MrRevhead

Alot more consistent routing it seems as opposed to the servers this site used about a year ago. Although at times on particular servers you still get the odd dud run.

Bigpond Cable (8Mbps Liberty Plan)

Sydney:


Canberra:


Melbourne:


Napier


with ADSL1 8Mbps plans

sTARk

eva. I'm with Netspace at the moment and as soon as my contract runs out on the 19th April I will be churning to Internode. Their ADSL1 plan has 10GB more data for only $5/month making it 40GB which you can use 24/7 (no peak/off-peak). 15/15 is just not enough.

If you want a good and cheap ADSL2+ capable modem (non wireless) I bought a Netcomm NB5Plus4 Modem Router. It's really easy to use and works great

MrRevhead

Exetel's 8Mbps ADSL plans are also decent. Total 84GB for $95 (36GB Off Peak, 48GB Peak)

Netcomm NB5Plus4 is a feature rich router/modem for its price, but just a heads up that it does not play well with ADSL2+, especially with iinet DSLAM's. You will find it limits you to a max of 10-12Mbps despite being at a distance where your capable of much more (based on attenuation readings).

Billion's ADSL modem range FTW

sTARk

http://ozspeedtest.com/

Mirror: OptusNet
Data: 3 MB
Test Time: 4.74 secs

Your line speed is 5.17 Mbps (5173 kbps).
Your download speed is 647 KB/s (0.63 MB/s).

Mirror: OptusNet
Data: 9 MB
Test Time: 14.22 secs

Your line speed is 5.32 Mbps (5316 kbps).
Your download speed is 665 KB/s (0.65 MB/s).

Mirror: OptusNet
Data: 15 MB
Test Time: 23.69 secs

Your line speed is 5.29 Mbps (5291 kbps).
Your download speed is 661 KB/s (0.65 MB/s).

http://users.bigpond.net.au/speedtest/

Download: 339 Kilobytes/s
Upload: 38.9 Kilobytes/s
QOS: 81%
RTT: 28 ms
MaxPause: 95 ms
Test location: Sydney

http://www.speedtest.net/index.php



Pretty consistent to all Cities. Adelaide was via Internode Auckland has a shocking link compared with Napier

Edit: Very surprised to see Australia in the Top 5 at No. 2 considering everyone you talk to says our internet infrastructure and general speed of service does not rate compared to the rest of the world.

sTARk

Exetel has nice plans but I read many complaints about there service which has kind of turned me off.

The Netcomm has been a great performer, I won't be going with iinet so shouldn't be a problem and I dont expect to get much faster then I'm already getting since I can only connect to the exchange @ 6624kbps on an 8000kbps capable line/plan. I think the distance will be a problem for me, I will minaly be switching to ADSL2+ for the cheaper plans/same data ratio.

I have/had a Billion, it died. If the Netcomm is no good I'll sell it and get another Billion. The Netcomm was only $100.

sTARk

Exetel's plans are very attractive and I might be swayed to churn there but all you have to do is read some of the posts on their Whirlpool page to make it blatantly obvious they don't give a **** about their customers. They offer NO phone support, they actually removed it and made their customers use email/forum to which if you raise any complaints which are a little heated they BAN you from the very forum they force you to use Not only that, I read some post about Exetel canceling a customers churn to another ISP stating the customer wanted to stay, the customer in question said he sent no email or gave no advice to that effect. So they not only don;t give a **** about you they don't respect you period.

This is an ISP to avoid with a capital A Ladies and Gentleman.

Don't believe me? Read some of the threads here http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-threads.cfm?f=105

MrRevhead

It does look like their customer service is taking a turn for the worse of late, but based on my/family's experiences with Exetel over a period of about 2 years and 2 different service types, we have not had ANY major problems, the biggest being we didn't like our invoices being sent by email and on two instances we did not received any invoices (which were resolved by communicating with them). The uptime & quality of service has been good, with very little downtime over the 2 year period. This is kind of expected as Exetel resell both their line & wireless services from larger ISP's.

But just like ANY ISP's sub-section in whirlpool, they are filled with negative comments & problems regarding service that any ISP provides. Realistically though, how often do you contact your ISP or technical support? I know I would prob make the odd call every few years. Annette Linton (Exetel Rep) is also a pretty rude & arrogant lady, which I guess does not help matters over at Whirlpool, the reason she has reduced her contact with consumers as well.

I think that churn example you provided is an isolated, subjective case. If it was something that happens on a high frequency across many of their users, Exetel would be in pretty big trouble (legally) as its a breach of their NDA/Contract with their customers, not to mention false business practice. They cannot explicitly state something on their website & terms of service and not deliver. TPG done the same a couple of years back and got heavily penalised through an ACCC investigation, this is no different as its within the same context.

Exetel ADSL might be something to try and churn over to if they meet your needs, after all, the fact remains you are still getting almost double the downloads for the same price when compared to some other ISP's.

Just noticed the forums posts time stamps are 1 hour ahead

sTARk

Well I might give them a try. I have to admit there plans suit me to a T both in the hip pocket and data allowance I realise they are isolated incidents but there is no denying they get more then there fair share of complaints and of various types. If you look at Internode right now, I cannot see 1 complaint on the first page. I just don;t want to be a statistic or one of those isolated incidents and then be locked into a contract with them

If your family is still using them (you obviously are'nt) would you mind jumping on the Exetel connection and running the speed test/s and post your results here? I would greatly appreciate it