NTL hardware

proteus

Hi all,
I'm looking at dumping Eircom and getting NTL (broadband starter).
I've had no problems with Eircom broadband, its reliable and has good pings
to UK games servers but I no longer need a telephone line in the house.


I was asking an NTL sales assistant to describe the hardware that they provide and they wanted to know if I was connecting a laptop or a desktop to the connection?
They continued talking about USB and pcmcia connections until I got tired of their ramblings.

The question is is as follows:
I need them to provide a box that has a dhcp server, multiple ethernet ports (switch) and wireless 802.11 a/b/g.
What hardware do they actually provide?

cheers

nava

proteus wrote:

I need them to provide a box that has a dhcp server, multiple ethernet ports (switch) and wireless 802.11 a/b/g.
What hardware do they actually provide?

cheers

They are giving a Netgear router if the NTL cable is not on the same room as your PC or laptop.

Kernel

proteus wrote:

The question is is as follows:
I need them to provide a box that has a dhcp server, multiple ethernet ports (switch) and wireless 802.11 a/b/g.
What hardware do they actually provide?

cheers

The cable modem can be connected to your PC or wireless router via ethernet or USB, not sure if they provide a wireless router (which is what you are looking for) - no doubt they will charge nicely for it. I'm running it from a netgear router I bought myself. I'm waiting for my NTL sub to run out and I'm dropping them and going to Smart. NTL are ****e these days, since they were taken over by UPC, I'm afraid.

This router would do you.

Reason I'm dropping them: traffic shaping / throttling, complaining when people download the amount that NTL have stated they can download (and to a lesser extent the 'late fees' they are charging people, which I think is a ridiculous way to treat customers). :mad: :mad: :mad:

I advise all NTL customers to leave them and vote with your €€€€€.

tinkerbell

Kernel, what are these "late fees" that you talk of?

cast_iron

Currently they seem to be giving out a Motorola modem and they charge €50 for a wireless router (which isn't bad). They have offers now and again, but not sure what they have currently.

Be careful though, pings were slow for a few weeks there, but seem ok now. Torrents aren't great.
And you sign a 12 month contract when you sign up.

Gran Hermano

Don't switch to NTL their service is complete pants.
Traffic shaping sucks and customer service is non-existent.
I've friends & colleagues actively cancelling their NTL service.

Try Magnet or stick with Eircom.
(Never thought I'd see the day where I'd recommend Eircom over
another company, but that's how bad NTL is!)

Kernel

tinkerbell wrote:

Kernel, what are these "late fees" that you talk of?

If you're a bit late paying off the bill, the cheeky pups charge you something like €8. Now, I'm usually grand with looking after the bills, but occasionally you can forget to pay one, and if I leave a Gas or ESB bill, they don't charge me extra. I just don't like companies treating customers like shíte.

proteus

Kernel wrote:

I'm waiting for my NTL sub to run out and I'm dropping them and going to Smart. NTL are ****e these days, since they were taken over by UPC, I'm afraid.

This router would do you.


I advise all NTL customers to leave them and vote with your €€€€€.

Hmmm. Last time I looked (about a year ago) NTL were the best around for pings and stability. Have they gone that bad? I see a lot of negative posts recently.

With regards to the hardware NTL provide, I'd like to buy a linksys WRT54G/Buffalo and hack it for dd-wrt but I'm not familiar with NTL's equipment so could somebody please outline how that hardware connects together?

Moriarty

The cable modem itself is a Motorola Surfboard SB5101E. It has an ethernet and usb port on the back of it. If you go with the 6meg package, they give you a free Netgear WGR614 wifi router. It has 4 lan ethernet ports and b/g wifi.

Gran Hermano

proteus wrote:

Hmmm. Last time I looked (about a year ago) NTL were the best around for pings and stability. Have they gone that bad? I see a lot of negative posts recently.

With regards to the hardware NTL provide, I'd like to buy a linksys WRT54G/Buffalo and hack it for dd-wrt but I'm not familiar with NTL's equipment so could somebody please outline how that hardware connects together?

NTL Ireland were sold by NTL UK within the last year (probably since you
last looked at feedback on their service). Their re-routing of traffic
off the NTL UK network and via continental Europe has had a bad impact
on pings and DNS. The new parent company UPC/Chello has also bought
Chorus and merged them with NTL Ireland's operations. I'm not sure if you
heard any horror stories about Chorus' reputation for customer service in the
past but as UPC closed down the NTL call centre and moved it to the Chorus
site NTL's has gone from ok to absolute crap.

UPC are also heavily promoting their cable and telephony products
(just ask any old NTL customer how many direct mailings and telesales
calls they've had recently) without any visible upgrade/investment in the old
NTL infrastructure. The end result is serious contention issues.
UPC's solution is to introduce traffic shaping and to change the download cap
to an upload and download cap combined quota - without informing their
customers.

Just read the recent posts on NTL on the forum for further details -
not many happy customers at the moment but plenty of dissatisfied
souls.

proteus

Gran Hermano wrote:

NTL's has gone from ok to absolute crap.

Thanks brother.

Kernel wrote:

NTL are ****e these days, since they were taken over by UPC, I'm afraid.

I missed this post earlier. It shows how long I've been away, last time I heard about Smart they were going bankrupt!:D

stoneroses

"Reason I'm dropping them: traffic shaping / throttling, complaining when people download the amount that NTL have stated they can download (and to a lesser extent the 'late fees' they are charging people, which I think is a ridiculous way to treat customers). :mad: :mad: :mad: "


SO Let Me See - You get a bill - You don't pay :rolleyes: - You get a reminder :eek: - You still don't pay :rolleyes: - You get a late payment fee :eek: - You derserve it . NTL are not running a charity and actually do need customers to pay to improve on products services etc.:cool:

Kernel

stoneroses wrote:

SO Let Me See - You get a bill - You don't pay :rolleyes: - You get a reminder :eek: - You still don't pay :rolleyes: - You get a late payment fee :eek: - You derserve it . NTL are not running a charity and actually do need customers to pay to improve on products services etc.:cool:

No need to be patronising. I know that NTL expect to be paid, and I have been paying them for years (if I didn't, I would be cut off after all), however, if I forget to pay a bill on time, I don't expect to be penalised. Bord Gais doesn't do it, ESB don't do it, Eircom don't do it... in fact, only NTL do it. As I say, it's a minor reason for my turning my back on NTL, but if you treat your customers like an inconvenience, then.....

BobbyD10

OK, I was wondering when I see people talking about pinging, traffic shaping what do these terms actually mean and what use are they.

Unfortunately I am not a tech whizz but am learning. I am an NTL customer, both Digital and Broadband the last few weeks and touch wood the service has been great so far.

Jumpy

BobbyD10 wrote:

OK, I was wondering when I see people talking about pinging, traffic shaping what do these terms actually mean and what use are they.

Unfortunately I am not a tech whizz but am learning. I am an NTL customer, both Digital and Broadband the last few weeks and touch wood the service has been great so far.

In my personal opinion

AN ICMP ping is a way of testing the speed to a certain IP address.
Ie www.boards.ie. The lower the number (response time) the faster the connection, generally speaking.

Traffic shaping is managing the packets that are passing through a connection to control overusage. Basically in NTL's case they make sure that torrenters dont use all the available contended bandwidth (shared speed). This doesnt go down well with the heavy torrenters *boo hoo*, but helps those that use other protocols *yay*.

stoneroses

Yes ... people do forget to pay bills thats why reminders are sent also and then fees applied.

Kernel

stoneroses wrote:

Yes ... people do forget to pay bills thats why reminders are sent also and then fees applied.

*Sorry mod, have to go off topic one more time to answer this*

Fees applied by who? Do you pay bills? You do realise that NTL are the only ones out of all my (many...) household bills to introduce this late payment penalty dont you? I don't take kindly to being charged extra because I was a day or two late to give them their already expensive fees. I mean, is this even legal? It's not like they've loaned me cash or anything in fairness - they should be happy to have me give them money every month for their **** service.