Guide - Getting the most out of your high speed Virgin Media (UPC) 240mb/s service

CoBo55

AndrewJRenko wrote: »

Yeah, I did a call last week and was offered €84. I might give it one more shot before I switch. If I go Sky, I guess I'll be able to switch to Freeview /Saorview at the end of their contract period, and will never go back to Virgin - more than 25 years as loyal customer of Cablelink/NTL/UPC down the drain, because they won't give me the same deal that they'll give a new customer.

Unless you make absolutely sure you get a hybrid lnb you won't have the option of Freeview if you cancel after 12 months. I had sky BB back in the old days of ADSL and it was dreadful, the only provider I ever had trouble with, to their credit they let me move to another provider without penalty after several attempts to sort it.

garo

I am coming off the Virgin TV+broadband (500Mbps)+phone bundle. I paid 52 (53.75) for 6 months and 84(87.5) for 6. They increased prices midway. I am leaving because I am not a fan on the Virgin TV box and service. I will continue to get broadband with VM paying 52 for 9 months and 67 for 3.


For TV, I am switching back to Sky paying 30 for basic + netflix. The installer is coming tomorrow and changing the dish and I made sure to let him know I need a hybrid LNB. It is not hassle for them as long as you let them know in advance.


Going back to the topic and your VM speeds, as someone here suggested, connect a laptop to the Hub via ethernet and then do a speedtest. That will tell you what your connection is truly capable of. The 40-50 you are seeing could be because of your device or the signal getting weaker from your hub to your device due to walls etc. You would hope that the Sky service would give you similar speed. Of course you have 14 days to cancel Sky if you find your speed is much worse.


PS: @TheDoc I was cleaning out my PMs and saw that we did business in 2009! Pre adverts.ie days.

CoBo55

garo wrote: »

I am coming off the Virgin TV+broadband (500Mbps)+phone bundle. I paid 52 (53.75) for 6 months and 84(87.5) for 6. They increased prices midway. I am leaving because I am not a fan on the Virgin TV box and service. I will continue to get broadband with VM paying 52 for 9 months and 67 for 3.


For TV, I am switching back to Sky paying 30 for basic + netflix. The installer is coming tomorrow and changing the dish and I made sure to let him know I need a hybrid LNB. It is not hassle for them as long as you let them know in advance.


Going back to the topic and your VM speeds, as someone here suggested, connect a laptop to the Hub via ethernet and then do a speedtest. That will tell you what your connection is truly capable of. The 40-50 you are seeing could be because of your device or the signal getting weaker from your hub to your device due to walls etc. You would hope that the Sky service would give you similar speed. Of course you have 14 days to cancel Sky if you find your speed is much worse.


PS: @TheDoc I was cleaning out my PMs and saw that we did business in 2009! Pre adverts.ie days.

The new 360 TV box is supposed to be very good.

garo

Thanks. Got the Sky Q box delivered today so will be waiting a year to try out the 360. Hope to have more first hand accounts by then. But I got a hybrid LNB today so I might just make the plunge to FTV.

TheDoc

garo wrote: »

PS: @TheDoc I was cleaning out my PMs and saw that we did business in 2009! Pre adverts.ie days.

Was I buying or selling

garo

I think selling. An Athlon 3000 bundle ring a bell?

TheDoc

garo wrote: »

I think selling. An Athlon 3000 bundle ring a bell?

Hah vaguely

Kema

hey all
i have Virgins 250mb in my apartment and would like to buy a 3rd party router to replace the router that was giving to me with Virgin as i do alot of Streaming/Torrents/Gaming

is there a go to router on the market for this sort of thing

garo

Why do you want to replace the router? What specifically is wrong with the Virgin router? Also note it is hard to replace a cable router. Most people put the Virgin hub in bridge mode and add a router to the end so the virgin hub just provides the internet connection and your own router does everything else.

CoBo55

branners69 wrote: »

Would you not look into a mesh system. Very reasonably priced and were not really an option when this thread started 5 years ago?

I got this after, set it up yesterday evening, myself and the family are delighted with it. https://www.currys.ie/ieen/computing-accessories/networking/network-routers-and-switches/routers/asus-rt-ac86u-wifi-cable-fibre-router-ac-2900-dual-band-10172009-pdt.html

S.E.A.L.s

CoBo55 wrote: »

I got this after, set it up yesterday evening, myself and the family are delighted with it. https://www.currys.ie/ieen/computing-accessories/networking/network-routers-and-switches/routers/asus-rt-ac86u-wifi-cable-fibre-router-ac-2900-dual-band-10172009-pdt.html

Those AC86u's are deadly, I've also setup the ASUS AC87u, AX88u, and DSL-AC68u all with custom Merlin firmware running for years at multiple locations, with multiple ISP's (including NTL/UPC/Virgin) to date for friends and family.

Cannot recommend the mid to high end ASUS routers enough

Check out smallnetbuilder (snb) forums if you want to custom

CoBo55

S.E.A.L.s wrote: »

Those AC86u's are deadly, I've also setup the ASUS AC87u, AX88u, and DSL-AC68u all with custom Merlin firmware running for years at multiple locations, with multiple ISP's (including NTL/UPC/Virgin) to date for friends and family.

Cannot recommend the mid to high end ASUS routers enough

Check out smallnetbuilder (snb) forums if you want to custom

Noo, don't put the temptation of customisation before me:D:D. It's a brilliant router, I love that you can turn off the lights and it just sits there and does its thing, and I have my USB back which I really missed.

S.E.A.L.s

CoBo55 wrote: »

Noo, don't put the temptation of customisation before me:D:D. It's a brilliant router, I love that you can turn off the lights and it just sits there and does its thing, and I have my USB back which I really missed.

But router level ad blocking (Diversion) that actually stops 95% of ads for every device on the network, an enterprise level customisable firewall with controls (SkyNet, actual name, come on geezer!) and so much more via the very easy to deploy amtm package on snb

Wait, there's more!!...

TheDoc

Meant to check this, while troubleshooting my network I noticed my Virgin Hub is still in router mode. I had problems tail end of last year and had to reset my network to scratch and start again, and while the WiFi is disabled on the Hub, I guess I left router mode enabled.



Should I look to turn this over again to Modem mode?

I'm onto their tech support and they are saying "Does the customer know the router should be reset once a week to ensure they clear congestion and get a new IP lease" ....Sorry what?

garo

Yes if you have another router connected to the hub.

TheDoc

garo wrote: »

Yes if you have another router connected to the hub.

Yeh I do. Remember previously though moving to modem only mode absolutely borked the network and I had to do a separate(not related to last time out) factory reset on everything

Might give it a whirl shortly. Was trying to play a game there and was just shockingly laggy

TheDoc

Ok now I remember why I didn’t turn on modem mode. WiFi down on the house and Hub admin panel not responding. Ugh

garo

Hub URL changes when you enter modem mode. 192.168.100.1 IIRC.

TheDoc

Ok so got it sorted. When enabling modem mode my WAN needed to be DHCP protocol. Immediately picked up info and started working.

I had it set on static from the original post on this thread

CoBo55

TheDoc wrote: »

Ok so got it sorted. When enabling modem mode my WAN needed to be DHCP protocol. Immediately picked up info and started working.

I had it set on static from the original post on this thread

Don't forget the address of the VM hub changes to 192.168.100.1 when its in modem mode.

Romero

Live in Lucan area and for the last couple of weeks I've only been getting at most 88Mbps download, I've been using the 360 hub in bridge mode but even doing a full factory reset and hardwired into the hub the above is what I get. I'm wondering is their 1GB service hitting the bandwidth on the 240Mb package? I have an engineer due out on Friday although I think everything will check out ok, I don't mind paying for anything over 160Mbps but don't think I should be paying full wack for a third of the speed I'm paying for.
Btw this is the max speed I get morning evening 2am so it doesn't look like network congestion.

TheDoc

This is what I'm seeing for ten days now, nothing but red



Going to give them a call next week to sort this out, internet is genuinely in bits. Seeing the 1GB thread, I wonder have Virgin gone and milled themselves trying to do 1GB.

Think I'm still in 14 day cooling period and for the first time in probably 15 years toying with the idea of changing, this is shcoking

CoBo55

TheDoc wrote: »

This is what I'm seeing for ten days now, nothing but red



Going to give them a call next week to sort this out, internet is genuinely in bits. Seeing the 1GB thread, I wonder have Virgin gone and milled themselves trying to do 1GB.

Think I'm still in 14 day cooling period and for the first time in probably 15 years toying with the idea of changing, this is shcoking

Is that the 1 Gig service?

TheDoc

CoBo55 wrote: »

Is that the 1 Gig service?

No 500mb, resigned up to it last week as too many issues with the 1GB that I can see.

Network specialist in my department in work got it in this week(after a few weeks waiting) and he's not overly impressed with it at all. He'll be a good indicator for me about when its working and what the problems are.

We deal with Virgin for business stuff, so he's going to try sound out the account manager on it

ED E

TheDoc wrote: »

This is what I'm seeing for ten days now, nothing but red



Going to give them a call next week to sort this out, internet is genuinely in bits. Seeing the 1GB thread, I wonder have Virgin gone and milled themselves trying to do 1GB.

Think I'm still in 14 day cooling period and for the first time in probably 15 years toying with the idea of changing, this is shcoking

That just means you're not responding so the BQM is set wrong (old IP) or you're no longer configured to respond to ICMP.

TheDoc

ED E wrote: »

That just means you're not responding so the BQM is set wrong (old IP) or you're no longer configured to respond to ICMP.

Not with you on those abbreviations haha. I’ve been half concerned it was me recently setting their router into modem mode.

Any of this something I can resolve or troubleshoot or need them to sort ?

ED E

1. Check your IP is right on the Think BB site
2. Enable ICMP on whatever router you're briding too. Its ignoring the pings thus 100% red.

TheDoc

Took a while (nearly 10 days to speak to someone) but worth the wait. One of the most helpful technical support people I've met. did real meaningful troubleshooting and collated good information from me. Confirmed there appears to be an issue with a downstream channel on my router, so organising to dispatch and engineer to resolve.

Fingers crossed this should be my problems sorted.

Damien360

TheDoc wrote: »

Took a while (nearly 10 days to speak to someone) but worth the wait. One of the most helpful technical support people I've met. did real meaningful troubleshooting and collated good information from me. Confirmed there appears to be an issue with a downstream channel on my router, so organising to dispatch and engineer to resolve.

Fingers crossed this should be my problems sorted.

Just to put a fudge on this. Had a similar helpful technician send out an engineer for an issue. He couldn't find anything and left. We were sent a bill for his time as they found nothing. After a few irate phone calls, a helpful technican changed something on the back end (their words), one reboot later and the problem was resolved. I was getting constant reboots every 2 hours. Engineer had stayed for 20 minutes. Wife dealt with him. I'm on 360 package.

TheDoc

Damien360 wrote: »

Just to put a fudge on this. Had a similar helpful technician send out an engineer for an issue. He couldn't find anything and left. We were sent a bill for his time as they found nothing. After a few irate phone calls, a helpful technican changed something on the back end (their words), one reboot later and the problem was resolved. I was getting constant reboots every 2 hours. Engineer had stayed for 20 minutes. Wife dealt with him. I'm on 360 package.

Well I won’t be taking any bill for an engineer that’s for sure. Granted I’ve never needed an engineer, **** that. I’d consider it part of their support agreement to me as a customer and even if he doesn’t find something it rules out issues.