BT Home Hub 6

[Murdoch]

Has anyone got the new BT Home Hub 6 yet? I've read a few reports which seem to suggest that its a real step forward and we have areas of the house where the Wifi is flaky at best"

We used to have the Home Hub 5 but the router kept resetting so I swapped it for a TP Link which has been really "stable"

Thanks

 

[Blue Duck]

I've got a four or a five and it's lettuced, too many BT routers in my area.

I would go netgear also stops the Chinese government spying on me!

 

[Murdoch]

Re too many routers have you looked at the other wifi around you and adjusted your channels?

I used this:

https://www.acrylicwifi.com/en/wlan-software/wlan-scanner-acrylic-wifi-free/

on my laptop as apple products won't run it!

 

[ProDave]

I have just "upgraded" from a HH3 to a HH5 (have an Open Reach engineer staying in our B&B at the moment and he kept telling me how much better it would be)

BB speed is perhaps 10% faster (but still slow).  It remains to see if it crashes any less often than the HH3 used to.

I have yet to own a BB router that does not crash and need resetting at least once a week, so I am not expecting this one to be any different in that respect.
 

 

[Murdoch]

The HH5  was ok with hardwired items but the Wi-Fi was too flaky

 

[ProDave]

I have never had issues with the wifi, but we are out in the sticks with little in the way of neighbours wifi to cause problem.  The issue has always been every router we have had drops it's broadband connection regularly and nothing connects to the internet. We can still then communicate over the wifi between computers even when the BB connection has died.  Only ever solved by powering off and back on again.
 

 

[Blue Duck]

Re too many routers have you looked at the other wifi around you and adjusted your channels?

I used this:

https://www.acrylicwifi.com/en/wlan-software/wlan-scanner-acrylic-wifi-free/

on my laptop as apple products won't run it!

I'm on fibre (copper to the box) and regularly get speeds as low as 2.5mbps as opposed to the 40+ it's supposed to be, so I regularly change the settings and can only assume that other BT users in my area are doing the same.

Generally get around 25+ with a bit of tinkering.

I have no currently running windows products.

 

[phil d]

I,ve worked for both BT and Virgin,when Virgin brought out the 20 meg download speed we were told that it was not actually acheivable at the moment but not to tell the customer!They were in the process of sorting it but wanted the customers "now".

Getting the optimum speed depends on EVERYTHING being in A1 condition,from the house to the node to the exchange,fibre only gives you the best speeds if you have it from the exchange to your door,the bit of copper from the node to your door can drastically affect speeds if it isn't perfect,which in most cases it isn't.

With wifi there are now 2 channels available,called 2G and 5G,running on the 5G can avoid some of the problems associated with too many users being in the area,unfortunately at the moment it seems that it's only mobile phones that can run on the 5G side.I think a lot of problems could be avoided by simple communication,the trouble is most people don't talk to their neighbours these days,on my router there are eleven channels.Now if everyone spoke to each other then you could all agree to operate on a certain channel and stay on it and that would solve the problem for everyone.However if nobody speaks to each other then problems will arise,2 people are o  the same channel and start hopping,they end up on  another channel used by someone else and they too start hopping,and so it continues.If everyone was on a different channel and stayed there then half the problems could be alleviated.

 

[ProDave]

Or if your router just selected a "quiet" channel all by itself.  Nah, that's way too simple.........
 

 

[Murdoch]

I,ve worked for both BT and Virgin,when Virgin brought out the 20 meg download speed we were told that it was not actually acheivable at the moment but not to tell the customer!They were in the process of sorting it but wanted the customers "now".

Getting the optimum speed depends on EVERYTHING being in A1 condition,from the house to the node to the exchange,fibre only gives you the best speeds if you have it from the exchange to your door,the bit of copper from the node to your door can drastically affect speeds if it isn't perfect,which in most cases it isn't.

With wifi there are now 2 channels available,called 2G and 5G,running on the 5G can avoid some of the problems associated with too many users being in the area,unfortunately at the moment it seems that it's only mobile phones that can run on the 5G side.I think a lot of problems could be avoided by simple communication,the trouble is most people don't talk to their neighbours these days,on my router there are eleven channels.Now if everyone spoke to each other then you could all agree to operate on a certain channel and stay on it and that would solve the problem for everyone.However if nobody speaks to each other then problems will arise,2 people are o  the same channel and start hopping,they end up on  another channel used by someone else and they too start hopping,and so it continues.If everyone was on a different channel and stayed there then half the problems could be alleviated.

Not sure I agree with this statement.

most wifi routers can operate at 2.4ghz or 5 ghz, each of these frequencies  have "channels" and some of the channels overlap.

With our HH5 i ended up switching off the 5ghz to improve matters - it didn't work. With the replacement unit it works on both frequencies and our phones and Ipad use the 5ghz if in the house nearest the router - the further away you get, only the 2.4ghz works....

 

[steptoe]

I use 6 of the available channels, doesn't leave much room for my neighbours,,,,,