VirginMedia - your experiences

cdd · Tue 18 Mar, 2008 01.55

I am currently hating Virgin Media, their connection is presently extremely unstable and drops out very frequently. Loathesome ISP.

And download speeds? Try 22.7kb/s.

Sput · Tue 18 Mar, 2008 07.58

Gavin Scott wrote:
I've made about three calls from that line since demanding they change the number after allocating me one from a well publicised volunteer service in Edinburgh which had moved location. The number was listed on various websites I discovered.

On the upside, you got LOADS of handiwork done for free.

Stuart* · Tue 18 Mar, 2008 16.47

When I first moved to Plymouth the number BT gave me was 606666. While that was creepy enough having all those 6s in it, I soon discovered that it was very similar to the main City Centre taxi company's 606060. I was often woken at 2am at weekends by some drunken idiot who had mis-dialled. The amusement of telling them their taxi would be with them in 20 minutes wore off after a while and I had the number changed.

Nick Harvey · Tue 18 Mar, 2008 17.48

Yes, know the problem!

nwtv2003 · Tue 18 Mar, 2008 22.22

In our house we have to Virgin Media STB's, one NTL the other Cable & Wireless, thats how old they are. Anyway the folks decided to cancel Sky Sports and Sky Movies, I wasn't too fussed about the latter but they did so anyway. Eventually after a month both disappeared from my CWC STB, whilst the NTL STB still has both services on. But they haven't told Virgin about it mind.

Although a friend of a friend has a Eurovox STB, and that picks up all the VM Channels, although they're not in the same order in the EPG, it's rather similar to the 'bridged' analogue cable system.

Sput · Tue 18 Mar, 2008 22.24

Speaking of C&W, I'm about to move flat and VM claim the new place isn't serviced, yet there's a C&W coaxial hookup in the lounge. Anyone know if that necessarily means it's serviced, or whether it's some decayed relic from an old network branch that's long dead?

I should point out I'm only interested in moving the service with me because I'm still in contract. I wouldn't DREAM of continuing past 12 months.

nwtv2003 · Tue 18 Mar, 2008 23.18

Sput wrote:Speaking of C&W, I'm about to move flat and VM claim the new place isn't serviced, yet there's a C&W coaxial hookup in the lounge. Anyone know if that necessarily means it's serviced, or whether it's some decayed relic from an old network branch that's long dead?

I would have thought you'd be able to get VM, considering that I've never known any form of Cable TV Cable ever being removed from a whole area and the fact that you're in Manchester which is well covered by VM, ex-NTL, ex-CWC and ex-Nynex for that matter.

Chris · Wed 19 Mar, 2008 01.04

nwtv2003 wrote:
Sput wrote:Speaking of C&W, I'm about to move flat and VM claim the new place isn't serviced, yet there's a C&W coaxial hookup in the lounge. Anyone know if that necessarily means it's serviced, or whether it's some decayed relic from an old network branch that's long dead?
I would have thought you'd be able to get VM, considering that I've never known any form of Cable TV Cable ever being removed from a whole area and the fact that you're in Manchester which is well covered by VM, ex-NTL, ex-CWC and ex-Nynex for that matter.

It could be that it's a relic from the analogue era. Don't know if this has any truth to it, but i have heard/read that some areas still are analogue only and haven't been upgraded to all singing-all dancing digital, and that they aren't doing any new signups for the analogue service.

Re. thread topic, I've not been with with Virgin Media (cough, ntl - despite all the fancy new branding, they're still the same shit company) for years and am glad for leaving them.

Even though we left in 2003, we still junkmail-come-begging letters from ntl asking us to come back, and it bangs on about how they have invested £5,000,000 in their infrastructure/services etc. They couldn't bill us properly and took odd amounts from my mother's card each month. The service was pretty mediocre, download speeds were not too bad but they used (still use?) those web-caches which most of the time didn't work!

Stuart* · Wed 19 Mar, 2008 15.18

Sput wrote:Speaking of C&W, I'm about to move flat and VM claim the new place isn't serviced, yet there's a C&W coaxial hookup in the lounge. Anyone know if that necessarily means it's serviced, or whether it's some decayed relic from an old network branch that's long dead?

It may depend on how old the building is. If it's 10-15 years old it could be that the internal cabling was completed during construction (as it's obviously easier to do at that stage). Perhaps none of the original tenants applied for C&W's service, so it was never hooked up to the external network or activated. VM may therefore not be aware of it.

Even if VM ultimately discover they do have a viable connection to your flat, they may charge you an activation fee which is more than you would have to pay to cancel your current contract early. Does the landlord not know whether the cable was ever active?

Sput · Wed 19 Mar, 2008 15.21

The landlord doesn't even know how much the RENT is

I'll see what VM say when I harangue them.

Gavin Scott · Wed 19 Mar, 2008 15.56

StuartPlymouth wrote:It may depend on how old the building is. If it's 10-15 years old it could be that the internal cabling was completed during construction (as it's obviously easier to do at that stage). Perhaps none of the original tenants applied for C&W's service, so it was never hooked up to the external network or activated. VM may therefore not be aware of it.

C&W would not have installed a coax outlet in a new-build if they hadn't connected it. The wall plate termination is the last part of connection, not the first.

Its not the same thing as builders running unterminated CAT5 into new homes.