BT Fibre vs Sky Fibre Pro

[Marcvs]

So we got our new place - now I have to decide BT or Sky Fibre, which is going to be better for online gaming, streaming videos and the like.
Cost wise thhere isnt much between them when you take into account early leaving penalties etc.

One thing that is interesting is Sky retained the bulgarians from BEthere, who usually got the job done.

I also thought about plusnet but heard they manage traffic?

Which network usually has the better ping etc? [im aware they use the same infrastructure - but for example BE ran on BTs network and always gave me +7-8Mbit over what anyone else gave]

[HalloweenJack]

been using sky`s 40mbit service for a while - a friend had the 70 odd speed and we found sod all difference in the real world , multi HD streams from internet game pings are low - and if you download from a torrent , it really matters how many on the other end to your own speed (apparently) as he rarely maxes his or gets close to it

[Marcvs]

If I was dowloading a torrent would be linux distros which actually have Gigabit+ seeding - actually looking at the 80/20 for upload speed (download speed i really dont care all that much about as I have a home server that I can just leave stuff running overnight.

Can anyone comment on the strength of peering to say EU/US

[Lee H]

I think I'll chip in with my 2ps worth.

When we had sky fibre, it was okay but suffered from slowdown at times, esp say after 4pm when most people are jumping online. Also had a few dns issues with pages not loading then working so swapped to opendns to resolve the issues.

Sky also had a weird MER encryption system in place that stops people easily replacing the absolute garbage Hardware they provide.

Jumped ship to BT. Got their fibre and HH5 and it is fast all the time, no issues with XBL or any streaming. Sky used to stutter a bit when on Netflix, yet BT never has that issue.

Gaming - pings lower by a few ms but it feels more fluid, even at peak times.

I hope this helps

[MrRockliffe]

Same experience as Lee. Had real slow down issues with sky, where YouTube wasn't usable at all after 6 in the evening. Now with BT and very happy, except router is awful (better than sky though)

[Marcvs]

If i go BT - what router would you recommend?

At min I need Gigabit Ethernet internally - and wireless N (130mbps) would be nice

Regards

[MrRockliffe]

Not my strong area at all I'm afraid. People rave about the new linksys wrt1900 but it's expensive. You won't need that sort of power. Asus offer some good routers from what I've gathered, but I'd rather someone more knowledgeable comment on this.

[Butcher]

If i go BT - what router would you recommend?

At min I need Gigabit Ethernet internally - and wireless N (130mbps) would be nice

Regards

HH5 has gigabit and wireless N, but it's a home hub, so aimed at numpties. It's by far the cheapest option though.

[MrRockliffe]

Wireless AC I believe as well!

[Lee H]

I find the HH5 isn't too bad at all and its performance is actually pretty good, esp for gaming sessions for a prolonged period.

Its only had to be rebooted 3 times since I got it and that was my fault as I was playing with the router.

It is AC supporting upto 1300 Mbps and can offer some fast speeds.

Its just that blue light - thank god its hiding downstairs away from my PC and room.

[walibe]

I'd agree with above, although it's so minor I'd go personally where ever the better offer is. Don't be afraid to swap your broadband now and then or at least threaten your ISP to.

[Marcvs]

Ordered BT Fibre - as i said cost was negligible but less aggro of having to move phone line and such is what pushed it over - plus Im sure she will like the 100quid sainsburys voucher!

[Marcvs]

Biggest thing is: how well does a HH5 cope with high throughput applications such as large transfers too and from fileservers etc.

On our current router Im averaging around 60MBit constant network use (internally) in the evenings

That Linksys looks tempting; but I dont really wanna spend £250 on a router lol

[Lee H]

Biggest thing is: how well does a HH5 cope with high throughput applications such as large transfers too and from fileservers etc.

From what I've seen and used it for its not skipped a beat at all. Thats with uploading lots of photos and filling up all my HDD's with mixes and live sessions and also using netflix on 2 devices at the same time. I'm a serial broadband abuser so if its not up to scratch I would be whinging

We have 4 wired devices connected and also 6 wireless devices connected as well

[Marcvs]

Anyone got any thoughts on the Netgear R7000?

[quady]

I find the HH5 isn't too bad at all and its performance is actually pretty good, esp for gaming sessions for a prolonged period.

Its only had to be rebooted 3 times since I got it and that was my fault as I was playing with the router.

It is AC supporting upto 1300 Mbps and can offer some fast speeds.

Its just that blue light - thank god its hiding downstairs away from my PC and room.

mmmmm mine was installed early last week and had to reset it a good 10 times already

I've got my Sonos setup so when the net goes it kills the music.

I'm getting a ping of 35ms - how does that compare and anything I can do to improve it?

I'd recommend BT though, the engineer was great, the cabling was old so he rewired from the telegraph pole to the socket so I've a warm fuzzy feeling that the wiring won't be an issue for a while.

I'm getting 75MB and it feels quicker than when I was on Virgin @ 50MB. Downloads really zip along.