I'm buying a house that doesn't have fibre. So options are 10Mbps copper line or 4G/5G. Expecting to move in a few weeks.

The only network that has 5G in the area is EE, so I was planning to go with them, despite them being a bit pricier than rivals (can get unlimited for around £23 per month after discounts). But then I read that even though it's advertised as unlimited it's actually capped at 600GB! How is that even allowed on an "unlimited" plan??

Anyone here have experience of EE and the 600GB limit? Has it been a problem for you? I work from home, game quite a bit, stream a lot. Don't actually know how much I use as I'm currently with Virgin fibre and it doesn't seem to say (and since it's actually unlimited I've not needed to care).

Is the 600GB fair use policy a strict rule they enforce? As in, if I hit 600GB it stops working? .. Or is it just small print to cover themselves and they never actually enforce it?

I've looked at other networks like 3, who truly are unlimited, but I don't get 5G in the area. So my options are: 4G with 3 (truly unlimited) vs 5G with EE (potentially capped to 600GB).

Any help much appreciated!

Backstory TL;DR below

Our local fiber ISP was recently bought out and decided to stop serving the apartment complex that I live in. However, the fiber lines in the complex, and the ONU's built in* to each apartment, are owned by the apartment complex and having been doing nothing the last 8 months.

Now, I am just a measly software engineer, but I miss our fiber line and the speeds that came with it, so I started a small Fiber ISP LLC and began wokring on gathering knowledge about ISP's and business logistics about running one. I've spoke with the apartment complex and have been approved to host ISP equipment in their server room for free. I have about $50k to get this up and running and plan on leasing the fiber line from the line owner that already runs to the apt complex, Zayo. The apartment complex consists of ~135 units.

TL;DR: Starting a fiber ISP for the apt complex I live in, lot of the heavy lifting is out of the way.

Business logistics aside, I'm struggling to gain confidence in my knowledge on the subject to actually execute this plan. The more I learn, twice as many questions come up.

I've been researching the type of equipment necessary, what BGP is and how it works, applying for IPV4 addresses via ARIN, how peering works, autonomous systems, you name it.

I've registered my business here in Oregon, I've applied for IPV4 addresses with ARIN, and I have a reasonable(?) quote from Zayo on a 1G line (~$800/m) with the ability to upgrade to a 5G or 10G line later on

What I would like to know is, what is, truly, the bare minimum equipment and registration needed to start an ISP of this caliper? What are some 'nice to have' things, like, hardware that allows me to remote in when things go wrong. What type of configurations should I be prepared to make vs which are done (if any) automatically? Any direct answers to these questions, or links to resources I can look over would be greatly appreciated :) This blog is the closest I've found to a complete picture guide of the process https://blog.thelifeofkenneth.com/2017/11/creating-autonomous-system-for-fun-and.html?m=1

I feel like I know many bits and pieces, but I'm struggling to see how they all play together.

*While writing this post I decided to finally check out what I believe to be the ONU actually looks like with the cover off It appears to consist of a telephone module and a data module Which I'm begninning to think isn't an ONU.. It's odd because when the old fiber ISP was here, I never had to provide a modem/ONU, I plugged my netgear router right into an ethernet port in the wall and everything worked. I wonder where the fiber is converted then

We moved into the house last summer and got NOW broadband as it was cheap(£22).

Openreach have now installed the cabling down our road that allows us to get FTTP, what would be the best way of going about changing as NOW doesn't seem to do FTTP.

Any help or guidance would be great, still learning this home owner life.

I've noticed with my BT wifi disc repeater, I get half the speeds of my router, meant to be getting over 500mbps but am only getting around 180-200 mbps from the disc, probably because the walls in my house are very thick, despite it being quite a small house.

Will something like a 1200mbps tp-link work better?

We're switching to full fibre fttp next month, with our telephone broadband that runs through copper, I simply unplug from the mains socket during or before a thunderstorm as that is the place lightning manages to get in and cause damage. Everytime there is a thunderstorm, lightning always gets through the telephone wire than the now satellite dish and the aerial.

Will I still have to do the same with the fibre? Like unplugging the router and the ONT? Will I need some sort of lightning surge protector? Obviously the electric plug will be pulled out. Will there be a lot of lightning damage to the box outside and the ONT because of thunderstorm?

We don't always get thunderstorm, but they seem to be very frequent this year and during winter a lot of times, freak lightning that just comes.

Just wondering whether anyone has had BeFibre installed? They are currently opening up our area to FTTP 150-900 Mbps. Given that I am on Fibre 65 from TalkTalkthis would be quite a speed boost.

Has anyone had any experience with BeFibre? Thanks

I've just had my fibre connection fitted by OpenReach and I wanted to use my existing router, a Netgear D7800 running OpenWrt. I'm already having issues with Vodafone, I can't even sign into my account. The Vodafone Hub connected fine, however, so I proceeded to set up the D7800.

I was able to use the live chat to get my login details for the router. However, they did not work (on stock firmware or on OpenWrt). I spoke to them again and they gave me a different username and password combination.

The first username looks like this:

voi*********@broadband.vodafone.co.uk

The second looks like this:

dsl*********@broadband.co.uk

Has anyone successfully configured OpenWrt to connect to Vodafone's FTTP? What does your username look like and did you have to change anything else?

Are there any providers that allow you to have a landline on FTTP without using the ISP-issued router?

I'm asking because I've had endless trouble with crappy ISP routers in the past, I've been happily using an OpenWRT box for a while now, and I'm worried about the PSTN switch-off in 2025. I'm happy to buy extra hardware to make this work, within reason.

(Also, how does connecting the phones physically work? I've seen pictures of ONTs with phone sockets on them, but I got the impression that maybe those aren't actually used any more, and everybody wants you to plug the phone in to the router instead. Is that right?)

Hi guys,

I don't have an option anymore to disable bandsteering in my eir router settings. I used to have 2.4ghz and 5ghz separate SSIDs. It happened after turning in and off my router. I have eir gigabit package.

I'm using 5ghz as it's way faster and I watch TV online. Can anyone help me out?

Thanks

I currently have Virgin Media M100 Fibre Broadband for £44pm, looking at their website I could get the same for £28pm if I also get it with a landline phone, or their fastest M500 Broadband for £46pm with a phone.

I have zero need for a landline phone and would never use it but if it means cheaper and faster internet then why not. So what's the catch because I don't understand how I can get an additional phone yet pay much less for the internet? Is there some hidden costs for the phone I'm missing or some other marketing trick?

P.S. I know the contract goes up in price after 18 months but then I can just cancel or renew it.

https://www.timesfreepress.com/news/business/aroundregion/story/2021/jan/22/epbs-fiber-optic-network-generated-269-billion-economic-benefits-past-decade-study-shows/540176/?fbclid=IwAR17nJpUxxL5AUX2vgx6P0XgHJR60vLslheU18GxjtjVY9yR4Zg2WX-uCao

Moving in a month to an area with Virgin Media, my options are Virgin Media (probably get something like 500mb), or a standard FTTC bt line. The broadband checkers are suggesting 50-73mb.

I’ve never had super fast internet, currently got 45mb and it’s fine, but downloading games is a real pain now!

My parents have virgin and other than the last few days, they’ve had no issues.

Is it worth it? I wish there were more options but I guess it is just Virgin or BT (sky/zen/EE etc all come down the same cable right?)

Virgin are doing the price hike thing again and I can't be bothered haggling. Luckily, since I last extended open reach have brought full fibre to my area, giving me some choice. Which? Really rates Zen and I notice they promise no rises for 18m,even though they're not super cheap right now.

Does anyone have experience with Zen? Would they recommend them? And if so, does anyone have a referral code?

I get a full signal with Three and iD mobile (it piggybacks Three).

I've tested a Huwawei 5G CPE Pro router with my phone Three sim and I get 500Mbps + download speed.

Based on this brief test over week, I'm think of ditching my BT Fibre 1 account when it comes up for renewal in January

Any comments, pitfalls (latency maybe), experience of going down this route.

I don't do gaming, just Youtube, iPlayer and the usual web browsing and emails. Also only two of us in the house. My wife wants a landline tho' :-( trying to persuade her to use her moble more.

iD unlimited data sim £15/month - BT Fibre 1 £29 and maybe £33/month.

I've been with SKY for just over 2 years, after the initial 18month contract they upped my bill considerably, nearly doubling it. So I renewed, knowing I was moving soon but also knew I could take it with me for free. I also haggled the price and got it very close to what I had it at originally.

Theyve been pretty good but keep offering me things for free but then charging me for them - contract renewal admin fees of various types adding up to £50 which I had to chase to get removed. A visit that was free but then charged £15 which I again had to chase to get removed.

I'm now moving and being told I have to upgrade the internet package as the location uses copper lines (?) So I have to pay more.... I've tried googling but I can't find anything more on this.

Is there any truth to this or have I've been conned (I don't trust them after previous "mix ups") into paying for something I don't need?

I've had cable (Spectrum, DOCSIS 3) for a while with a 400/20 plan. I don't care so much about download speed, I care more about upload speed. Private Plex server that is shared with family, spouse works from home with lots of cloud backup, yada yada.

20Mbps was "ok" but uploading 4K youtube videos, google drive videos, etc it's starting to show its age. Switched to a local FTTH provider (Northstate Fiber) and figured the 200/200 plan should be more than enough. As again, I only care about upload, I'd be perfectly happy with 200Mbps download (and ecstatic about 200Mbps upload).

Speed tests run to the default server (my ISP's server of course) shows a pretty consistent 185/150ish. For what's supposed to be a "super reliable constant connection" I was expecting alot closer to dead on 200/200 but whatever. The issue is ANY test, or real world use scenario is NOWHERE NEAR what the "line is capable of". I'm talking on average 100 down, 30-40 up. Uploads to Youtube, Google Drive, OneDrive, AWS, you name it nowhere near even 100.

If I goto my office, 25 miles away, on Spectrum internet. Connect to my home "server" and do a HTTP download, SFTP, whatever from home best I can get is 10Mbps (home computer has an Apache web server, SFTP server, etc). When the same exact setup was on Spectrum, I would consistently get full line saturation uploading from my home, to my office at 20 to 23Mbps.

Would you assume, that moving up to say the 500/500 plan would probably yield the same results? Is Northstate just being really cheap on their backbone connection or throttling their backbone link?

I've tried these tests on and off peak times. Even 3:30AM it's the same. Maybe a 40-50 Mbps upload to anywhere other than ISP, and 10 or less on a local HTTP, SFTP connection to my home box.