BT - Broadband/TV package - any good ?
Discussion
Look likely I will move from ZEN to BT and also take on the BT TV package, pirmarily because the TV package offers me the stuff I want to see at a decent price.
Assuming internet will be the same as now because Zen use BT hardware I believe.
Is it reliable ? Ive heard bad things about BT service wise, and Zen have been excellent whenever I have an issue.
Is the BT Hub abd HD box any good ?
Ta
Assuming internet will be the same as now because Zen use BT hardware I believe.
Is it reliable ? Ive heard bad things about BT service wise, and Zen have been excellent whenever I have an issue.
Is the BT Hub abd HD box any good ?
Ta
I've used BT Internet for years and it's been pretty reliable. Occasionally there have been issues with Hub firmware (my Home Hub 5 has unstable WiFi with the latest firmware, got around it by installing Whole Home discs to replace the WiFi Access Point) and BT were slow to fix with updates .. current issue has not been fixed to the best of my knowledge and likely won't ever be as the tech has been supplanted by FTTH and new hubs.
I used to have BT TV. It was pretty OK for the price but then they started to jack up the price and since I had a ton of other streaming services at the time, I dropped it. The best feature was how it worked with both the supplied PVR (integrated into the TV guide) and digital streamer boxes as an app.
The only real complaint I would have is that if you do have issues, their support can be a nightmare. You typically get an Indian call centre and they just run through a checklist with no real knowledge on their end. You can get told all sorts of different things depending on who you speak to, usually wrong. They messed up a friend's order for a new installation and he spent about a month getting it sorted out.
I used to have BT TV. It was pretty OK for the price but then they started to jack up the price and since I had a ton of other streaming services at the time, I dropped it. The best feature was how it worked with both the supplied PVR (integrated into the TV guide) and digital streamer boxes as an app.
The only real complaint I would have is that if you do have issues, their support can be a nightmare. You typically get an Indian call centre and they just run through a checklist with no real knowledge on their end. You can get told all sorts of different things depending on who you speak to, usually wrong. They messed up a friend's order for a new installation and he spent about a month getting it sorted out.
I have used BT for broadband for over a decade. Mine's been very reliable. I upgraded to fibre and for a day or so I had no direct connection but I live near one of the many BT hotspots so just logged on to that. I opted to go from Sky to BT about 7 years ago and I don't regret doing so.
There's nothing BT does that is outstanding. It's not streets ahead anywhere, but it isn't behind anywhere either. It's only claim to fame is its Home Hub which regularly garners praise in various side-by-side test. EE has reat coverage where I live.
I had an intermittant fault on the BT TV Box. Phoned one morning to be told a replacement would be arriving the next day, and an engineer attended to fit the latest box in the morning.
Three months before contract renewal, I phone for offers, and always get something pretty good, be it on broadband, TV or phone.
I'm satisfied.
There's nothing BT does that is outstanding. It's not streets ahead anywhere, but it isn't behind anywhere either. It's only claim to fame is its Home Hub which regularly garners praise in various side-by-side test. EE has reat coverage where I live.
I had an intermittant fault on the BT TV Box. Phoned one morning to be told a replacement would be arriving the next day, and an engineer attended to fit the latest box in the morning.
Three months before contract renewal, I phone for offers, and always get something pretty good, be it on broadband, TV or phone.
I'm satisfied.
Can't comment on TV but moved to BT fibre last year after being with Sky for nearly a decade.
I've found the hub very stable and less dropoffs that I used to get on Sky (both old and new hubs).
Only issue I did have was intermittent connection loss shortly after moving to BT and the hub was flashing lots of colours. Rang them up and they had already got on to it and had arranged an engineer. Some problem at the exchange. Got sorted and without any complaint got an email with a partial refund for the month.
Happy customer here.
I've found the hub very stable and less dropoffs that I used to get on Sky (both old and new hubs).
Only issue I did have was intermittent connection loss shortly after moving to BT and the hub was flashing lots of colours. Rang them up and they had already got on to it and had arranged an engineer. Some problem at the exchange. Got sorted and without any complaint got an email with a partial refund for the month.
Happy customer here.
BT internet is fine. I always got a similar service to what I have with Zen. It isn't cheap after the initial contract period (24 months, which could be good or band depending on your point of view) so you'll have the song and dance of renegotiating, which you won't have had to do before.
I don't know about their most recent hardware but their older hubs used to be fairly locked down. They generally performed quite well but you didn't get the level of control you get with other routers.
I don't know about their most recent hardware but their older hubs used to be fairly locked down. They generally performed quite well but you didn't get the level of control you get with other routers.
Once upon a time when I worked for BT Global Services customer used to descibe us as 'the best of a bad bunch' and I think that holds true for their broadband.
I have the FTTP at 500m for 6 months now and it's been stable, and that's about all I can say. 99% of the time I don't notice the additional speed over the copper based ADSL I used to have. One thing i do notice is the latency, which is noticeably better.
Also have the TV pro box. It looks and feels the same as the standard BT box so it's not game changing, but it does seem to load things like iplayer and netflix a little quicker, and the search function works across all the installed apps which is useful.
I have the FTTP at 500m for 6 months now and it's been stable, and that's about all I can say. 99% of the time I don't notice the additional speed over the copper based ADSL I used to have. One thing i do notice is the latency, which is noticeably better.
Also have the TV pro box. It looks and feels the same as the standard BT box so it's not game changing, but it does seem to load things like iplayer and netflix a little quicker, and the search function works across all the installed apps which is useful.
Turn7 said:
Assuming internet will be the same as now because Zen use BT hardware I believe
Zen and BT Internet use Openreach infrastructure. Openreach is not BT.Any throttling you experience, contention ratio (if applicable), speed through the ISPs routing equipment etc. will vary and is impossible to predict until you see it once live.
What I can tell you about is the support will vary and Zen very much come up trumps here.
My experience of BT Internet support on a long running line issue at my parents house was appalling. Totally taking advantage of ageing customer who did not like to complain yet irrationally would not move away. Rarely did my parents get the minimum guaranteed speed and getting anything resolved seemed impossible. Once an engineer came out and claimed to have corrected a remote line fault, yet it reverted within a day or two.
Their handling of the account when my dad died was unacceptable and with that I managed to get the service moved to Zen.
Zen had an Openreach engineer around within days of the switch, issue was indeed a line issue and was resolved. Been solid ever since.
I switched to BT from Virgin after constant breakdowns in the broadband service (Virgin Media exchange boxes get broken into a lot, if this happens at the weekend not many engineers out to fix it). Broadband has been OK, we have the "unbreakable EE" package where the router will switch to the mobile network if the landlines fail. If even that fails, they will send a mobile hub out the next day to get you back up and running 
I switched from SKY to BT two years ago. I loved the user-friendly interface of SKY's tv guide and never though BT would be as easy.
I was wrong. It's really easy and I get more channels with BT and the Streaming portals (Netflix, Prime, iPlayer etc) are easily accessed in the 'Blue Button'.
They have just sent me a letter to say costs are going up so I may give them a call to say I'm going back to SKY, see what they say.
I was wrong. It's really easy and I get more channels with BT and the Streaming portals (Netflix, Prime, iPlayer etc) are easily accessed in the 'Blue Button'.
They have just sent me a letter to say costs are going up so I may give them a call to say I'm going back to SKY, see what they say.
Freakuk said:
One thing to note is terrestrial HD TV channels are not available on BT TV, you will need freeview and an aerial to get those channels, or use iPlayer, ITV Hub etc.
That's what BT told me in December when I was looking to consolidate BB and TV.
I don't know if they still do it but when you sign up for BT TV you used to get a full Freeview HD PVR system which also could work with the streamed BT TV packages (and later on, Prime, Netflix and NowTV). The BT channels integrated into the EPG and you could record them on the internal HDD just like regular broadcast TV. It's quite a decent PVR and the deal at the time was that you got to own it after the initial contract period expired, I think they may have changed that now though with the newer systems which might also be all-streaming.That's what BT told me in December when I was looking to consolidate BB and TV.
It was understood that you'd use Freeview for the basic terrestrial stuff and the streaming side was for Pay TV. I guess if you lived somewhere with rubbish TV reception (but decent internet) that could be less than ideal though.
(Also, you had to pay extra on top of your channel package for HD streaming though to be fair, their SD streams looked very decent and I never felt the need to pay for HD)
Lucas Ayde said:
I don't know if they still do it but when you sign up for BT TV you used to get a full Freeview HD PVR system which also could work with the streamed BT TV packages (and later on, Prime, Netflix and NowTV). The BT channels integrated into the EPG and you could record them on the internal HDD just like regular broadcast TV. It's quite a decent PVR and the deal at the time was that you got to own it after the initial contract period expired, I think they may have changed that now though with the newer systems which might also be all-streaming.
It was understood that you'd use Freeview for the basic terrestrial stuff and the streaming side was for Pay TV. I guess if you lived somewhere with rubbish TV reception (but decent internet) that could be less than ideal though.
(Also, you had to pay extra on top of your channel package for HD streaming though to be fair, their SD streams looked very decent and I never felt the need to pay for HD)
BT YouView box. Still have mine from about 8 years ago, and they're pretty common on Ebay etc. Plug the aerial in, then freeview channels come via the usual way, and streaming is for the pay-TV channels. Also very cheap way of buying a PVR system. EPG is good on it too. It was understood that you'd use Freeview for the basic terrestrial stuff and the streaming side was for Pay TV. I guess if you lived somewhere with rubbish TV reception (but decent internet) that could be less than ideal though.
(Also, you had to pay extra on top of your channel package for HD streaming though to be fair, their SD streams looked very decent and I never felt the need to pay for HD)
Not sure if it would work with the newer system if most of that is streamed, but would be worth a try.
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