I could be a BigPond fan…
28 Nov 2004This is just so amazingly fast! I just grabbed a 330-odd MB CD image in around ten minutes. I know you can get all kinds of theoretical numbers, but that works out to a through-put of about 4000kbps. Yeouch.
I’ve just looked at their website for cable plans… their Unlimited* 10GB shaped plan looks excellent for my usage! Not only would there be sufficiently insane speed, but it also seems as though the capping/shaping is rather soft — not that this really impacts me, seeing I normally managed perhaps 6GB a month with iiNet! Having said that, uploads would be counted with BigPond, which is a little sucky, but bearable (especially seeing people report being able to download 30GB+ sans capping).
The only other thing that’d be lame about Telstra, AFAIK, is the blocking of port 25 (not a huuuge problem, but I’ve got used to running a local sendmail daemon to deal with outbound stuff) and possibly support, if contact with them is ever required. The service quality here since Thursday has been perfect, but Tori (also a BigPond Cable user) has constant dropouts — uncertain if that’s her wireless or the actual ‘net link, though.
I looked around for details about port 80 being blocked, but it seems that’s something which I just imagined… fortunately, it doesn’t seem to be the case! Which, so I think, is a good thing. Well, certainly a useful collaborative thing, as it’s easier to seek feedback whilst editing a site live locally, rather than waiting the hundredth of a second for it to upload elsewhere (yes, I’m being perfectly serious; I would choose an ISP based on that).
Anyone have any horror stories with BigPond that they wish to share? Preferably someone who has actually USED BigPond before in their life, as everyone seems to be very opinionated, simply because it’s Telstra. Oh, and telling me they don’t peer with PIPE Networks doesn’t count, because I’d already stopped using PIPE content in an attempt to make some kind of dent in my iiNet download quota. Needless to say, I failed.