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Anyone on Giganet?

Your call on the other router. It does address your port issues, and I think it's only the 6E (probably of no use now) you'd 'miss out' on.
No standard ISP router is super flexible - dedicated unit from that. I liked what zen provided - the fritz 7530 due to stability. I can't comment on the tecnicolour
If you're aligned with eero's approach, then maybe it will have better support/deliver fixes quickly but so hard to tell.
I was intrigued in improving wireless so did go down that route.
 
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Hmm, you know anyone who sells FTTP who doesnt use PPPOE?

--fixed typo sorry
Openreach FTTP? Then what @-Iain- said, TalkTalk. I think Sky could fall into this category too. not entirely sure how their FTTP product looks.

What's the motivation for avoiding PPPoE?
 
@WKDRED
1. Not many UK ISPs offer DHCP instead of PPPoE. However if it's mtu you are concerned for, I know many openreach ISPs support baby jumbo frames, so you can still achieve 1500 MTU (with 8 extra bytes on top then for the ppp header). This is RFC6438, and it works with giganet alongside a Fritzbox I tried (where it has to be explicitly enabled). It does not work with the eero.
2. You can get a reduction on the install fee if you opt not to use their router. I think it's 25 or 30
3. There's a referral scheme (I am a customer so can happily offer a referral if you wish) whereby each party gets 25 back
4. The eero is 'interesting'. Let me come onto that in another post!
5. I don't see why you need a static ip to forward ports as such. The issue is how you refer to them. The ip address may change. You can use DDNS to mitigate this, though it's not something the eero supports. Other routers often do. You could run a client on another machine you have locally like a raspberry pi. Note that for IPv6 (which giganet supports) you may not even need port forwarding, though the naming issue may remain. I haven't asked how stable the IP prefixes seem to be, though they look stable. Nor have I looked into dns for my local ipv6 systems.
6. I share your confusion over contract. I would take a screenshot of the page sayin no exit fee just in case - it looks to me as if there's no contract but I've not tested this. A big reason I went with them is that cityfibre may be here any moment. We got BT fttp in Jan. Cityfibre. Who knows. April 2023? Sep? Jan 24? Never. Really can't tell. So I wanted flexibility, but also get a decent service now

My experience generally
- the network service has worked without any problems
- the eero had a few issues - see below
- call times to customer service seem to be getting worse. Hard to know if this is a blip
- when I did get sensible replies from level 2, they seemed helpful and eager to get things sorted -- but were clearly overloaded.

eero next
Was using baby jumbo frames for it when on VDSL was still a little problematic, I had to add exemptions for certain destinations which would stall for infinity using the virtual 1500 MTU. It also uses much more processing power so ideally I will avoid it if I can.

The UK relies on PPPoE much more than the rest of the world, I think because of our unusual wholesale arrangements (PPPoE makes reselling much easier).
 
Just thought I'd mention, but you clearly know :-)
I wonder if the stalls were more local, one end of the home-dslam link, after all the point of RFC6438 is just to get around the pppoe wrapper and allow 'normal' 1500 mtu. I used it for about a month on giganet and didn't notice issues - but back to eero now, in part for physical simplicity and lower power drain (evaluating....)
Completely understand the cpu concern if using a non-isp/mainstream router
 
I'm considering to switch from Cuckoo (£40/m for 115Mb) to Giganet (£32 for same speed). Openreach is the only FTTP available in my area.
Not sure why Giganet wants to still charge me £55 for the installation when I already have a recently installed ONT working here.
Interesting, especially because Giganet bought Cuckoo six months ago.

Also their FAQ states that to do port forwarding on the eero you need an add on for fixed IP for £3/m. Wtf? Is this an eero thing? What am I missing? Since when do you need a fixed ip to forward ports? I'm currently doing it today with dyn IP.
Huh, I wonder if it's just badly worded. As you know, a static IP makes things simpler, but isn't necessary.

Also confused that they advertise 12month contract but no exit fee. So if you're not tied, why is it a 12m contact?
Well, that's the cool thing. What Giganet do is commendable. You have certainty they won't cheekily increase the pricing mid contract. (I think that should be normal, but isn't). And then they go beyond, making it lop-sided in your favour: you can leave at any time.
 
Huh, I wonder if it's just badly worded. As you know, a static IP makes things simpler, but isn't necessary.
Here it is: https://www.giganet.uk/faq/does-the-eero-support-port-forwarding/

Well, that's the cool thing. What Giganet do is commendable. You have certainty they won't cheekily increase the pricing mid contract. (I think that should be normal, but isn't). And then they go beyond, making it lop-sided in your favour: you can leave at any time.
Yeah, I understand and not complaining. Just can't understand what's the diff between that 12m contract, and Cuckoo saying 1 month rolling. Giganet is also 1 month rolling in practice, isn't it? It's just the wording is confusing and feels like they are hiding some shady clause and you won't be able to leave as easily.

Interesting, especially because Giganet bought Cuckoo six months ago.
Yeah, I was informed. Also asked Cuckoo because their tariff is currently not competitive in price, but they said they couldn't do anything, which is weird.
 
Just can't understand what's the diff between that 12m contract, and Cuckoo saying 1 month rolling. Giganet is also 1 month rolling in practice, isn't it?
The difference is that with 1m rolling you are not protected from price hikes. 12m gives you confidence of no price increase for the duration of the contract - *unless* stated otherwise in the contract (e.g. mobile providers quite often put a price increase clause in their contracts)
 
Ok. On the eero. I just have one. I'm using an additional AP purely for some outside stuff, but it's a separate ssid. Maybe in future..
- 6E is of zero use if you don't have any devices supporting it (6 Ghz) - I don't. It may be of future use of course. Or with multiple eeros wireless connected it may offer better interconnect.
- compared to my fritz 7530 (wifi 5), the wifi speeds are noticeably better everywhere. probably +30% minimum. Whilst before I had 3 7530s in a single ssid mesh, now the eero alone is good enough for my 3 floor town house.
- The eero offers little insight to the user in what it's doing. No user accessible logs, no way t debug and little control. DNS filtering is a paid for extra (I don't use this, I use controld instead). It seems generally reliable
- conversely, the ISP and eero support can access a lot more information. I'm not certain exactly what, but I suspect configured devices at a minimum. This may be a privacy concern.
- I had issues with the eero and IPv6 . The prefix was not reliably allocated. This didn't affect my other router, so the giganet service is fine. ISP was helpful and reported it and should be fixed soon.
- I've not measured power drain, but it gets noticeably warmer than my prior router, so probably draws more power. However this is offset by needing less devices
- I've not tried their mesh, but expect they do this rather well. Buying extra units is quite expensive, though you could mix with other models, or rent an extra one from giganet if you wish.

Happy to answer any other questions
Could you share some screenshots or video about the kind of admin panel the eero has? I'm worried I won't be able to manage basic stuff like port forwarding etc. Actually Giganet's GAQ says you need to pay an extra for that. Could you confirm?
If not, I think I'm choosing the Technicolor with Wifi 6, but having an admin panel is far more important to me.
 
Yep for FreeBSD's servers, ironically I just posted about it on kitz as someone on there is having issues with bonding with FreeBSD download servers as well.

I also had to add it for one single server I manage for myself, I was able to mitigate the problem (instead of infinite stall, it recovered after few seconds) by adjusting the orphan timeout tunable, but only way to get it working normally was setting my MSS to 1452.

Firewall is pfsense which configures the MSS using scrub, so I had added a custom hostname alias for exempted hostnames such as ftp.freebsd.org and distfiles.freebsd.org and then patched the firewall script to add extra scrub 1452 MSS lines for the alias.

For everywhere else on the internet it seemed fine though.
 
The reason why you cannot do port forwarding with Giganet is because they use GCNAT (share one IP for multiple customers, which can cause IP bans for some services due to bad usage). It was mentioned in the thread before, but I just didn't know what it was until now. This is a complete deal breaker for me.

They also told me atm they are not giving out fixed IPs anymore. They expect to be able to offer them around April again, and on WhatsApp they said £1/month, which doesn't match the £3 they say on the website, but I won't complain.

I will check back with them in April, and will switch only if they can ensure a fixed IP, as I really need public IP for local server access.
 
The reason why you cannot do port forwarding with Giganet is because they use GCNAT (share one IP for multiple customers, which can cause IP bans for some services due to bad usage).
Right! Of course. Dang.

They also told me atm they are not giving out fixed IPs anymore. They expect to be able to offer them around April again, and on WhatsApp they said £1/month, which doesn't match the £3 they say on the website, but I won't complain.
Hmm. Their website said £1 only a few months ago. Hopefully it remains cheap, if the alternative is CG-NAT.
 
When I signed up fixed IPV4 was £1 a month on the pricelist. The IPV6 is fixed as standard, so you only need fixed IPV4 for non IPV6 items.
 
I seem to have an ipv4 allocated in the portal. I didn’t pay extra so not sure if it’s just reporting a shorter term lease, though never changed. Don’t seem to have cgnat, though I am on an openreach service

I will test port forwarding, not something I really need
 
I seem to have an ipv4 allocated in the portal. I didn’t pay extra so not sure if it’s just reporting a shorter term lease, though never changed. Don’t seem to have cgnat, though I am on an openreach service

I will test port forwarding, not something I really need
🤫 , don't want to lose my freebie, had to close my Draytek 443 port they leave open for VPN or someone could access the login page from outside the LAN.

 
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Wish I'd read this thread earlier.

Similar to AstroZombie, I've not even had my service connected but the communication experience appears to have dropped from the experience shared by those earlier in the thread.

Both advisors I've spoken to, have taken approximately 30 minutes on hold although it doesn't advise you where you sit in a queue or any form of estimated wait timeframe.

Nevertheless, I advised the customer service agent I'd not had any form of confirmation for the installation appointment (their FAQ states you should hear something within 48 hours?) - yet it let me select Monday, 27th March when I submitted the order about a week ago. I was somewhat shocked to find out they'd arranged an Openreach engineer for 11th April. Despite, never informing me (which is almost a month from the original order).

I then advised them it was a new build property, the ONT/NTU was already live and had been at the time I'd ordered the circuit, as the Openreach Engineer suggested there would be no need for an engineer visit, as he'd already activated the circuit and connected it to the exchange (PON on the ONT is solid/stable). I advised the call handler, who I imagine 'shrugged' their shoulders and had little understanding of what I was talking about. He just advised that the service will be made live on the 11th April.

Haven't even been able to get the service live yet and their customer service is somewhat lacking. I've even been on the likes of BT/Zen etc which all advise they can see an ONT live at my property and can make a service live without an engineer appointment.
 
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