Connection Stability

[#1]

Hi guys,
I'm considering applying to join the FTTC trial.  My gf works from home semi-regularly and so I am looking for your experiences of the FTTC connection stability.
I know that the FTTC service is a trial and that nothing's guaranteed.  However, having read through many of the threads here, most people's "terrible download speed" is still better than our current ADSL service.  What I'm looking for is frequency, duration of and customer service response to completely service outages.  Is it a common thing, does it last long?
Again, I know that anything can happen but I'm looking for the record to date.
Cheers
Banjo

[#2]

To date i have had very little trouble. My connetion speed is cosistently above 25 meg down and 5 up. The response time to questions is ok but not fantastic as everything is done through this forum, but that is part of the deal as it is a trial afterall. I have tried a few different routers and would strongly recommend the buffalo WHRG300N in my opinion it is worth every penny of the £20 from ebuyer it hasnt put a foot wrong i dont even feel as if i am on a trial... i am very 

[#3]

I've been on the trial since the end of August and not had a single problem, the only issue was with the supplied router which was restricting download speed to 11MEG, changed that for a Netgear and its all good now

[#4]

We've been on FTTC since the 6th of September and as far as I know its not failed once.
My wife works from home a reasonable amount, and comments that since FTTC the connection is not just noticeably faster but that it seems more reliable.
With ADSL we found that the connection would drop sometimes - our router was excellent at reconnecting, but there was a reconnection/retrain wait for a minute or so.
VPN under FTTC works a treat - Cisco's VPN client under Windows 7 has been rock-solid and again the comments I hear are that its almost like being on her network at work.
The only thing to be aware of (and this isn't related to FTTC) is making sure that if the VPN is into an LAN network the other end, that the local IP's don't clash.
There are a lot of 192.168.0 and 192.168.1 networks out there - if VPN is important, consider choosing an IP range for your local network that isn't common. We use 192.168.45.* - so far no clashes or problems with work (for either of us) or any of my clients I need to VPN into.
Regards,
Ashley

[#5]

Hi,
So far we've had a pretty good experience with faults. The most common time to have a fault is on activation and because you have an engineer present on activation the amount of faults are lower. We have though seen some faults that have still happened on install and some that happen in life. So far we've found that the faults are taking longer to resolve, mainly because everything is new and there are a lot more processes to go through.
From a support point of view then for everyday general questions about the trial then the forums are the first point of call (for account related queries, e.g. billing, then the normal support routes should be used). For faults and other issues then the support team are also the first point of call but not everyone has had full training on FTTC yet or may not have even spoken to a customer on the trial so the first line guys will just log the fault for you and pass it on to our faults team to handle.
Major faults (e.g. where you can't connect) aren't common but do happen and we have had some ongoing for several weeks. We have got a large number of orders completing this month and all looking OK so far but I'm not counting chickens just yet.