I have been on Plusnet Business Broadband for a few years, and their customer service and speed of connectivity has been first class.
I was getting 40.0Mbps download and 11.9Mbs upload speeds.
However, they are not the most cost effective option in the ultra-competitive broadband marketplace, and since I am on a cost saving drive, I decided to look around and see what else is available.
The best seemed to be Vodafone, and as a Business Account holder for more than twenty years, I was offered their 63Mbps Superfast 2 bundle for £25 per month.
Order was placed, and I received an email and several text messages to say my service would be swapped over on Friday 12th April
The Router was received on Tuesday 9th April, however I planned on using my own equipment – I have a superb Draytek Vigor 130 Modem and DrayTek Vigor 2952 Dual-WAN Router which have served me very well for the last few years.
I have quite a lot of networked kit in my home (all hardwired with CAT6 via gigabit switches wherever possible):
- Synology RackStation RS815+ NAS (two)
- Texecom Alarms (house and workshop)
- Nest Smoke Alarms (two)
- Ring Video Doorbell Pro
- Philips Hue Lighting
- Insteon Outdoor Lighting
- Honeywell Evohome Central Heating
- Sonos (Soundbar, Sub and Rear speakers in the lounge, six Sonos Connect:Amps with KEF in-ceiling speakers throughout the house and Play:5 in the Workshop)
- Sony TVs (four)
- Sky+ HD
- Sony BluRay player
- NOW TV
- Apple iMac
- Dell Optiplex Desktop PC (two)
- Numerous phones and iPads
- Ricoh Printer/Copier/Scanner
- Siemens Oven
- Network sockets in every room
The main reason for wanting to keep my own Router in place is because a lot of this I can control from my phone and/or iPad which is useful when I am away for external access, I need several Firewall Rules, Port Redirection and Network Address Translation to be in place.
I requested my Username and Password from the Vodafone techs via their Live Chat service ready for the big day.
Your Username is dsl0012xxxxx@broadband.vodafone.co.uk and your password is – oNmxxxxX
Friday the 12th came, and at 12 noon my Plusnet service was switched off.
Within an hour, the line was live again.
I put my Vodafone credentials into the Router, and rebooted it.
Nothing.
I backed up my static IP’s, port redirection and NAT configuration then factory defaulted my Draytek Modem and Router.
I put in my Vodafone credentials and rebooted the Router.
Nothing.
I plugged in the Router that shipped from Vodafone, and powered it up.
It connected up straight away, and I had a reasonable broadband connection – 24.2Mbps download and 6.8Mbps upload.
Back on to the Vodafone techs via their Live Chat service to double check my credentials.
Your Username is dsl0012xxxxx@broadband.vodafone.co.uk and your password is – oNmxxxxX
Same as before, and confirmed in the Transcript they email through when the chat session is terminated.
I reflashed the firmware on both the Draytek Modem and Router using the .RST images – this updates them firmware, and clears all settings.
I put in my Vodafone credentials and rebooted the Router.
Nothing.
Friday night came and went, and in the early hours of Saturday morning I was at the stage of trying several settings manually – VCP, VCI, VLAN Tag Insertion Value and Priority, Multi-PVC Channel, Encapsulation Type, Protocol, Modulation, MTU – all of which required a router reboot or reset each time.
Nothing.
Third time lucky I think and on Saturday morning it’s back on to the Vodafone techs via their Live Chat service to triple check my credentials.
Your Username is dsl0012xxxxx@broadband.vodafone.co.uk and your password is – oNmxxxxX
Same as before, and confirmed for the third time in the Transcript they email through when the chat session is terminated.
Nothing.
So on Saturday evening, after falling through the ceiling (all my home network kit is in a little rack in the loft, I was in a rush, and there are no boards or lights up there) I started to resign myself to the fact that I would be stuck using the Vodafone supplied router.
I create a profile on the Draytek router to accept the WAN input connection as Ethernet, and started thinking about how I was going to double NAT the equipment that needed to be externally accessible.
Internet access seemed slow, I think partly because everything was now going through extra hops.
I shelved my configuration efforts for the day to regroup and to clear all the alerts on my phone telling me that my various services were unavailable.
Fresh headed, wide-eyed and with a bruised backside, lower back and arms from falling in the loft I set out on the Sunday morning to get this fixed.
I had decided that double NATing was not an option, and that if I couldn’t get my Draytek hardware working properly, I’d exercise my right to cancel with Vodafone and go back to Plusnet on bended knee, cap in hand, seeking forgiveness.
I did some searching on the web, and found some interesting articles on the Think Broadband forum.
There was a Vodafone section, and I dutifully checked my settings against some of the threads.
Then I found it – an item titled Business customers: own modem with PPPoE useful info/rant posted by ubernick
He described an experience with the Vodafone tech Live Chat team that I immediately recognised.
He then proceeded to point out that Business Broadband subscribers get a different username than the Consumer side of the business.
I should try username@businessbroadband.vodafone.co.uk
Note this is different to the uername@broadband.vodafone.co.uk I had been told from the Live Chat sessions on three previous occasions.
So I tried it – and guess what.
It worked!
Based on the successful connection attempt, I proceeded to restore my previous configuration from the backups I had made prior to this debacle. This contained all my rules, port redirection, DHCP settings (including reservations) etc…
Then I entered my correct credentials dsl0012xxxxx@businessbroadband.vodafone.co.uk and my password – oNmxxxxX
The service connected straight away.
So my thanks go to ubernick and the information contained in this article Business customers: own modem with PPPoE useful info/rant
And my takeaway from this Google is my friend.
