailmail spam and tons of gruesome commercials (I really wonder if they have some of secret competition for the most moronic commercial. In anycase, they get more and more braindead over time, which is a good thing since I was scared they would one day firgure out how to check our bandwidth quota. That's right folks : the belgian national telco isn't capable of checking bandwidth quota.. *lol*... no, make that *weep*...)

    • but with outages varying from monthly to daily and peaks of hourly !

      even though i agree with the rest of your statement, I only had 2 outages in the 2 years ive used telenet internet.
      I live in a neighbourhood were the connection is good though. In the morning 500 - 650 KB/sec is rather rule then exception, could be that in other places the connections are worse
    • How does DSL reliability increase if you have two separate accounts. I mean, they share a common link to the phone company's central office...isn't that where the major source of problems were with DSL reliability?

  • The Register article... (Score:5, Informative)

    by carm$y$ ( 532675 ) on Sunday April 14, 2002 @05:21AM (#3338440) Homepage
    ... is a little less optimistic (and a lot more realistic :)
    BT to launch cheaper 'no frills' ADSL service [theregister.co.uk] followed by BT goes for broadband broke [theregister.co.uk]

    Being handled by huge monopolies doesn't help...
    • heres a map of the U.K. now really do you think that broadband can reach most of us ?

      http://www.btopenworld.com/broadband/ava61/ [btopenworld.com]

      really BT need to sort their exchanges out before they offer video on demand via ADSL
      (which is their plan after all)

      regards

      john jones

      • They've offered Video on demand via ADSL for years. Its with a company called Homechoice (used to be Video-Net). I've had it since it was in beta for about three or four years now. It works very very well, good quality streaming, real 'on demand', you can just pick a film from their collection and watch it. Basicly they run an f/o to your local exchange and you get 2.4mbs ADSL connection which holds the video with a standard ADSL splitter/modem. This then goes to a set-top box. They also offer an internet service with it, but only at 115kbs since most of the bandwidth is reserved for the video. For more info check here [homechoice.co.uk].
      • By population, yes. If you cover the SE, Manchester, Merseyside, Birgmingham and the central belt of Scotland, you have more than a majority of the population.

  • Surprise, surprise. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by popoutman ( 189497 )
    The pricing schemes were outrageous and just a bit silly. When BT got their heads screwed on right, and brought down the price, also releasing a DIY home kit, it was not going to be long before the service started taking off.
    And BT is to release a 'no-frills' service as well: BT to release basic serices [theregister.co.uk]

    Now all I have to worry about is DSL being rolled out in Ireland - I live 300m from an exchange on a fiber backbone, but the telco will not be rolling dsl out for another 2 years :-/

  • 'Broadband Britain' is somewhat a sham. (Score:5, Interesting)

    by wackybrit ( 321117 ) on Sunday April 14, 2002 @05:24AM (#3338448) Homepage Journal
    As you can see by the hundreds of people rushing to post on this topic (not), we're not excited or really interested in this story.

    Why? Because BT, Cable & Wireless, NTL, and all of the other British telcos have spewed bullsh*t like this in the past without actually delivering.

    It's nice that BT is dropping the wholesale price of DSL, but that doesn't actually mean their installations will get any quicker, that the DSL will remain reliable, or even that large swathes of the country will ever get DSL.

    In the mid 90's, we were told that cable modems were a 'year away'. Funnily, we were told this in 96, 97, 98, and 99, when the trials started to roll out. A similar thing occured with DSL.

    But let's face it, BT is a lumbering giant, and not particularly interested in 'broadband for all'. Unlike Canada, our government won't fork in some $$ to help them out, so we're stuck with their patethetic inefficiency. The UK is a tiny country, but even places like Finland, Sweden, and Canada have better coverage than us.

    Wi-Fi = Non Existant

    To compound these problems, WiFi is not taking off in the UK at all. I know of a few trials around London, and they want to hook some stuff up in Wales, but as a whole, it's not available. Unlike in the US, we don't have any small local WiFi providers.. why not? Because in remote areas that would benefit from WiFi.. the ISP can't get the affordable bandwidth to hook all of the customers onto the Internet anyway!!

    So, Broadband Britain is a sham, and I fear it will remain that way for some time. Move on from this story. Nothing to see here.
    • In the mid 90's, we were told that cable modems were a 'year away'. Funnily, we were told this in 96, 97, 98, and 99, when the trials started to roll out. A similar thing occured with DSL.

      Odd, I'm sure I've been using this cable modem for a year. OK, so it was late compared to other countries, but it's here. (I know what you're saying though, I remember cable modem trials in 1996ish, nothing came of them though). Broadband still isn't available to everyone, but isn't that the case everywhere? The price reductions are a big step, and seem to have had success - apparently Pipex have had a large increase in orders recently (and also this [bbc.co.uk]). It also means that ISPs can offer useful services (multiple static IPs and the like) for a reasonable price now, whereas before you'd be lucky to get it for less than 50 or 60 quid a month. *Big* improvement as far as I can see.

    • It's nice that BT is dropping the wholesale price of DSL, but that doesn't actually mean their installations will get any quicker, that the DSL will remain reliable, or even that large swathes of the country will ever get DSL....

      ...In the mid 90's, we were told that cable modems were a 'year away'...

      I'm posting this from a computer sitting behind a BT ADSL connection. My friends across town have one too, and my friends in the next town over have a cable modem from NTL instead (much better than BT, and only £25 a month, but not available here).

      I wholeheartedly agree that Britain lags behind in broadband, and I also agree that the fault lies mainly with BT for maintaining an effective monopoly on the last mile, amongst other things. But the same was true of dial-up access in the first place, and it is now almost ubiquitous. Britain will get its act together -- a few years after the rest of the world, as usual.
    • i think the problem still lies with BT's debts, and their stubborness. they cant afford bring out new technology or fixing lines etc so that dsl can reach further, but if they said that publicly, their backing (stocks?) would ditch them in a second. BT screwed up bad by monopolising their phone lines and oftel came in too late.

      the way i see it, bt will split up seperate bits all sold off, the dsl side will split up further and NTL/Telewest will take up more ground (i believe ntl/telewest are targetting area's without dsl where they are present)

      still, this will probably take another 5/6 years :/
      • this will probably take another 5/6 years
        Simple traditional British conservatism and pessimmism. This story is big news, my other browser window is on E*Trade to buy some BT.A on Monday morning at fill or kill £2.60 (not kidding).

        NTL, Telewest and Marconi have no money and could go bankrupt [guardian.co.uk] so they cannot invest in purchasing ADSL equipment. Thus there *IS* something to see here, this is big news. BT is either very clever and striking gold now by stealing NTL & Telewest's customers (revenue stream) at the time they are most vulnerable to bankruptcy, or BT is very stupid. After 3G BT is under pressure to make ruthless decisions. Don't forget MCI gives bad service as well but they are a multi-billion dollar company. Plus remember Bill Gates is stupid, he dropped out of his education.

    • To compound these problems, WiFi is not taking off in the UK at all. I know of a few trials around London, and they want to hook some stuff up in Wales, but as a whole, it's not available. Unlike in the US, we don't have any small local WiFi providers.. why not?

      The reason there is WiFi in the UK is that it is illegal sell access to 802.11b networks here. This law however is up for review and BT have just announced that they want to roll out 400 hotspots in the next 6 months.

      Also i've just installed the Wires only ADSL at my new flat and it works fine. No problems from BT whatsoever. This is in sharp contrast to my last ADSL install a year ago which _was_ a nightmare.

      • Um... If access to 802.11b is illegal here, how come so many places in the City do it? Then again, given the pathetic levels of security they seem to have in place, perhaps it should be illegal there, if only so the big banks don't wind up losing all our money to crackers...

        • It is illegal to RESELL 802.11b bandwidth. Using it in your organisation is OK, you just can't sell access to it.

        • Re:WiFi is illegal? (Score:3, Informative)

          by kubrick ( 27291 )
          AFAIR, it's illegal to onsell, not illegal to access. You can set it up for your employees, maybe even as a bonus for customers, but you can't sell wireless access as a service (probably due to spectrum licensing laws).
      • Have you checked out Tele2 (www.tele2.co.uk)? Wireless broadband is actually available all over the place (including here in Bath, although we also have Telewest cable modems which are a better bet).

      • There's Wifi and there's wifi. That may be true for 802.11b but NTL are currently trialling line-of-sight radio internet in london, with connection speeds >10Mbit (if you're lucky). I was accepted for the free trial, only to find a THE TOP F**KING LEAVES OF A TREE blocked me. Pants.
    • And Broadband in ireland is also a sham and an expensive one at that!

  • Still late, Still expensive, Still poor coverage.. (Score:5, Informative)

    by ezs ( 444264 ) on Sunday April 14, 2002 @05:27AM (#3338452) Homepage
    For personal use the BT DSL is adequate - but still slow and expensive compared to what those reading in the US are used to.

    Even compared to European prices from other ex-state owned Telcos the price is up to 40% more.

    http://www.broadband4britain.com [broadband4britain.com] and the ever useful 'reg [theregister.co.uk] give the full story.

    For a real usable service (I have 2Mb with static IP) you are looking at over $300 per month..

    My own experience is that you are encouraged to move to the most appropriate access method - I was urged that a move to a full leased line (at $30k per year!) was ideal for me...

    Looks like the BBC [bbc.co.uk] is re-posting the BT [bt.com] press releases.. :)

    • Coverage is lousy, despite what BT proclaim.

      I live 5 miles (8km) due south of Cambridge city centre, supposedly the area with the highest number of geeks per square meter in all the UK.

      My exchange is still not DSL-enabled and BT flatly refuse to suggest when it might be upgraded.

      Stories of price cuts don't do much for those who can't get the service at any price.

      Paul

  • BT != BTOpenworld (Score:4, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 14, 2002 @05:28AM (#3338454)
    Please note that BT Ignite (wholesale broadband), which has made price cuts is not the same as BT Openworld (Retail DSL/Dialup ISP)...

    You can get your DSL from any number of UK ISPs, letting you choose who provides your upstream.
  • this can't be as bad as when AOL came online.

  • the news has only been out for weeks....

  • Duh! (Score:2, Informative)

    by skinfitz ( 564041 )
    Blimey - it appears that now the moron Bonfield has been forced to resign, his successor MIGHT have actually grasped the concept that people want lower broadband prices and not pathetic 'extras' like classical music services.
    They lower the price and more people take it up - genius.
    • his successor MIGHT have actually grasped the concept that people want lower broadband prices and not pathetic 'extras' like classical music services

      Well, this is the "broadband model" that DIDN'T work elsewhere; users just want the high-speed access, and companies that tried sell tis access at little - or not at all - profit, and expected to make profit from "extras", lost big-time.

      It seems that BT doesn't want to learn from others' mistakes - they want to reenact them.
    • IIRC, Verwaayen said just that in his first week, and hence the sudden broadband feeding frenzy.

      Has anyone else read the Mobility Strategy Statement [ft.com] which came out on Wednesday?

      BT to create UK's first Public Access Wireless LAN network, it says here. Apparently they are expecting the UK Radio Agency to allow reselling of 802.11b Real Soon Now, and are going to build something with Cisco and Motorola.

      Zack
  • This basically happened because of simple competition. Here in australia, We basically have one option: Telstra, every single provider except optus goes through them on the wholesale level, so they basically control the marketplace, (there plans btw are a stupidly expensive 89 dollars a month for 3 gig of traffic per MONTH, why even bother having broadband?)

    With stuff like this in england, hopefully our goverment will open its eyes and realise how stiffling a monopoly for a telco can really be, its about damn time we started to open up this vital service structure a little more, let some competition in.


    Nerv
    • Open their eyes? They're stuck in the 1950s, the only thing John Howard wants to see are nice happy *white* families.

      Besides, as 51% majority owner of Telstra, and having sold the other 49% to shareholders, what incentive does the government have to rein in that monopolistic bastard? Yes, that's right, SFA. If they let the Telstra share price drop, then they'll find themselves out of power.

      Speed the freaking day, I say.
  • You mean to say that it wasn't the lack of legally downloadable movies and songs that was holding up broadband access and was instead some bizarre and esoteric reason like "It cost too much"? Now who [senate.gov] would ever have imagined that?

  • Availability is another thing (Score:4, Interesting)

    by cheekymonkey_68 ( 156096 ) <amcd.webguru@uk@net> on Sunday April 14, 2002 @06:24AM (#3338521)
    Don't think this is BT being generous though they're just trying extend their mononoply position over the local loop into the broadband area.

    BT's competitors buy access to the network through BT, so when BT cuts their prices they price their charges so that the minnows can only compete on wafer thin margins.

    BT has competition from the cable co's for sure, Telewest and NTL mainly but they are both heavily in debt and have not spent the resources upgrading their networks for broadband access.

    For example, I've got a cable phone line and for I live in Parkstone on the Poole/Bournmeouth border and for over 5 years NTL have been promising broadband is coming soon.

    I could go to BT but that would mean changing my phone line, and paying BT's higher prices, as for cheap broadband NTL offer a basic 128k service for £15 a month, which would be good if they actually provided across the country (yeah I know 1 meg would be better, but try getting the wife to agree !)

    NTL took over the old C&W franchise and have dragged their feet over introducing broadband to all us C&W customers.

    The only competition in the sector is really from the small indepedents biting at BT's ankles.

    Better stop before I go into rant mode!
    • It's bad enough that biggish cities like Poole and Bournemouth struggle to get broadband cable, but look at London! It's almost entirely ex c&w or videotron and so far only very small sections can get anything other than (expensive) ADSL. I got NTL phone/TV because I was assured that we'd have bb within 3 months - that was 2 years ago. This is not uncommon ...

      "Broadband Britain" is a sick joke, and Oftel should be forced to watch streaming media over dialup for 10 years (with the occasional flash demo of "always-on" internet performance for variety).
  • I know little or nothing about the cost of equipment, cost of installation, or ongoing maintenance costs of a telco's infrastructure. I've asked Telewest (another member of the British ISP cartel) again, and again, for cost justifications, and never received an answer. What's even worse than that is company fanboys start warbling about "business confidentiality."

    I have a similar problem when trying to dig behind the true cost of prescription glasses. Despite a so-called opening of the market place to competition average prices are triple what they were ten years ago. This is typically hidden behind a guise of "designer glasses" or "exotic materials" such as tungsten being used in their manufacture.

    Even though the new management at BT have taken the right steps by raising the importance of customer service and value for money, I won't believe it until I see long and sustained delivery.

    In an age of deregulation and opening of markets the amount of quality information a customer has to make a purchasing decision, and effect change within existing suppliers, is lower and lower. Companies seem to be getting their business models and customer service policies from the same select set of business gurus. The two factors in combination act as an effective means of controlling the customer and company revenue streams.

    Is consumerism the new big brother?

    Why doesn't it get cheaper faster?

  • I've been using BT's DSL since last October, when I first got it was VERY lousy with huge ping spikes in online games, and very variable download bandwidth...

    sometime around the middle of January, it stopped sucked, lets hope it doesn't slip back to it's previous state :)
  • ...little old (young) me living in the leafy suburbs doesn't have an enabled exchange. No plans for cabling my road for "the next 10 years" and really don't have the £2000 setup cost plus £60 a month for satellite. Dammit

  • The state of things (Score:5, Informative)

    by Yomlogs ( 321545 ) on Sunday April 14, 2002 @07:08AM (#3338586) Homepage
    Broadband access in the UK is pretty much limited to these options:

    1. ADSL. The "last mile" is monopolised by BT, but there are several ISPs which repackage BT's service. This is the most widely-available option, but I believe only about 50% of the country can get it. BT's exchange upgrades have been very slow in many areas.

    BT's wholesale price drop by £10/month (which this article is really about) has only really had a significant effect on the bog standard 512/256Kbps ADSL service, which people have been signing up to in droves. Anything faster is still ludicrously expensive.

    2. NTL/Telewest cable. Priced fairly reasonably, but very limited availability. NTL only offer broadband in some of their cabled areas, and in most of these areas they force you to take their awful phone and digital TV package as well.

    3. ISDN, which is hugely overpriced and slow compared with other options.

    4. Leased lines, which are far outside the price range of most home users.

    5. Tele2 wireless. Also quite limited coverage, but they aim to cover areas without other broadband options. Good service, and can offer asymmetric connections (which cable/ADSL can't) up to 2Mbps. But, like all the options, a rip-off compared with what's available in other countries.

    I can only hope that the increased uptake will make all the providers drop their prices further. At the moment the UK is a laughing stock in the broadband world.
    • "Good service, and can offer asymmetric connections"

      Whoops, I meant symmetric of course.
    • I have tele2. It's very good when it works, but they seem to have a lot of problems with their hardware. My connection was down for two days last week when the box lost its settings, and the base station went down yesterday for about 6 hours.

      Was really pleased when I first got it - was downloading ISO's at 400kb/s! That soon dropped back to 50 or 60 though :(

      One other thing I should mention is that, although they don't advertise it, all tele2 connections have a static ip address. Useful!
      • Agree with you about Tele2's strong points (I have it as well), though maybe I've been luckier than most. Don't think I've had more than an hour's downtime since I got it a few months ago.

        I also had an incredible connection at first, the engineer told me that they don't bother capping the speed for the first day or two.

        I was surprised as anyone when I found out the IP was static, they definitely advertise it as dynamic. Maybe they'd get more signups if they told the truth!
    • BT's wholesale price drop by £10/month (which this article is really about) has only really had a significant effect on the bog standard 512/256Kbps ADSL service, which people have been signing up to in droves. Anything faster is still ludicrously expensive.

      Yes, but does the BT price include a license for using hyper-text links? It's quite a deal if it does, since no one else is allowed to use them.
  • Damn,
    My Yearly Contract with Pipex is inplace until October!!! Admitedly I get 2MB downloads, But also have to PAY for it!
    Must remember to renegotiate that contract... :-)
  • Probably The worst thing about uk internet access is the three tiers it operates on... For businesses who need the reliability of a leased line it's extremely pricey.. £50k for a 4mbit link.. almost double that for a 10mbit link. Compared to US prices it's extortionate. For The lucky home users, we can get half meg links for £20-30 a month. But sometimes they're unreliable and the quality of service is poor. The unlucky home users are stuck with 56k, and ISDN, which are expensive comparatively, and they are also awkward and at times unreliable.. The uk government needs to look at these issues before they kill our tech economy.
  • Now the Brits can enjoy our love of heroinware [slashdot.org] and Evercrack too!

    ____________________________
  • My home network [ro0t.com] is 100mbs, too bad i only have 512kbs cable, whos upstream is limited to 128kbs. I'll be moving soon though and getting 2meg down, 256k up (both are blueyonder cable). At least Britain has the idea that charging for transfer is bad :)
  • I've had NTL broadband (600 up,128 down) for nearly a year now. I've enthused repeatedly to friends how great it is but they didnt take the plunge. The big change is as the article points out the wires only install, no longer do you have to pay BT anywhere in the region of £150 to come and plug in a DSL modem and the monthly rental is significantly cheaper (previously it included the DSL modem rental). So now you can buy a POS £50 DSL modem and for £25/month you have a 512k download. Compare this to over a year ago when I was desperately trying to get broadband and signed up to a contract that was £250 Installation and something like £79/month for the same thing!

    The numbers speak for themselves, two of my mates signed up to Pipex within a couple of weeks.
  • Here in Australia I had to pay for the cost of the install including a cable modem (which I needed) and a network card (which I didn't need). The Optus tech was very good but it was nothing I couldn't have done myself (and I have done since with system reinstalls).

    What really peeved me though was that I had to really work hard to get the Optus guy to not install their custom browser and other software. He had to call head office and argue with them for several minutes before he finally got permission. Even then I had to sign off that I agreed that I didn't want their software and that I would take responsiblity for the results.

    I know that /. readers are mostly technology smart but I'm sure that there would be enough tech savy people in most markets to make DIY installs a viable business option.
    • When I moved into my current place I went with Rogers Cable (then Rogers@home). I called them up to send someone for a do-it-yourself install (where they take off the bw filter on the cable, hand me the modem, nic, and cd, and leave) They said are you sure you want to do this? it can be difficult... I am now a database programmer and had then just finished a network engineering course at school... so of course I would do it.

      On the saturday when the guy came, it turned out that because I knew more about networking than much of the city, Rogers felt tat I would require the services of a supertech (their top end technician).

      It was actually quite funny... I talked him into giving me 2 nics (i needed 1 for my laptop and the other they just threw in for free). But whats worse, I had my masq/NAT box all set up... and had to fight with the tech because he wanted to do the install on my windows box... but I wouldn't let him touch it... It was, IMHO, a very bad move on Roger's part... sending a supertech when I asked for DIY.

  • Checkout the UK ADSL Guide (Score:3, Informative)

    by bradsjm ( 22738 ) on Sunday April 14, 2002 @07:40AM (#3338628)
    Best place to check out what is happening in the UK for ADSL and to talk about the different providers is at www.adslguide.org.uk [adslguide.org.uk]
  • Or did anyone else laugh when they saw the Network Neighbourhood icon with the caption underneath: "home networks are becoming popular"

  • Broadband in the UK is somewhat sucky yes. (Score:3, Informative)

    by Second_Derivative ( 257815 ) on Sunday April 14, 2002 @08:54AM (#3338760)
    From reading many of the replies, I can only offer sympathy to these people. Our provision's been getting better every year though; in 99 I just had a 56K modem to myself with unmetered access after 6pm or on weekends (which was the only time I could ever use it, horrible to imagine now isn't it?). Sept 2000 saw us getting ISDN on surftime via Demon; this set us back 80gbp a month or so but it was fantastic - a real permanent internet connection! with a static IP as well! ISDN is just a digital phone service but if it's unmetered and Demon has no qualms about you being connected 24/7 then why bother hanging up. I even ran a webserver off this system. Now, whilst on holiday in August I idly checked the BT rollout page and it told me that I finally could get DSL. One month later we had a 512/256kbit link, 5 static ip's and this was for 100gbp/mo. Now they've lowered the cost too. I agree this is probably peanuts bandwidthwise compared to what the yanks are getting, but come on how many of you have more bandwidth than that AND still have unlimited use w/static IP and a green card for running servers? probably quite a few but a priviledged few nonetheless.
  • Hmm, just got some ideas of some polls for Slashdot like:
    How much does a 2mbit DSL connection cost where you live

    1 Free
    2 less than 50$
    3 less than 100$
    4 Less than 200$
    5 over 200$
    6 Can't get it

    or

    That speeds of DSL are available in your area(country?)
    1) less than 256kbit
    2) 512kbit
    3) 1Mbit
    4) 2mbit
    6) None.

    Or just maybe one that asks about the speed of which people are connected to the internet in their home. Even if one such poll has been made before the difference between a earlier could be interesting.
    I rememeber we had one poll Bandwidth to Home Via... [slashdot.org]
  • While Europe is quickly getting reliable and cheap broadband, US-Americans are about to be relegated to second-class internet citizens as our broadband providers roll out their "per megabyte" pricing plans. For shame!
  • This woefully-thin-on-facts puff piece misses some essential points (facts, any sense of editorial tone, etc) The 'demand' will be confined to the same 400,000 (at best) households that have been waiting for this, agitating for this [broadband4britain.com], for >2 years. Here's my 2c worth on what's holding it up:
    1. BT monopoly. There are tales of people 'phoning BT to get broadband and being signed up for unmetered dialup (56k) instead due to BT customer service idiocy. The BT/ BT OPenworld/ BT whatever split makes Railtrack's look sensible.
    2. UK Cableco current funding. This does *not* indicate any future network upgrades will be forthcoming soon. I am with Telewest [telewest.co.uk] Blue Yonder [blueyonder.co.uk] - my service is excellent for what it is (>60 days same IP, between 100-250k down, 40-80k up) but does not come close to US definitions of broadband. I pay 25 UKP/ month for this. NTL are bringing in 1mps [digitalspy.co.uk] for 50 UKP/ month (!) in selected areas, but have many pockets of analogue only TV / dialup subs.
    3. 3) The UK government's terrible record on encouraging broadband - hell, even dial up - access. Last year the Guardian reported reported [guardian.co.uk] that the UK has committed
      £30m to extend broadband technology outside metropolitan areas. Sweden is committing £1.19bn.
      This despite the UK 'e-zar' loudly boasting about how good things are.
    4. Basically, the UK gets whipped at non-LANned betwork gaming evry time :(
  • The reasonable priced one is GBP23-GBP29 per month (depending on ISP), with a once-off charge of GBP50 (or an installation cost of GBP250, IIRC, if you want an engineer to plug stuff in) and it's 500K/250K with contention ratio 50:1.

    So yes, it's better than a modem, but you're still not going to be watching films over it.

    Cable seems to be fairly similar (a bit cheaper, perhaps), and has, of course, been available quite a bit longer.

  • I'm now living in Edinburgh in the UK rather than my home city of Dublin, largely because of the inavailability of broadband in Ireland. I wanted set up my own Internet-related business from home and using a dial-up connection literally wasn't an option.

    For all the bullshit about the Celtic Tiger, greed and idiocy on the part of the Irish Government messed things up for an entire generation of would-be Irish entrepaneurs. The bungled privatisation of the national phone company, Eircom, followed by it's filleting, ensured that even the prospect of broadband was delayed for years.

    Now the remnants of Eircom, in a battle of wills with the telecoms ombudsman, are refusing to launch any service until the government allows them to set ridiculous service fees including a per MB charge. It's 2002 and the Irish, both potential online business professionals and the public in general, have yet to start developing the online sensibility that only an exposure to high-speed Internet can offer.

    I'm using Telewest's service. You can get their cable internet on it's own but their TV and phone packages are pretty good too. I pay £49 (80 Euros) a month for broadband 'net, a phone line and 70+ channels (no premium channels). The national phone charges are pretty good and if I made more calls I'd probably pay the extra £15 a month for unlimited calls within the UK. Their international charges are, like BT's, extortionate so I use OneTel for that (good online billing, monthly direct debit).

    I forget the math at this stage but I remember, before I signed up, working out that an equivalent Sky TV / BT DSL combo would only have worked out better per month if I was going for the premium film channels too. Also, the installation charges just to get a phone line installed were outrageous.

    Maybe these new reductions change that but, to be honest, I don't trust BT, not after they were caught deliberately restricting bandwidth to certain customers. To Hell with them!

    I also gather that Telewest will soon (?) be introducing a premium 1Gig service; the guy who installed my broadband 'net connection a couple of months ago told me that he actually has a test version of that service installed at home. Lucky bastard.

  • Now all those Brits can go online and file for their unemployment checks!

    Honestly, I think they have some other problems to deal with before broadband internet is the top story, really...
  • If you charge too much, people will not buy. If you have insane or innane intrest rates people will not buy. Look at the stuff with the intrest rates, freebee's, ect on cars? I mean sales took off, people will buy when they think they are getting a good deal, or if they NEED it. Otherwise, it's a luxtury item and they don't need it.
  • Great, see Mr Hollings, you don't need to create draconian laws designed by hollywood to make people get broadband. I want to get broadband anyway so i can finally download all those warez, mp3s, pr0n and moviez with out having to wait!!

    But why would anyone want to use BT? they are greedy pigs (and my lines are crappy quality) i think consume.net is a better option (when i get those wireless cards...)
  • The little town of Launceston (gateway to Cornwall, right on the main road etc.) has finally been offered broadband by BT... In the form of a stupidly expensive satellite link-up. £900 installation and £60 per month after that. BT can now say "oooh, we've enabled 99.999% of the country with broadband", but they'll neglect to mention that it's unfeasible for a lot of those customers.

    Of course, this means that they no longer have to install ADSL here.

    Broadband for businesses? Fine. Broadband access from home? Never going to happen while BT are still a monopoly. Bastards.
  • I keyed in my post code on BT's availability checker page [bt.com], and it replied with this helpful message:

    BT has no plans to upgrade your exchange in the near term.
    BT is working on partnerships with local and national government bodies to evaluate the possibilities of bringing broadband to your area in a cost effective way.
    We are also investigating alternative technologies, such as, Satellite Services. We will be providing you with more information on this site at the end of June.
    Alternatively you may be receiving service from another telecomms supplier.
    It's clear to me that they have no plans to offer DSL in the small town where I live. Ever. They will just cherry-pick the big cities. Small surprise really, as they are in pretty bad shape financially. [itworld.com] Good thing that national highways and railroads weren't built like this...

    There might be an excuse for this sort of dribbling geographic coverage in the US or Canada, where the distance between cities is enormous. There is little excuse for it here in the UK.

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