Switch to Toob?

[HergestPhil]

My current Virgin contract is almost finished.  Toob has just moved into my area, providing 900mb Fibre to the premise for £25 per month.  I'm tempted to switch, as I'm fed up with the hassle to get a reasonable price with Virgin.

Current package is costing me £76pm.  An "exclusive offer" to sign up for a further 18 months at £91 (usual price £136 for the equivalent package), but this cost increases every April?

Does anyone have any experience with Toob for broadband?  Is it reliable, low latency+jitter?  I gather there is no email account with Toob, I'm assuming I'd lose my Virgin Media email and would need to replace this with something else.

Would I be able to retain a Virgin TV package, without using their broadband router?  Would I save much by switching broadband+TV+landline package to a TV only package?  If I could get my same TV package for around £50, my total cost would be the same, but I'd get 3-4x faster broadband.

[Graham_A]

@HergestPhil  I have no experience of Toob, however I can answer a couple of your questions.

Yes, you would lose your Virgin Media email addresses 90 days after ceasing to have a broadband contract with them.

Virgin Media TV packages will not work without a VM broadband connection.

[Richard1959]

As Graham_A has said you would lose your email address and all your existing stored emails unless you copy/move them to another email account if you have one. I recently got a new personal email address that I am transferring all my contacts onto so that if at some point if Virgin stop being prepared to negotiate on prices so I decide to leave Virgin then losing my email address will not be a concern.

If you switch to TOOB for your broadband then that leaves you with Sky (Sky Stream or Sky Dish) as your only option for TV as both Virgin and BT require you to use their broadband for their TV packages.

[Cardiffman282]

Or just use the TV apps on your TV and happily forget bloated and expensive TV packages. 

[nodrogd]

---

@Richard1959 wrote:

I recently got a new personal email address that I am transferring all my contacts onto so that if at some point if Virgin stop being prepared to negotiate on prices so I decide to leave Virgin then losing my email address will not be a concern.

---

With VM no longer issuing email addresses to new customers & insisting non VM email addresses are used when updating your MyVirginMedia account, it's likely it won't be long before we all have to do this even if we are staying with VM.

[HergestPhil]

Thanks everyone.  I already have a domain name that includes an email account that I redirect personal emails to, but I was using Virign email address for less important emails.  Not too bothered if i lose that; I can set another email address up for that purpose.

I'm surprised there is no TV-only option, that I could only get Broadband or broadband+TV.  I don't have a freeview aerial, and the TV is a bit old.  Not sure how Sky Stream would work, I'll see if it would be an option.

[nodrogd]

---

@HergestPhil wrote:

I'm surprised there is no TV-only option, that I could only get Broadband or broadband+TV.  I don't have a freeview aerial, and the TV is a bit old.  Not sure how Sky Stream would work, I'll see if it would be an option.

---

VM TV boxes no longer contain internal modems, only broadcast tuners. The V360 Horizon system (which is designed specifically for cable provider use) relies on a headend server to operate. Virgin has 50+ local franchise headends that all operate separate broadcast TV, On Demand & authentication systems. Therefore as the TV boxes only ever see their local headend, the same server address can be used by every box on the network. The same goes for Virgin Stream boxes, which also run on Horizon.

[Roger_Gooner]

A TV-only option is perfectly possible and requires a hub to provide the network connection that the box needs to use. I'd have thought that this makes sense as the possibility would always exist to upsell to TV with broadband, but VM has decided not to do that.

[nodrogd]

---

@Roger_Gooner wrote:

A TV-only option is perfectly possible and requires a hub to provide the network connection that the box needs to use. I'd have thought that this makes sense as the possibility would always exist to upsell to TV with broadband, but VM has decided not to do that.

---

It won’t work on a multi franchise cable system. Sky is one UK system. VM is split into 50+ separate networks, the boxes are headend driven, unlike Sky’s that work from a huge Postcode database for location data. On VM with both the box, hub & server on the same piece of cable there is no need for it. Also, if the VM box is moved to another house & connected to another hub, this is easily detected & box can be disabled. Even if both are moved more than 1km the location change can be detected.

[Roger_Gooner]

I've no idea what your post is about. A TV-only option is providing a crippled hub to deliver enough broadband for the TV box to work, that's it. It's essentially the same thing as a phone-only option with a hub and a phone.