Over the past 5-6 years I have had Sky, BT and now Virgin broadband. For an 'average' household and members in it who just simply want to plug a router in and get wifi all three devices will suffice as they play on their Xbox's, ipads whilst streaming netflix, Amazon etc.
But those who are in the know (us!) are aware of the limitations of an ISP's hardware - it's cheap and cheerful. On all occasions I have changed the provided hardware with either a direct connected device (Sky/BT) or setting the Virgin router into modem mode. The results of 3rd party hardware are very noticeable to me with regards to wifi coverage, configurability, devices supported etc. I see pro's and cons in all the ISP solutions:
Virgin has great internet speeds (I've got Gig1 now), the router Hub3/4 are not brilliant with wifi in my home and the biggest negative with Virgin in my opinion is set top box interface (Tivo). I think it is bloody awful and about time Virgin did a full firmware revamp.
BT supplied hardware is ok (especially with their whole house wifi promise) but internet speeds dont match up to Virgin (although adequate for most household usage) and once again their desktop is antiquated.
Sky's hardware (especially the Q setup) isnt too bad to be honest as it has a sort of Mesh setup which improves wifi and the set top box interface for Q is brilliant (please note Virgin).
What am I trying to say - well most households wont see any issues (and I bet many wouldn't know even if they did have any), We are geeks (in a nice way lol) and pursue the best setup we can.
What did I do to resolve my wifi issues i had - well I used the router I bought when i had my previous BT setup. Then I upgraded the router to one that supported OpenWRT and Virgin kindly sent me some wifi extenders. Still issues so I took the plunge and purchased an Asus ZenWifi CT8 mesh solution (and I know some on here dont like mesh 😁 ). Has it fixed the problem - god yes. Should I have to fork out £270 to fix my wifi issues. God no!
