Poor user experience with iOS connect app, WiFi connection

[chrisg42]

Hi there,

I've just connected my Virgin app having recently rejoined following Sky increasing their prices. My experience has not been good so far though, and wondering if I have made a mistake and I will just go back to Sky after all!

Firstly I connected my hub 3, it seems to be working OK, but there is a constant red light. I have an internet connection and the test says it's OK, but I am not sure if it red is good (because it's the virgin brand colour) or whether it should be green instead. Either way, it appears to work, but I don't have a lot of confidence it's going to work well enough to rely on.

Anyway, we've had flaky wifi issues in the past, so I wanted to check to whole house for blackspots, and was happy to see that the connect app was the way to do this. Except, ironically, the iOS app didn't connect to the hub at all. The last error was, "Oops, something went wrong" error, but I've also had various errors around not being able to connect to the hub, then finding the hub and searching for devices, but never finding them.

I did eventually get this to work - so to help others, this is what I did:

1. Powering off and on the hub
2. Reinstalling the connect app on my iPhone 11 (iOS 16)
3. Uninstalling the app, restarting the phone, then reinstalling it (no difference)
4. Installing the android app on my kid's tablet - Success

The android app worked fine, and after I did that, the iOS app magically started working too. So it seems to be a bug with the iOS app specifically.

Next, I scanned my house and found a few blackspots, as expected. The kitchen is giving as low as 6Mb and the office 1Mb. I expected there to be some bad spots in our extension, so I wanted to see how virgin could help with this. So I clicked on the option to learn about the WiFi pods, sounds great. But then I find that I have to pay another £8 a month for the pleasure of this.

So I have to pay £144 (8 x 18) for a £100 guarantee that I will ensure my Wifi works at a decent speed? No thanks.

Should I give up and cancel? I don't want to be locked into an 18 month contract with a company that provides poor software, hardware and is first suggestion to fix it is to pay them more money.

In the past, since Virgin's wifi was previously poor, I've run the hub in modem mode, and I am capable of buying WiFi hardware and setting this up, but I object to having to do it, and won't be doing it on this occasion. I'd prefer to switch to a provider with reliable software and hardware so I don't have to waste the little free time I have. It's not much use having a fast cable modem if the WiFi speed is too poor to take any advantage of it.

[jbrennand]

Ok.. you can cancel within 14-days post activation free of charge - but dont leave it to the last day!

Is it a red light - or actually "magenta" which means its in modem only mode. Red light on Hub3 indicated an overheating Hub3 - or just a dodgy old failed LED - you may have been issued with a refurbished Hub3. Anyway - I will alert VM now and they will reply here and PM you to get it exchanged.

Re the other stuff - the connect App is indeed flaky and they know it. You are correct re the wifi too - see this..

https://www.virginmedia.com/help/wifi-max

Note that its common practice for BB suppliers to charge extra for whole home wifi guarantees - BT and BRSK  charge £10-or-£8 /mo - dunno about Sky

I have never run a VM Hub in router mode - I always use my own router and wireless equipment - I prefer to control it rather than leave it to whoever is writing Firmware for the VM Hubs.

Dont you still have the equipment you had previously? If so - what make/model is it and have you tried it

[Chris_W1]

Hi chrisg42, thanks for the message and welcome to the forums. 

I am sorry to hear that there is an issue with the hub and will send you a private message so that this can be looked into further. 

Kind regards, Chris. 

[chrisg42]

Thanks for your reply @jbrennard

I do have an TP-Link Archer C9 which I have used in the past (when I was last on VM) to support our wifi signal, it's getting long in the tooth though and I worry about lack of firmware updates for security. (The hub 3 also gives me warnings for TKIP on it's out of the box settings, incidentally, but I know how to turn that off).

I was hoping signing up to a new contract I'd get some more modern equipment and I wouldn't have to shell out for my own - though it has been my experience in the past that ISP routers are hit and miss. It would be nice if they didn't keep pretending they worked really well though. There do seem to be some rare exceptions like Zen, who I would consider if they still did G-fast or we were in an OpenReach FTTP area.

In regard to Sky, they have a "wall to wall" wifi guarantee where they give you money back, but it's a lousy 3Mb it has to be below, so I'm not sure it's much to boast about either.

That being said, the Sky hub has been very reliable, their customer service really good, and they are one of the few to offer 150Mb via G-fast to us. I was going to stick with them, but I loathe the practice of mid contract price hikes, so I took the opportunity to show my displeasure and upgrade slightly to 250Mb with Virgin. I do appreciate all ISPs have been doing it, including Virgin, but unless it costs them in the pocket they are likely to keep at it. Hopefully the regulator will crack down on them and they'll stop with the one sided contract clauses in the future. From my point of view, if they want to increase your prices then you should be free to leave at any time.

Someone from Virgin has contacted me in a PM. The light is definitely red and not magenta - I don't know if it's actually showing anything wrong though. Apart from the poor signal in the kitchen, things seem as expected. My office is in the garden - I don't expect a fast signal out there, but it would be nice if it worked reliably with my smart devices at least, and I didn't had to give them an extra monthly fee for a simple wifi extender. 

I've noticed that Virgin also don't let you change your IP subnet anymore either, so I will have to reconfigure things for that too. But at this point I've just turned the hub off and switched back to Sky so I can do a comparison. I've been putting off buying an overpriced mesh wifi solution, but looks like it might be the only way to work with the options I've got.

[Chris_W1]

Hi chrisg42, thanks for the message over PM 

I am glad to see that this is on the way to becoming resolved. 

Please let us know how it goes. 

Chris. 

[jbrennand]

All good points let us know what you do.

Re the office in the garden - if that is a "permanent" situation - I would run exterior grade Cat6a ethernet cable from a Hub port (from any BB supplier) out to the shed and attach the other end to a good wireless access point (or the C9 in bridge mode) to provide full speed on ethernet and wifi in that important area.