We're Back! Better, Faster, Cheaper
New broadband installation is complete but was not without some pain. That's not really surprising as domestic providers aren't really geared up for supplying businesses. The line was swapped over by about 10am and I promptly got a text message to inform me that I could connect my new "Be Box" ADSL router. The supplied CD-ROM failed to install on my Vista x64 PC ("Not designed to run on your operating system"). I suspect they haven't heard about 64-bit processors yet. Never mind, I hate those CDs anyway. They usually do more harm than good and I certainly wouldn't let it anywhere near my server.
The "Be Box" is actually a Thomson Wireless Multi-user ADSL2+ Gateway. It seems to be quite a capable box. If you backup the configuration (an INI file) and edit it in notepad, it has loads of settings, akin to what you'd expect to find in a Cisco router rather than a domestic Internet gateway. I couldn't get it to put my server in "DMZ" mode. I called tech support. The good news is that the call centre is not in India. Bad news is that it is in Bulgaria! That said, apart from the thick eastern European accent, the lady I spoke to knew exactly what I was asking her. "Oh, you need to put it into bridge mode to do that". They gave me a configuration file to upload to the router, and it promptly went into bridge mode, transferring all traffic directly to my ISA server, which assumed my new public static IP address.
Downloads are certainly faster, As a test I downloaded SQL Server 2008 RC0 X64, a 1058Mb download. IE struggled to beat 10Mbps throughput but as soon as I gave it to my download manager, the download was sliced and diced into 12 parallel streams and the throughput shot up to about 2412Kbps and stayed there. The whole download was done in just about 10 minutes, less time than it took me to write this blog entry. 24Mbps as promised. My VoIP service is a lot better too, completely jitter free so far, mainly due to the better upstream speed.
Oh, and the bill. A pleasant surprise. They gave me free installation. No charge for the modem/router, no charge for installation. Because I've joined the service in the middle of a billing cycle, they pro-rated to fee. Total cost to dump Demon 8Mbps and upgrade to Be Broadband 24Mbps? £9.99. I was expecting to shell out close to £50 for the upgrade. That's a big thumbs-up from me for Be Broadband.