BT Home Hub 6 (Smart Hub) on PlusNet

[#1]

@davybhoy1983

Today elsewhere there was a staff post that said the staff would be surprised if it happened in the "immediate future" when asked about fast speed FTTP.

[#2]

Is this the downfall of Plusnet. How can I recommend new clients to a great company that cant supply a decent router.

[#3]

I guess it comes down to price.There's no reason why you can't recommend Plusnet and a make of third party router. If any of your recommendees are currently with BT they may already have reasonable hardware.

[#4]

I get decent BB speeds with PN (via John Lewis) where I live in the sticks - upgrading the router for £35 to get dual band, better wifi and better connections was a no brainer for me.

[#5]

This might be helpful to someone else who has a similar experience to mine with trying to set up a bt hh6 router. As has been outlined throughout this thread, the trick is to initially connect to the hh6 via ethernet cable and leave off the broadband cable to avoid any interference from PPP and BT settings, turn off Smart Setup, etc. Did all this and managed to change the username and pw to those required for my Plusnet dsl connection. I then connected the broadband cable and got the blue connected light. Time to break out the celebration drinks. Unfortunately no.

The connection was fast and stable for about 30 minutes. The hh6 is a great router, much improved from the early versions. Then I got the dreaded orange disconnected light and nothing will get it back, despite 2 days of effort. Routers are fiendishly complex devices and there is just no way to explain why it worked for a short time, then died. So on my Plusnet dsl, the hh6 just does not work even if you successfully change user set up name, pw, etc.

Full marks to Plusnet for their help with all this. They were knowledgeable and very fast to test my line and respond to the problem. I will be getting a new router from Plusnet to replace my 6 year old one, which works but is slow. I guess the lesson is that you cannot assume all routers are basically similar. Some are just not compatible with your isp broadband service and there is no way of knowing until you test it. Thing is, you have to know when to give up…

[#6]

This might be helpful to someone else who has a similar experience to mine with trying to set up a bt hh6 router. As has been outlined throughout this thread, the trick is to initially connect to the hh6 via ethernet cable and leave off the broadband cable to avoid any interference from PPP and BT settings, turn off Smart Setup, etc. Did all this and managed to change the username and pw to those required for my Plusnet dsl connection. I then connected the broadband cable and got the blue connected light. Time to break out the celebration drinks. Unfortunately no.

The connection was fast and stable for about 30 minutes. The hh6 is a great router, much improved from the early versions. Then I got the dreaded orange disconnected light and nothing will get it back, despite 2 days of effort. Routers are fiendishly complex devices and there is just no way to explain why it worked for a short time, then died. So on my Plusnet dsl, the hh6 just does not work even if you successfully change user set up name, pw, etc.

Full marks to Plusnet for their help with all this. They were knowledgeable and very fast to test my line and respond to the problem. I will be getting a new router from Plusnet to replace my 6 year old one, which works but is slow. I guess the lesson is that you cannot assume all routers are basically similar. Some are just not compatible with your isp broadband service and there is no way of knowing until you test it. Thing is, you have to know when to give up…

[#7]

It sounds like your were just unfortunate and your BT Smart Hub was about to give up the ghost any way. Be it for use with plusnet or BT.

[#8]

You may be right. Bought the hh6 from ebay as a used item but tested... so the advert said. Who knows if they checked anything at all. Would have been great for £25 but it is now going back. Two days effort down the pan.

[#9]

Electronics does fail. Just because you had one that failed doesn't make it incompatible with a Plusnet account, as many of us can demonstrate every day. 

[#10]

Now moving emails so that I am not tied to Plusnet. This will make a move easier.

[#11]

Just checking - did you try factory reset then click off the default bt reference again.

[#12]

If I had a result like that I wouldn’t have needed to go and buy a router. They didn’t want to know other than sending an engineer out which could be chargeable. It was cheaper to sort it myself with less hassle. Respect all gone.

[#13]

Yes, I did a hard factory reset. Then managed to successfully change and save my dsl username and pw into the router. Very odd that it worked brilliantly for 30 min and then dropped the connection. This happened a few times, so who knows what the real problem was.

At first Plusnet offered to send an engineer which would have cost £65 if the fault was mine. I stopped all that quickly as I was pretty sure the problem was with the router. As you say, usually it is easier to sort it out yourself. I imagine a lot of customers accept the engineer option as they have no idea what to check and how to do it.

Ebay make it easy to return goods under the 14 day Distance Selling Regs. The hh6 goes back on Mon.

[#14]

Yes that does sound like a duff router. That’s the kind offer Plusnet offered me £65 for an engineer. I bought a reconditioned 6 from an ebay seller. I then bought an extender from another ebay seller. So easy to set this up too. I can now listen to my google home at the bottom of my garden. It’s the evening sun and bbq end. I would suggest a new unit when you get your money back. I have had trouble free Netflix and iPlayer ever since I installed the 6. My wife’s computer works quicker and has not dropped out since either.

[#15]

Does anyone know if the BT Home Hub (Hub6) will receive firmware updates when connected to a PlusNet account?  

Given that BT/PlusNet are the same.

Thanks.

[#16]

Based on other users - yes it should still get updates