BT vision vs virgin

[dombanks]

has anyone had both? virgin have decided to put their prices up again and now i find myself in the position of paying nearly 80 quid for the services.

 

ive been a long standing advocate of virgin, ive been a customer since they were telewest, but this is too much for me now. I wouldnt mind paying the cash if i got excellent service all the time but it just seems like its going down the pan. the phone is bad, poor quality, and costs so much we never use it. its just there so her indoors' mum can call from oz. to call to her mum we use a phone card as its much much cheaper and better phone lines. the tivo is w**k just plain w**k. its slow clunky and mediocre at best. we often find its quicker and better to plug the laptop in and use netflix/iplayer etc that way. to the point that we wanted to watch masterchef on catchup and it wasnt there, but it was on the iplayer via the laptop. how does that work then virgin.

i do like the pause rewind record functions but most do that and the bradband is super quick most of the time.

 

its just a cost thing, we dont watch half the channels and the ones i do watch there is only one regular channel (comedy central) that isnt on BT and im not sure i will miss it too much as its gone a bit pants these days. the BT package also offers more sport which is something i dont get with the virgin.

 

i'd like to know how the bt one stacks up regarding the tivo features and use etc? i live right by an exchange and according to the site i can get infinity at 70mb.

 

im really unhappy with the virgin at the mo and i don't think its worth it.

[robsurplice]

I got free sat 6yrs ago 

[Captain Colonial]

I'm surprised you're having that sort of poor connection with everything on fibre optic cable.  I'm with Virgin getting 60Mb download speed and a TiVo box that rarely lets me down.  I'd suggest calling Virgin, telling them how unhappy you are and why, and requesting tests are run on your line.  I know they replaced broadband amplifiers in the box near me last week because there are some slowness issues about.  If you don't tell them, they won't know it's broken and can't fix it.  Also, do you have the old Virgin modem or the newer hub?  If the former, you can get a free update to the newer hub which supports higher download speeds.

 

With regards to BT, it will very much depend on how far you are from your nearest exchange - you must call BT in advance and ask what broadband download speeds you can expect.

[peterg]

I'm surprised you're having that sort of poor connection with everything on fibre optic cable.  I'm with Virgin getting 60Mb download speed and a TiVo box that rarely lets me down.  I'd suggest calling Virgin, telling them how unhappy you are and why, and requesting tests are run on your line.  I know they replaced broadband amplifiers in the box near me last week because there are some slowness issues about.  If you don't tell them, they won't know it's broken and can't fix it.  Also, do you have the old Virgin modem or the newer hub?  If the former, you can get a free update to the newer hub which supports higher download speeds.

 

With regards to BT, it will very much depend on how far you are from your nearest exchange - you must call BT in advance and ask what broadband download speeds you can expect.

 

I'm with Scott on this, I recently upgraded my Virgin TV service to XL+ so I can get MotoGP/2/3 on BT Sport next year and I still 'only' pay £69/month but phone calls and broadband and the TiVo box all perform perfectly

 

btw: Masterchef might not have been available on Virgin catchup because the BBC only release it to service providers at a later date to encourage people to use BBC iPlayer 'allegedly'

[Andy Banks]

No experience of either but we have copper (sadly no fibre here yet) and Sky for everything (phone line, free calls, unlimited bband, no sports or movies, HD, 3D all the catch up services) at £60 a month. it's not the fastest but it all depends where you are in relation to the exchange, especially on copper.

 

As HonMemSec says, over fibre you should be getting first class service quality and speed especially with the latest kit.

[Captain Colonial]

Just to add that the reason Virgin have upped their charges (which they seem to do once a year) is to support the roll out of the increase from 60 Mbps to 120 Mbps download speed mid-2014 for the same fee.  You do need to go on to the Virgin media site and pre-register for it to make sure you're in the front of the queue, but that's it.

 

BBC iPlayer is on Virgin TiVo - it's in the Apps section.

[dombanks]

the internet is great please don't get me wrong, its pretty much always fast. im on a 60mb bradband (tvXL and phone M) and most speed tests hit 55+. but the tivo... my god its woeful. freezing, unresponsive, the control is designed by a child. it took 5 mins to get into netflix. the tv guide will often scroll so far freeze and then exit so you have to start again, they have disconnected my email again from the main account.

 

Ive complained in the past and it works fine for a week or so then drops back. an engineer did say one of the times that they can do something to force a persons speed to get better but its only a temp measure to test stuff and he thought thats what they had done for me (dont know how true this is).

 

the phone is next to useless for us. we dont use it but it came with the package and we need one for incoming calls from Oz. i would consider dropping the phone and just having the broad band and tv but it doesnt make it much cheaper.

 

im 500m from the exchange and its a massive building so i guess its a decent size not a local thing, like i said im just looking about and want to know how the TV compares and if the BT thing has the same functionality as the tivo.

[Captain Colonial]

Something definitely wrong with your TiVo box if that's the case - I'd demand a replacement unit.

[peterg]

im 500m from the exchange and its a massive building so i guess its a decent size not a local thing, like i said im just looking about and want to know how the TV compares and if the BT thing has the same functionality as the tivo.

 

I did briefly look at swapping to BT as there were rumours that Virgin hadn't been able to do a deal to get the BT Sport channels on their service, AFAIK the BT version of 'TiVo' only seems to let you look back over the last 7 days whereas I have films from over a year ago that I save on the TiVo as and when they come out on TV as I enjoyed them so much and/or when sequels come up I could watch all two or three together -  like The Transporter1/2/3 for example  

[SootySport]

If you only need to watch terrestrial TV and Catch Up why not just buy a You View PVR and have the normal Freeview channels, then add to that a supplier for your broadband and phone.

 

If you must have the football and Moto go to BT TV and have one of their all in one packages, you then get the You View box included. Can't comment on the pricing as I get it all free, (BT Employee).

 

Third scenario is stay with Virgin and re negotiate the monthly cost,  they do that like Sky, to keep your business.

[peterg]

Here you go, BT Youview box details (looks very similar to a TiVo box in functionality)  http://www.productsandservices.bt.com/products/tv/youview-box

[stu999]

Just tell them that you are leaving and signing up to Sky. That is very often enough for them to re-negotiate a monthly price, especially for a faithful customer like yourself.

[jak]

Yep, I renegotiate with them, once out of contract.

No problems with tv phone or broadband for me. Tried Sky - won't make that mistake, although never used BT vision.

John

[steve_m]

I swapped from Virgin to BT Infinity because I was getting a lot of freezing on iPlayer, 4OD etc.  I was on Virgins 30 meg service and after several complaints they gave me 40 or 50 meg but it didn't resolve the issue.  I suspect there are congestion points in their network, especially as everybody is now watching on demand TV, and they're not adding capacity as swiftly as they ought to.  

 

BT has been perfect which makes a change !  I get 73meg down and 16meg up, very low latency and consistently high bandwidth even at peak times.  

[dombanks]

I swapped from Virgin to BT Infinity because I was getting a lot of freezing on iPlayer, 4OD etc.  I was on Virgins 30 meg service and after several complaints they gave me 40 or 50 meg but it didn't resolve the issue.  I suspect there are congestion points in their network, especially as everybody is now watching on demand TV, and they're not adding capacity as swiftly as they ought to.  

 

BT has been perfect which makes a change !  I get 73meg down and 16meg up, very low latency and consistently high bandwidth even at peak times.  

how does the functionality of the bt vision box compare to the tivo? ive read all the stuff and they all basically say they do the same thing but as a user how do you find it.

 

i have been a big fan of the virgin service for a while but at the moment i dont think im getting £70 odd quids worth out of it and i cant really cut it down to make it cheaper.