Very pedantic of you JGF2, but it is not. It is mps (or mbps in full if you prefer) and stands for megabits per second as opposed to mBps which stands for megabytes per second - I'm sure you will know the difference or find out on Wiki....... Incidentally, after Openreach brought fibre to my nearest roadside cabinet about 200 yards away (maybe even 300 yards away thinking about it), I still had aluminium cables from the cabinet to my house giving me around 20 mbps. Then about a year back, Openreach upgraded the underground ducted aluminium cables to my nearest pavement junction box to high grade copper. That has pushed my download speed up to around 35 mbps - I can live with that.
We had to ditch Sky Broadband nearly 2 years ago. My Wife worked at home at the time and the Broadband connection at its worst was dropping every 5 mins. Lengthy complaints, new hardware, and visits from BT followed where old phone lines were taken out, new copper connections were installed at the local exchange, filters were added to phone sockets etc etc. It did get better for a few months. Then it all started again so we walked away. So we're now being ripped for Virgin fibre at £41 a month (including Line Rental) and in the 2 years it's failed twice. Both due to fibre breaks in the area.
Unfortunately Virgin is not on the map where i live,We dont have any mains waste,no gas supply. We do have electric,and water though. Oh and overhead telephone cable supply
I’m on Sky and to be honest apart from one problem which was my end, that I rectified after I googled it. Yet I found BT just confusing on the bills and their customer service terrible. Weird that a company called “British” chose to have their call centre out of the country? Virgin is not over here so can’t try them, but not heard great things anyway. I’m thinking of going to Vodafone because they are doing a Black Friday deal of £25 for broadband and line rental, with additional £4 to have evening and weekend calls free. But I bet I will stay with Sky as I know the customer service has never failed me, I don’t mind chatting to a Geordie or Scottish person on the phone. And I know what my bill is every month. Oh and I’m a good mile or so from the exchange and still get 35 mbs / mps which is above average for the town. @Oldsparkey I’m still a Merc over a BMW.
You can talk to the people on sky, they understand what you want and are very fair .... had a problem with my billing, and sorted in minutes, plus a free remote control as ours had a dodgy button .. we now have a his and hers ..... lol virgin is a pain with some, well most of their agents. Had one this week and complimented her ability to listen, understand the problem and sort it... her name was Bonnie, which was a change from Gupta or whatever ....
Im on Virgin ROD and had no problems at all internet wise, in fact its been really good, the TIVO box is terrible
you are probably on the same main distribution box as I am, it serves Whitchurch Stockwood etc sub stations. I get a feed from it [sub station] which comes from a round about way, could be a lot shorter but it is done to eliminate additional trunking
ROD - car preferences can become a very personal thing and owners tend to be defensive of their choices. The reason I got into BMW's was intially I was pissed off with the residual value of British marques when traded in. Back in the 80's, both me and my (eventual) business partner who I'd known for some time had Rover 3500 SD1s bought at the same time from the same garage - Howells of Cardiff. When we went back to trade them in a few years later, the offers for taking them back were a bloody joke. My fellow director, as he had become by then, decided to take out another one - an all singing and dancing 3500SD1 Van den Plas. I told them no thanks and went to the local BMW dealer SL Motors of Penarth Road for a look (that was when Frank Sytner was still a racing driver ). I didn't get any more from them for my Rover but I took out a new 528i. About 3 years later when we'd decided to change again, we allocated ourselves an equal amount of cash from the company and got some trade in values for our cars to top it up. The results were astonishing. Although costing roughly the same price new, my 5281 was worth twice as much as the Rover. I was able to take out an M535i. My fellow director had seen the light but didn't have quite as much as me at his disposal. He went down to a Merc Garage down west somewhere and took out an E230 and has kept to the same E Class ever since. I've been a driver and a passenger in them many many times over the years. Lovely cars but like chalk and cheese on the road. The Mercs are quality, but you actually get to drive BMWs as opposed to being "driven" in a Merc. Mercs can't get the suspension right for me. Their standard setup is way too wallowy and at the other end of the spectrum, the AMG set up is like riding on a board. The "sport" suspension on my wife's C Class is a decent compromise but even that can be very harsh on poorly made up roads. All the BMW's I've had have been flawless in that department and the engines both petrol and deisel are also superior - only my opinion of course.......
The thing is each car is different to each person. I’ve driven BMW’s for years and in that time had an operation on my back. Regardless of type of BMW my back has always pulled. Driving the Merc I could drive from Chelmsford to Chepstow in one hit where’s the BMW’s stopping in services to walk the pain off. Got a VW Passat now for my work vehicle drive approx150-250 miles a day up and down country lanes and down to two tramadol a day. Something that has not happened for years now. I was even carrying 30kg buckets of admixture up and down steps and touch wood no issues. Where’s sometimes after driving the wife’s beemer I struggled to pick up my granddaughter.
