Airtel broadband experience?

[rajil.s]

Hello,

I have currently a broadband connection from BSNL. Unfortunately, the service has been very poor with frequent disconnections. I am sick of chasing BSNL and was wondering if it is a good time to move to Airtel.

I had a few questions about Airtel broadband. If anybody has experience of Airtel please let me know.

1. Do Airtel and BSNL share the same exchange/DSLAM or do Airtel run a separate line to the house?
2. How open is Airtel if i use my own router? I would like to use a separate router (running openwrt) bridged to a modem if possible.
3. I want to get an unlimited connection. I understand that Airtel has a Fair Usage Policy. Once the high speed limit is exceeded, do they cut you off or start charging for more? The plan i was interested in is "
   Super Max Plus 9 GB (Airtel/UE/FL/007)"
4. Is Airtel willing to share the ADSL username and password?
   
5. How responsive is Airtel customer care dealing with broadband issues?

The connection is for UP East/Lucknow. Thanks for your help.

 

[alekhkhanna]

Hello,

I have currently a broadband connection from BSNL. Unfortunately, the service has been very poor with frequent disconnections. I am sick of chasing BSNL and was wondering if it is a good time to move to Airtel.

I had a few questions about Airtel broadband. If anybody has experience of Airtel please let me know.

1. Do Airtel and BSNL share the same exchange/DSLAM or do Airtel run a separate line to the house?
2. How open is Airtel if i use my own router? I would like to use a separate router (running openwrt) bridged to a modem if possible.
3. I want to get an unlimited connection. I understand that Airtel has a Fair Usage Policy. Once the high speed limit is exceeded, do they cut you off or start charging for more? The plan i was interested in is "
   Super Max Plus 9 GB (Airtel/UE/FL/007)"
4. Is Airtel willing to share the ADSL username and password?
   
5. How responsive is Airtel customer care dealing with broadband issues?

The connection is for UP East/Lucknow. Thanks for your help.

Hey. Since I've Airtel in Lucknow (got installed sometime last May), can answer some of your queries:
1) Airtel runs a separate line to the house. After you register for installation, the normal procedure is:
a) A CC rep will call you to confirm the address and inform you on the availability of Airtel BB in your area, plus the plans possible.
b) In a day or two (normally within a day), a sale rep will come and collect documents and connection charge (I was charged 500 INR in Lucknow. Was 1000 INR when I got a new Airtel BB in Delhi. Difference due to city tiers maybe).
c) Within the next 24-48 hours, a guy would come to run a line from the nearest node to your house.
d) Over the next 24-48 hours, a different person will come to install the router and activate your line.

2) You can use your own router. Airtel gives a free router only with a 4 Mbps or more line. Else you gotta use your own or buy from them.

3) According to your chosen plan, you will get 2 Mbps till 9 GB, followed by UL usage @ 512 Kbps. Speeds resets based on your billing cycle (normally Airtel runs a cycle from 25th to 25th toregardless of when you get it installed. So for example, if your connection gets activated on 20th, you have full 9 GB to be consumed in 5 days ! ). If you want to get back to your original speed post FUP, you can always purchase Smartbytes (data packs based on volume)

4) Yup. The final guy who comes for activation gives you all the info. UN/PW/Phone number (different from UN)/CC number etc.

5) In my experience, very responsive. With my connection in Lucknow, I remember having an issue only once, that too was resolved by CC on phone within minutes. Never needed any engineer visit. No downtimes. No speed issues. You get what is promised. Got a connection in Delhi as well and again no issues whatsoever. Yes, the FUP is not that great, but very satisfied with the speed and uptime. Just for comparison, I also have Airtel DTH at home and whenever we have issues, the engineer hardly takes 3-4 hours for the visit.

Lemme know if you have more questions.

 

[rajil.s]

Really appreciate your extensive response. Thank you very much.
1. That was my biggest concern. Just wondering if they run a separate line, does it mean they run their own exchange/DSLAM?
3. With BSNL there is popup whenever FUP kicks in. The popup gives you an option to go back to your original speed if you pay. The unfortunate side of this popup is that, http connections no longer work until a choice is made. So if you are not infront of the computer when FUP kicks in, your downloads, dyndns updates everything stops working. This is a huge pain. Hope Airtel doesnt work like that.

With BSNL i am getting only an SNR of 6.6
I hope Airtel leads to better SNR.

 

[alekhkhanna]

Here's what I'm getting in Delhi (Airtel):

Airtel doesn't show any pop-ups. After you exhaust 80% of the data, you will get an SMS and an email stating the same. Similar for when you reach FUP limit (post which connection will run uninterrupted @ 512 kbps).

 

[blr_p]

With BSNL i am getting only an SNR of 6.6
I hope Airtel leads to better SNR.

Your downstream snr can be boosted yourself. but your upstream you have no control of.

my snr values are similar on airtel in bangalore.

[DOUBLEPOST=1425891020][/DOUBLEPOST]

Here's what I'm getting in Delhi (Airtel):

Very good, you must be very close to your exchange

 

[asingh]

I am getting this for Airtel GGN. How are these numbers..???

Also:
Last week I had some downtime, for like 18 hours. I called up CC. They were going to send an engineer. Then after 15 minutes (after the call), the net started working. Today when I wanted to make this screenshot, I could not access my router. I pulled up the initial password they gave me for the router ADMIN (I had changed it when they installed it), they had defaulted it to my initial password. Can Airtel do this..? It had to be them.

 

[blr_p]

I am getting this for Airtel GGN. How are these numbers..???.

They're good

SNR 15.7 (down) 24.9 (up)
Attn 20.5(down) 14.5 (up)

For SNR
6dB or below is bad and will experience no synch or intermittent synch problems
7dB-10dB is fair but does not leave much room for variances in conditions
11dB-20dB is good with little or no synch problems* (but see note below)
20dB-28dB is excellent
29dB or above is outstanding

If your SNR is below 12dB you are pretty much screwed and will not get a consistent level of ADSL-service.

Attenuation
20dB and below is outstanding
20dB-30dB is excellent
30dB-40dB is very good
40dB-50dB is good
50dB-60dB is poor and may experience connectivity issues
60dB or above is bad and will experience connectivity issues

The standard signal attenuation spread for a given speed is somewhere in the region of 25-30dB for ADSL1 speeds

Today when I wanted to make this screenshot, I could not access my router. I pulled up the initial password they gave me for the router ADMIN (I had changed it when they installed it), they had defaulted it to my initial password. Can Airtel do this..? It had to be them.

your modem may have reset itself to default. Airtel does not do anything.[DOUBLEPOST=1425894077][/DOUBLEPOST]

With BSNL i am getting only an SNR of 6.6
I hope Airtel leads to better SNR.

View attachment 55485

The SNR is decent but your attentuation of 60dB is very high. you must be far from your exchange. which adsl modem are you using ? do you know what chipset it has.

As a test try to bypass the splitter and connect to the modem directly and see what values you get for attentuation ?

 

[asingh]

They're good

Okay, thanks. Good to hear that.

your modem may have reset itself to default. Airtel does not do anything.

Ya, that could have happened. But what confused me. Only my router ADMIN password was changed. Even the user name (which I had changed from 'ADMIN') remained the same. My broadcast SSID user name / password / security type all remained the same. Also I had modified the bandwidth setting and the 802.11 mode. Those are showing to what I changed them to vs. to what the router had, once the initial service installation engineer had set. So to what default values did it reset..? It does not seem like a router reset. What you think..?

 

[blr_p]

What you think..?

Change it to whatever and then monitor if it happens again.