Which ISP ?

[AnOther]

After a successful trip over for the final signing and taking possession of our new house I've got my new phone number so I'm faced with the decision of which ISP to sign up with.

It's a bewildering enough choice in the UK in one's native tounge but in my embarassingly limited Franglish it becomes pretty well impossible so I would welcome advice and suggestions from those in the know and I've attatched a summary of the offers according to dslvalley.com.

Seemingly I'm only up for 2mbs tops but nevertheless I would still like a decent monthly D\L quota plus maybe VOIP (use Skype otherwise) and maybe some free ordinary phone minutes thrown in.

Not too bothered about free modems/routers etc. as I have all that to bring over from UK.

[IMG]http://i127.photobucket.com/albums/p123/biskitboyo/ADSLOptions.jpg[/IMG]

Seems I've got possibilities with Alice also

Vous êtes éligible à l'offre Alice Box :

ADSL + Téléphonie + modem Wi-Fi à 34,95€/mois

À titre indicatif, le débit maximal supporté par votre ligne téléphonique est 2 Méga

[Danny]

Ernie
if you want the VOIP via the ISP then you will have to use the modem/router supllied by them. If you just want ADSL without anything else, it will work out (minimum) about 24 € per month. You can get this from Orange, Neuf and possibly others. It can be reduced to 19 € but you will be on their telephone preselection as well for all calls(not VOIP ones). If you want to or are able to you have to decide if you want to ditch the FT line rental 15€pm.

Otherwise Free, CI, Neuf, ALiceetc all offer much of a muchness with free being 5€ cheaper at 29.99€. There are little differences between them all - e.g. cancellation fees, 12 month contracts with varying fees so you have to read the detail...

You seem to be offered much the same as we are here (not far from you) and at the moment Club internet works well for us at 34.90 pm. I want to change to Free soon and hopefully economise on the FT line rental too.

There has been quite lot of discussion here about the various ISPs and I know that others are happy with Neuf and Orange and Free. I think the main issue is one that Cassis raised:

If most ISPs provide a mostly reliable service to most people most of the time then I suppose that what mainly distinguishes their service quality is

         what they are like when things go wrong or when you need assistance

and

• how easy it is to escape their clutches.

and it would seem that they are all pretty rubbish on the customer service front when there is a problem

hope that is useful
Danny

[BJSLIV]

There is also the newcomer ADSL from Darty.

Now Darty as a company pride themselves on customer service, and are reselling ADSL from a small provider.

If they are available I would be tempted to try them. they aren't on the comparison sites as yet but you can check availability at their main website

www.darty.fr under Dartybox.  29.90 a month including the box and  free calls.

Unfortunately they don't offer the all inclusive option of dropping the FT line rental.

 

 

[Lautrec]

Hi Ernie,

If you want am ISP which has English as the main language, get in touch with a newish company designed for use by ex-pats, Teleconnect. Their help line is free and you will be assisted by an English person. I am just moving from Wanadoo after 13 months of trial and tribulation and hope that any change will be as good as a rest!

[AnOther]

[quote user="Jane and Danny"]...what mainly distinguishes their service quality is what they are like when things go wrong or when you need assistance and

• how easy it is to escape their clutches.

and it would seem that they are all pretty rubbish on the customer service front when there is a problem[/quote]Not much different from UK there then...!

Yes, very useful info thank you.

From what little I can understand I'm "non degroupee" so probably locked into FT.

Some of the offers are a bit disengenuous too holding out the carrot of 8 or even 24mb when it's patently obvious that no way will my particular line support anything like that speed, in theory anyway.

I'll be happy enough using Skype if necessary.

 

Thanks for the tip Lautrec, Teleconnect sounds very interesting and may well be a good way to go. If it is American run then it's likely one could expect a better level of customer service.  

[BJSLIV]

Just because you are "non degroupee" doesn't mean that you can't save on your FT line rental. If you are happy with 100% VOIP then you can take something like 100% Freebox or the  similar offer from Neuf, mentioned on your pasted image above.

 

[AnOther]

Ok, I understand, I'm still relating to UK ISP's where you're either on BT or unbundled, nothing in between.

Does full VOIP preclude you from using Skype I wonder and do you know how much the basic FT line rental is ?

Are you an insomniac....????

 

 

[BJSLIV]

Does full VOIP preclude you from using Skype? I can't see how it would.

I wonder and do you know how much the basic FT line rental is ? 15 Euros a month including tax.

Insomniac?  No just Late to Bed , Late to Rise!

[Danny]

[quote user="BJSLIV"]

Does full VOIP preclude you from using Skype? I can't see how it would.

[/quote]

There doesn't seem much point in using skype (you can if you want) when the VOIP works so well. Club internet 41 countries, Free 49 countries all included and unlimited. Quality has been very good for us here.

ErnieY
I am sure you will be able to ditch the FT line rental if you would like to - just check on the ISP websites and enter your phone number to see if it is offered (see the other recent threads)

Danny

[Pierre ZFP]

[quote user="Jane and Danny"]

Ernie
if you want the VOIP via the ISP then you will have to use the modem/router supllied by them.

[/quote]

Why on earth is this so?  The router will be made by Cisco anyway, despite what it might be branded as and the choice of VOIP provider will be a setting on your PC not the router whoever you use, and SKYPE is just another VOIP so why not use that if that is what you are familiar with.

[BJSLIV]

It may well be  possible for an expert user to twiddle some PC / Router settings to make it possible to use the ISPs VOIP, but they don't make it easy, so fir the average punter I think the statement

if you want the VOIP via the ISP then you will have to use the modem/router supplied by them.

Is correct for the majority of average users.

[Danny]

[quote user="Pierre ZFP"][quote user="Jane and Danny"]

Ernie
if you want the VOIP via the ISP then you will have to use the modem/router supllied by them.

[/quote]

Why on earth is this so?  The router will be made by Cisco anyway, despite what it might be branded as and the choice of VOIP provider will be a setting on your PC not the router whoever you use, and SKYPE is just another VOIP so why not use that if that is what you are familiar with.

[/quote]

Skype does not work quite the same as the services offered by the ISPs. With them you plug you phone into the modem and just dial - no problems, computer does not need to be switched on and it is (for the most part) cheaper and just works,well, like a phone. Of course it is still possible to use skype but for most people ...why bother ?

Danny

[AnOther]

It's possible for an ISP to have their router firmware customised so that it can only be used with their service. BT do it with their free router but inevitably there is an underground group which has cracked it so you can DL a fix if you want to use it with other ISP's.

Skype is still useful because I doubt you'd be able to talk to other Skype users via a dedicated VOIP phone.

Also, with Skype, for your friends and contacts to be able to dial out to your phone, they would would need to put money into it.

 I'll definately look into the full VOIP option though.