I’ve been on their waiting list for over a year, and it’s too late for me as I’ve moved house now, but today Be e-mailed me to inform me that they had enabled my local Farnborough exchange for their service. This means Farnborough residents can now get up to 24Mbps downloads and 2.5mbps uploads using Be’s ADSL 2+ modems.
The 2.5mbps upload utilises Annex M of the ADSL 2+ standard and is only available to people who’s whose phone line is less than 2km in length from the exchange. For other users the upload speed is up to 1.3mbps.
I checked and it seems that the Aldershot, Camberley and Farnham exchanges are also now live on Be’s network. If we weren’t about to get a 100mbps fibre connection from NTL I might have considered bonding a few of these together at the office.
Residents of Rushmoor are now fairly privileged in the broadband stakes with multiple offerings available at over 20 Mbps (Virgin Media), and 50mbps on the horizon for 2008.
And the great hidden secret about Be is this:-
1. If you use the sales code ‘SALES1’, you get a free install.
2. If you refer yourself via a click-through from http://www.quidco.com you earn £40 cashback (used to be £55).
3. If you get a existing customer to refer you, you both get a free months service.
I had to pay a £50 “exit fee” to leave Virgin Media’s appalling ADSL service. So, all of the above help sweeten the deal. The fact that they (Be) are a decent ISP (unlike VM), also helped!!