Forums Forums Enthusiast Forums A - Z Gadgets & Tech Sky Broadband - Ongoing Review Of The Service

My broadband is still down 90% of the time.

When it is working it still disconnects after 10 mins

Sky technical support, although useless, have been quite proactive so far.

Sounds like a problem on your line/L2TP rather then a problem with Sky tbh. They are probably relying on Openworld to fix it.

Im just coning up to the 5 month period and still recieving nothing but great service, my connection is used for streaming 128Kbps music 24/7 at the moment!

Didn't realise it was that bad Rob.
If its every 10min (Exactly) there has to be a timer some where
knocking it off?

Rob are you connected via a wire or wireless?

I am connected via cat 5. I can see the router perfectly. The router is dropping the connection to the internet.

Apparently the problem with the exchange has been fixed.

The problem apparently lies at either the line going into the house (the quality of the phone is fine) or the equipment.

I never had any problems with the reliability from Tiscali

Have they offered ayou a new router?

As the voice part of the line is only the 0-4kHz signal, and the ADSL signal is on the 25kHz and above signal range (its protected by a 21kHz safeguard), it is quite normal for a line having problems with one service not to be with the other service, so your voice calls could be running fine whereas the internet is goosed.

Do you know what sort of leases you are getting on the IP from the DSLAM on your router and also from the router on your connected PC at all? If not, dont worry, its just if you do, it could be a leasing problem.

Do you know if they have considered the fact that your on the standard ADSL service and not the ADSL2+ service and the SNR can only be 75dB on ADSL and not the 90dB of ADSL2+? This can cause problems, especially if Tiscali were providing an ADSL2+ connection over a bad line previous to you moving to Sky. To be totally honest though, anything over 50dB can cause problems, dependent upon the gain on the line.

Its all a bit weird, the problem is as you say, either the box or the line. If its the line, its up to BT. Id suggest to them you should have a replacement box to rule that out, and if it solves the problems, then it was the router at fault.

i was gonna say that, no i wasn't but a replacement router
could be a simple step forward.

or it could just be the idle time set on your router if some one has messed with it? haha

seems to be a little better at moment

What has changed?

Nothing.

It seems to be really bad in the mornings and at weekends.

Going to see how it is this weekend. The problem is that i got so cheesed of with it, i not really used it recently.

Just been browsing around the Sky Broadband site and found this price comparison tool:

Sky Broadband Price Compare Tool

Its actually extremely good, very informative and best of all, its accurate and tells the truth (for instance, there is at least one package that I have found that shows Sky Broadband isnt the cheapest overall for something).

Remember, you will only really save money if you already have, or want to get Sky Digital TV. As my mother has done though, instead of pay around £120 for an ariel upgrade to get freeview and so she can get the likes of UK Gold etc and a crystal clear and high bit rate picture on her TV, she was paying £18 a month to Wanadoo, but when she moved house, she got Sky Digital and took the Sky Broadband 2Mbps service for free, so she is actually paying less then she was paying Wanadoo and recieving digital TV as well as broadband.

Well I passed the 6 month mark yesterday and so far ive had nothing but excellent service.

Havent had to phone up technical support to comment on them, other then when I first signed up to give in my MAC.

Overall the service has been rock solid and the speeds have been amazing at all times of the day, I easily push past 7Mbps, and have seen the connection go over 8Mbps recently, the usual speed I am getting off BBC iPlayer is past the 7Mbps mark.

The upload is also excellent, my usual speed when uploading to my web servers is around 410Kbps, considering the speed is supposed to be 400Kbps, I can't complain lol.

So for £5.00 per month, and someone that was happy with 2Mbps for £17.99 per month, I am extremely happy with it.

Lets hope it stays this way!

I have got a new router through on mine, just waiting to install it, although it has been slightly more reliable. But my sky TV Box has started playing up now.

I have had to power it down and power it backup 3 times in the past 7 days. Also, it has "crashed" about 2 times aswell.

Just my luck.

How old is the box and what model is it? Over time, especially on Amstrad and Grundig boxes, various capacitors dry out in the power supplies, causing allsorts of problems. It can also happen prematurely due to excessive heat, so make sure you are not covering any air vents.

Another thing that tends to happen is the decoder's can play up, and of course the LNB can be dodgy which can lead to random but sometimes continuous signal problems.

If the box is under one year old, it will be under warranty and will be replaced by Sky straight away.

It is a few months old, i got it at the start of my contract (a few pages ago in this topic) They have told me to ring them back next time it does it.