VIRGIN HUB3 V BT HUB 2 experience

[mart1969]

I've posted in the past about VM wi fi and how, in my experience though not awful is not great compared to my previous broadband suppliers SKY, & TENTEL. So obviously with price rises on the horizon i shopped around not necessarily for the best price but in search of stronger, faster wi fi..

So after asking lots of peoples opinions I bit the bullet and recently had bt installed. I did try and cancel Virgin by post as had no joy on phone, however sent letter to the old Nottingham address and so have had no reply so I'm in the position when i can compared both hubs wi fi. Both HUBS are running from the same room and not different parts of the house.

VIRGIN 100MB PACKAGE HUB3 £26.50 monthly

WI FI covers most of the house excluding cellar ( office) I got an it guy round to fit some kind of booster to solve this and now works "ok". Many speed checks my Virgin wi fi averages around the 25mb download speed wise, occasionally higher and lower.

67mb package BT HUB2 £29.99 monthly with £90 gift card

Wi Fi covers all the house with a stronger signal upstairs  and even reaches the cellar without the booster ( only 2 bars though) and in multiple speed tests averaging around consistently 35mb download speeds.

Now Its early days yet so not binned off the Virgin just yet as I believe I have till mid Feb to cancel it and will post of the BT goes pear shaped but thought someone might find my experience useful.

[newapollo]

Hi @mart1969 

Thanks for the comparison between the WiFi on both networks.

Just in case you need it again since you sent the cancealltion letter to the old Nottingham address, it's only recently been noted that VM hadn't updated the site with the correct cancellaion  address

It's now Virgin Media Sunderland SR43 4AA

[goslow]

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@mart1969 wrote:

I've posted in the past about VM wi fi and how, in my experience though not awful is not great compared to my previous broadband suppliers SKY, & TENTEL. So obviously with price rises on the horizon i shopped around not necessarily for the best price but in search of stronger, faster wi fi..

<snip>

Now Its early days yet so not binned off the Virgin just yet as I believe I have till mid Feb to cancel it and will post of the BT goes pear shaped but thought someone might find my experience useful.

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Interesting to read as I have been looking into a similar swap myself. Have to say though, with either option your wi-fi speeds don't look that great.

From my online searches, the BT Smart Hub 2 seems to have some missing features compared with the Hub 3. Seemingly no ability to split wi-fi bands and no guest network access as far as I can see. Seems to be the intention that the customer buys the BT wi-fi disk system to add more features/coverage. Also looks like one of the four LAN ports becomes a WAN port on a FTTP connection reducing LAN to 3. Does that sound right?

[mart1969]

Much appreciated. I'll give it another week or so.....just to make sure BT is....well good! 🙂

[mart1969]

Hey goslow, I was offered the WI  Fi disc booster but declined for now. So far I've not needed it but I guess I could get a I.T guy to rig up my other booster that I bought to give my Virgin Wi Fi a bit more omph? I "think" that uses internal wiring of the house to carry the signal....but I could be talking rubbish 

I am considering upgrading to the ultimate wi Fi though? I think it comes with EE 4G back up....just in case 

Ps BT was my second choice by the way Zen was my first but BT offered new lines installation for free as old was wasn't UpTo scratch....Zen wanted to charge for it

[mart1969]

PPS....that last comment earnt me a new badge "Superfast"...I really, REALLY won't miss that nonesence

[mart1969]

UPDATE. I'm a few months in now and can hopefully give a reasonably honest comparison. After BT tweaked something now getting on average 50-55mb download speeds over wi fi which is way quicker than Virgins ever was in my house. Is there a downside? Hell yeah. reliability. BT hub glows amber or red way too much for my liking so Virgin wins on that front. Someways it drives you mental with it then its fine for a few weeks then goes bonkers again. Got an engineer coming to look at the hub next week so we will see!!