Alternative to Excom

[TerryC]

Hello

I would appreciate some advice please.

My ISP is Excom who specialise in campo internet. I use it in the evenings to watch UK TV via Filmon and since Filmon ceased to allow downloads I'm dependant on a good internet service to watch TV.

When Filmon ceased to do downloads I upgraded Excom to 5Mbs to ensure I could watch TV with no problems.

However the service is very hit and miss, every evening this week the programmes have stopped and I have to wait for it to stop buffering, on average an hour's programme takes 90 odd minutes to watch which is very frustrating. All I want is to sit down and enjoy an evenings entertainment,

I have spoken to Excom many times about this and keep getting promises that they will upgrade the service, it seems to work for a couple of days then the same old slow service happens.

I live close to Villanueva de la Concepcion. I just want to relax and enjoy the TV (at a reasonable cost)

Any help would be appreciated, but without too much technical speak please.

TerryC

[El Cid]

First, you need to check your internet connection speed, both during the day and in the evening and tell us what you are getting.

Try www.speedtest.net

Sid

[TerryC]

Hello Sid

Thanks for getting back to me.

During the day I usually get bewtween 5.25 and 3.5Mbs but from 6.oo pm it drops down to 0.56, 0.95 1.25.

I've spoken to Excom again this morning and once again they have promised to fix the problem and say they will phone me tomorrow to see how this evenings TV went. But in the past they appear to have fixed the problem and I get a couple of good days and then it slows again.

TerryC

[TerryC]

Hello again

I appreciate that in the evening more people are probably online, I believe most of my Spanish neigbours also use Excom, as a result I know the service will slow down. But paying for 5Mbs I expect to be able to watch the TV without any buffering.

TerryC

[Enrique]

Hi TerryC,
Also use .......... tracert (Windows system) from the cmd box to 8.8.8.8 or http://www.google.co.uk
and compare the difference between day time and evening...........

The first IP will be your box on the roof and the next the antenna out in the campo then you will enter the ISP network , probably will start with 10.
You can then see it leave the ISP and go out the the wider web. I suspect you will find the evening times will be slower than daytime ones .

What you're looking for is the speed through the ISP network............ it should be in the region of 20 - 30 ms and not too many hops. I have four (4) through my ISP.

[TerryC]

Hiya

Thanks for the replies but getting back to my original question does anybody know of a reliable ISP that serves the campo?

TerryC

[gerryh]

The only ISP that covers all of Spain, pueblo, campo or wherever, is via satellite such as Tooway.
Not cheap and has a monthly download/ upload limit but it will work anywhere in Spain.
But, beware, Tooway does port high jacking so you can't use a smart DNS service to access UK TV.
If you are mainly interested in TV viewing Intelsat 907 works anywhere in Spain.
I have internet access via Vodafone 4G BUT I can get a very good signal where I live.

Cheers
Gerry
Ex Tooway user now Intelsat 907 for TV viewing

[Portugeezer]

My ISP is Excom who specialise in campo internet. I use it in the evenings to watch UK TV via Filmon and since Filmon ceased to allow downloads I'm dependant on a good internet service to watch TV.

Any help would be appreciated, but without too much technical speak please.

TerryC

My download speed in the wilds of Portugal is pants so I had to find a way of downloading from Filmon to stop the missus making my ears bleed with her moaning after Filmon stopped the ability to download. I discovered it is possible to download from Filmon by adding the Flash Video Downloader extension to Google Chrome. Start the recorded video playing hit the FVD button and away you go.

If you prefer using Firefox you can do the same with the FVD Firefox add-on, or the Video Download Helper add-on.

In Firefox you can rename the file at the start of the download, with Chrome you have to rename the file after it's finished downloading.

(I found this forum last year when trying to solve an IT problem I had, I've been lurking ever since and learnt loads. Thank you to everyone)

[TerryC]

Hello Portugeezer

Thanks for the info. I've added FVD as an add on to Firefox, started a video, clicked the FVD button but it states, no video available????????

Any ideas?

I've also looked at Europa's internet offers this morning, it looks pretty good and cheaper than Excom. Does anybody use Europa for their internet service and if so what is their experience of it?

Regards - TerryC

[Portugeezer]

Early on I had a couple of failures with FVD for Firefox not finding the video, a friend suggested it was because I hadn't waited for the video to start playing. I'm impatient so just went over to using Video Download Helper with Firefox and FVD with Chrome and haven't had any problems with either of them.
I seem to remember having to go into the settings menu on one of the extensions to ensure all the possible video formats were set (MP4, FLV, etc) but I can't remember which of the extensions it was.
The Missus is currently watching her Corrie omnibus, downloaded this morning with Chrome & FVD.