TPG ADSL2+ Is Very Very Slow, No NBN in My Area Yet, Is There Any Good Alternative?

I live in Sydney but currently my area is not covered by NBN just yet. I'm currently on the TPG ADSL2+ plan right here:

TPG ADSL2+ Unlimited Data Plan — $59.99/month

For the last 6 months or so, the connection speed got worse. I could get almost 8Mbps in 2018 but now I can only get 1/2 Mbps down and 0.5 - 0.8 Mbps up :(

Is there any good alternative for someone in my situation? I'm all ears and I don't mind paying a bit more if it means I can get a significantly faster speed.

Thanks in advance!!

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Comments

  • Take a look at the recent Telstra deals via JB?

    • +2

      Hi mate, ahhh I don't know that there's any deal for Telstra in JB HiFi, which one are you referring to?

  • Same here. Which area are you? I'm in South west Sydney

    • Hi ChiMot,

      I'm around the Parramatta area but the NBN will be here apparently somewhere between April - June 2020

      • +11

        And the reality could be 2025

        • +1

          NBN are closing SAM faster than ever. There is no reason for 2PAR to not be NBN ready as scheduled.

          • @whooah1979: Actually there are plenty of reasons for 2PAR potentially not to be ready as scheduled

        • He has a point, my NBN was meant to be be here in September 2017 but got delayed to April 2019. BTW I’m in Melbourne SE suburbs

          • +5

            @CrazyBargainCatcher: Mal promised he'd have it all done by 2016

            • +2

              @Geoff-bargain: He did us alright… The whole damn system was corrupted…

              • @xuqi: LOL looking at this discussion makes me worried. They promised my area will get NBN between April - June 2020 but yeah you never know 😅

                • @blue2609: I think it comes down to the workload of local companies doing the work on the ground.

                  My area in WA was originally meant to have service by first quarter of 2018, then it was pushed back to 3rd quarter of 2019, but ultimately went live in late March 2019.

        • +2

          My street was supposed to get NBN April 2019.

          April came and went. Absolute silence.

          2 months later they finally changed it to "January to June 2020".

          We only have mobile internet, no ADSL.

          We're moving.

      • In the same area as you blue… was contemplating W3networks air fibre.

      • Pretty shocking, I thought Parra area would have gotten it by now.

  • What's your modem?

    • Hi mate, ummm My modem is…. Netgear N300 Wireless ADSL2+ modem Router DGN2200

      • -2

        HOpefully mod is not confusing me to try to sell you anything, as I don't even have one to sell, when I used to use TPG ADSL 2+ in Campsie, I used this Belkin Share N300 modem router and the speed is really good. I offer to two of my customers previously and they have confirmed they have significant speed improvement with the modem router.

        • +1

          Ahhh I see what you mean.

          See I don't know if it's the TPG or if it's the router's problem so yeah…. I can try calling TPG first and I don't know if it's possible for one of the technicians to go to my apartment to see what's going on.

          • @blue2609: It's worth calling TPG, if the problem is downstream they should get it fixed.

            Sometimes the problem is in the home. At one place I rented, the speed was around 1Mbps. Luckily the flatmate's old man was ex-Telstra. He removed the wall socket, bared fresh wire and attached a new wall socket and we had 10Mbps

  • +9

    I have a similar issue. ADSL is painfully slow and NBN isn't available in our area until 2020.

    We have 4G with Optus on their 500GB plan.

    It's currently $65 for 200GB or $85 for 500GB.

    Pocket WiFi: https://www.optus.com.au/shop/broadband/mobile-broadband/net…
    WiFi Modem: https://offer.optus.com.au/shop/broadband/mobile-broadband/h…

    • Hi there mate,

      OOH someone pointed this to me before in the past! Is it any good?

      What kind of speed are you getting if I may ask?

      P.S. I just realised that $85/month is the cost per month IF you choose the 24 months contract right? Seeing how the NBN will be available in a year, I don't know if this is a good idea….

      • +3

        It's okay. The price has gone up though as it used to be $60 and $80 respectively.

        Speed will depend on Optus coverage in your area and also if it's peak time, but I'm getting on average around 25Mbit down.

        At least now I can stream Netflix and Stan without it buffering so I'm happy.

        Edit: Yeah I chose to pay for the modem outright, which you can do on the Month to Month.

        • Haha I see. Hey 25 Mbps is way better than my 1/2 Mbps so I'll take it for sure.

          The only issue I have is the contract. It says $85/month with 24 months contract so that means if I don't want to be locked in with a contract, we need to pay the $192 upfront for the modem.

          I don't know if Optus will allow me to buy a second hand Huawei B525 modem instead of buying it from them haha, I'll have to ask.

          Thanks so much for this though mate, I'll definitely have to see first.

          • +1

            @blue2609: If you go 4g, check that there is a 2300mhz tower near you or you will only get about 5mb down.

            • @crashloaded: Ahhh right right, I'll keep that in mind. I'll ask someone from optus later.

              Thanks mate

            • @crashloaded: Not any more - Optus no longer has speed restrictions.

              https://whirlpool.net.au/wiki/optus_wireless_broadband has more info…

              • @MELso: Q: What speeds are expected on these plans?
                A: These plans do NOT have an artificial cap on speeds like the old Home Wireless Broadband product. Speed is determined by factors such as tower capacity and your device.

                If you don't have a tower near you that has 2300mhz you will still be speed restricted. Home broadband runs on 2300mhz optimally.

            • @crashloaded: Not the case with me. I get 70mbit downstream when I drop to the 700mhz band or 1800mhz band. I get 120mbit downstream during peak when I do get the 2300mhz band.

          • -1

            @blue2609:

            I don't know if Optus will allow me to buy a second hand Huawei B525 modem instead of buying it from them haha, I'll have to ask.

            I have a feeling if you BYO modem, the'll make you get the Sim Only plan which isn't as good value ($70 for 100GB month to month): https://www.optus.com.au/shop/broadband/mobile-broadband/dat…

            • @tabz: Right right I see, I'll have to ask them first got it.

              Thanks heaps mate!

          • @blue2609: @blue2609 : I used Optus MBB for a couple of months early this year. I was able to get almost 100Mbps during off peak hours and over 50Mbps during peak. But speeds depend on the congestion and signal strength at your location. So I’d suggest you get a pre-paid or a month to month SIM to test the network before signing up for a contract.

          • +1

            @blue2609: I've been with optus for their 4g mobile broadband for a while now since I'm in an area where there are not enough ports at the exchange for me to get ADSL2 and there are too many trees interfering with uniti and nuskope. I get 240mbit downstream during off-peak and 120mbot downstream during peak using the optus ac800s modem in the aircard smart cradle dock (nifty if you want 4x gigabit ports) and I've got a cheap $70 panorama 4g antenna to boost the signal and speed.

            I honestly don't plan on going NBN when/if it becomes available when I'm already getting this kind of speed. Instead my next change will be to the 5g unlimited data plans for $70 that optus promised, simply because the speed is faster on 5g (most of the 5g modems still falls back to cat16 on 4g which is still up to 1000mbps downstream of you're not in 5g range) and I won't have to deal with setup fees whilst I'm renting since I can just take my modem and portable antenna with me wherever I go.

            Oh and gaming is fine as well on 4g, it's not the horrible mess that 3g was. I get average 20ms ping, and my partner and I can land up to 40 kills together whilst playing the big team matches on fortnite on the same internet connection, zero drop outs.

            • @DangerNoodle: Hi mate,

              right right I see, I'll definitely try it one of these days haha. Once I get a paycheck or somtehing so I can buy the Huawei modem.

              Regards

              • @blue2609: the huawei modem is nice but the ac800s modem is better. the huawei modem has a maximum speed of 150mbps downstream due to the modem being cat 6, whereas the ac800s (netgear) modem uses a cat 9 modem, rated for up to 450mbps with carrier aggregation. Otherwise, feel free to wait for the 5g plans to start becoming more mainstream.

                • @DangerNoodle: @DangerNoodle

                  Hi mate, just saw your comment right now haha.

                  Ah okay, so the smaller modem (the Netgear ac800s) is better? I seee, well how's the range though? I'm planning to use it in my apartment but I'm going to put the modem outside in the living room and I'll share the internet connection between me and someone else in another room, this is what I'm worried about.

                  I will absolutely do some research on this modem and see if it really is a better option as I'm not quite knowledgeable when it comes to this.

                  Also, wait…, can I just buy a second hand Netgear ac800s from eBay or something and then bring my own ac800s to an optus shop to sign up for the plan then (I'll definitely speak to optus about this later).

                  Regards

                  • @blue2609: I'm using the ac800s in the Telstra aircard smart cradle, they added support for the cradle in last year's firmware update for the modem and the cradle increases the wifi range. The cradle adds the gigabit ethernet ports which come in handy, I managed to pick mine up for $85 on eBay.

                    Range will depend on how you use it, without the cradle you can choose between 2.4ghz 300mbps wifi or 5ghz AC 867mbps wifi, but not both. With the cradle, you can have both. If you need range, I would recommend sticking with 2.4ghz for more range. I can still connect to the dongle from four rooms away on the 5ghz channel, but it will depend on the construction of your house. If you are concerned about range, you can always add repeaters and mesh routers down the track if you are not satisfied with the range of the dongle.

            • @DangerNoodle: Ive been running quite happily on NBN some some time now, I was with Uniti but they have massive issues with trees, rain fade, power outages, just got sick of it, the NBN couldn't come fast enough! NBN with backup 4G just works for me. I am looking forward to 5G, I am sure this will spell the death of Wireless ISP's and maybe even NBN in its current form. I can't comment on gaming but Netflix works just fine :)

      • You can go month to month, but you pay for the modem upfront.

        Clients of mine now get this instead of ADSL when NBN isn't available. A lot quicker, better upstream speed and 500gb is plenty for most.

      • I'm on Optus 4G mobile broadband and just did a speed test to check for ya.
        I got 85mbps down and 39mbps up:
        https://www.speedtest.net/result/8343183464

        I'm in rural town 3.5hours north of sydo.

        • By the gods, so many people recommended Optus 4G in this thread…. maybe I really should try it,

          85 down and 39 up??? O.O

          oh gooooddd, I umm, I'll try it one of these days, that's a dream come true for me LOL

          • @blue2609: I get ~25 download and 38 upload.

            Much better than the 6 and 1 I got from ADSL2+.

            • @UNO: @UNO

              Yeah currently I'm only getting like 2.2 Mbps down (often lower than this) and 0.07 Mbps up with the connection disconnecting intermittently.

              I'll definitely have a talk with my landlord and see if I can ask them to cancel the TPG subscription/go with Optus 4G $85/month

    • I resorted to Optus 4G on $60 200GB plan a year ago. At best I get 30mbps down during the day, but typically it is between 5-10mbps down between 7pm to 11pm
      It streams Netflix fine at 720p. Sometimes it hits 1080p quality.

      My phone on Telstra is consistently 110mbps+ down at almost anytime during the day in the house.

    • Hi there mate~

      Ahhh $39.99 does sound good but it's not unlimited right? Me and my room mate are watching a lot of youtube vids, streaming, etc. so that 250 GB data cap is definitely not enough. We'll burn through it in 1 week haha.

      Thanks for the suggestion though

      • It's pretty hard to use 250GB on 1/2 Mbps in a week

        • Oh yeah yeah, not right now, I mean in the past when our TPG connection was still reasonable (7/8 Mbps down) my room mate and myself in total can use 200 GB ish in a week.

      • +5

        You sure its not your roommate hogging all the bandwidth?

    • +1

      It now comes with Netcomm nbn+4G modem

  • +8

    You’re problem probably Telstra ducts related. Call TPG tell them you have shit speeds, they’ll do their usual steps and ask you to do things, and they’ll send someone out and work out what’s wrong.

    Happens with every adsl isp, it’s not isp related. Gotta just get Telstra technicians to come out and fix the issue, even if you switch makes no difference

    • +3

      Hi there mate,

      Huh you're actually right! I just called TPG and I called Telstra right after that. Apparently there's a cable issue or something like that underneath the road next to my place so a Telstra technician will do a checkup tomorrow (from what they told me).

      Thanks mate!

      • +3

        That’s ok, I reckon I’ve made 10 of those phone calls in my time, Telstra cables are the worse. Sometimes lazy Telstra techs just unplug yours and plug the other job in what was your perfectly working adsl, to fix the other dudes problem. And you wake up with shit internet.

        It’s so terrible. But like I said, it’s not your isp fault, doesn’t matter who you are with, gotta make that call, tell them your on sub 1mbps and they know something is wrong and will pass the job back to Telstra (the infrastructure owner) to fix.

        • Yep I called Telstra and I'll see how it goes. A technician will come tomorrow and check the line

  • -7

    The pathetic service levels of the ripoff private sector continue.

    Their going to be wasting their time and your money rolling out 5G service that's worse than ADSL soon.

    And the braindead morons that make up the Australian population will keep repeating neoliberal talking points like zombies such as: the private sector is always cheaper than the Government.

    As they lose their own money like retards.

    • +4

      Whoaaaa, you seem like you have quite a strong opinion on this whole thing mate hahaha.

    • I gotta say I get surprised by some of the comments on this forum…

    • Or, maybe OP just has a damaged cable somewhere.

      You must be fun at parties.

  • I'm in a similar situation. I got Optus home wireless broadband. Most of the time it works really well, but it can slow down when the weather is poor or when it's peak time. Note that this is not the same as mobile broadband. This comes with a more powerful modem than those little pocket thinggies. Go directly to Optus to get full network speeds. Resellers like Exetel and Spintel may be cheaper, but you're restricted to 12/1Mbps.

    Check out this review:
    https://ausdroid.net/2019/01/20/optus-4g-wireless-broadband-…

    • Hi mate, yeah someone already suggested this to me actually before. I'm honestly considering it right now, I'll see first :)

      Thanks for the review link mate, definitely helped!

      • +1

        My only advice about wireless is, its very unstable. Most of the time it’s great, but very very often you hit these congestion patches or whatever and you slow to nothing, ADSL is actually pretty consistent (one phone call per year kinda thing). Mobile wireless I find is once a month/fortnight drops.

        I game a bit, so I feel like so often it spoils the experience too much. I tried it before nbn arrived in my area.

        • +2

          I game a bit, so I feel like so often it spoils the experience too much.

          Wireless has terrible latency especially during congested times. However, for most non-gaming uses, bandwidth is much more important than latency and 4G just has far higher bandwidth than old ADSL2+ these days.

          I used to get around 500 KB/s on my ADSL 2+ connection on a good day. I can easily get 2 MB/s on my 4G connection, sometimes even higher, and of course, over 10 MB/s on my NBN.

          • @p1 ama: over 10 MB/S on NBN?? T_T Can't wait until it gets to my area….

            • @blue2609: You'll have to sign up for the 100 Mbps plan, but I'm not sure if you'll get these speeds. My area was one of the first ones, so I have fibre straight into a box on the side of my house. I believe the NBN being installed now is only FTTN, which still relies on some copper lines.

              • @p1 ama: Ahh I see, it depends on the area and other things.

                Yeah all good mate, I'll think about it later once my area gets NBN between April - June 2020, I really can't wait o.O

        • Right right I see.

          Well, seeing as how the only game I play is rocket league haha, I don't think that'll be too much problem.

          Thanks for the heads up though

          • @blue2609: Even with Rocket league, you might feel it. The latency is honestly a big issue for anyone who is used to a low ping.

      • +1

        100% recommend the optus 4g deal. I've got the 500gb package and consistently get between 30to60Mbps. Was on some shitty old ADSL and this is miles ahead. You might have to lock the modem to a specific band to get these speeds but it's pretty easy. Pm me if you go that route and I can put in the right direction.

        • @Freaksta, which package is that ? (500gb) still available now?

          • +1

            @CyberMurning: https://offer.optus.com.au/shop/broadband/mobile-broadband/h…

            There is 200gb @ $65 and 500gb @ $85. Those are the new prices I'm on the old price which was $5 cheaper.

            • @Freaksta: thanks will check that. if i get it i will ask further guidance re: locking modem from you :) hoping for some kind of optus special deal on those plans. 24 months is kind of long

              • @CyberMurning: Option one is sign up to the 24 month contract and they give you the modem, if you leave early you pay out the remaining device cost and you are done.

                Option two is not sign up and pay for the device upfront. So kinda no brainer to go for option one and if you do leave early they at least paid for a bit of the hardware.

                Also there is a 3rd option which is BYO modem but they have a very specifc list of modems and I've heard people having issues with actually getting the store to not do the modem. I have an old compatible version but the speeds aren't near as good as the B525 so I would recommend the B525.

        • Hi mate - could you please explain howI can lock the modem to a specific band? I have the AC800s modem and have two towers near me. One is 2100mhz and the other 2300mhz. How do I lock the modem to the specific band to get a faster connection?

          • +1

            @tnticeman: No entirely sure on the AC800s but on the B525 there is a little tool that allows you to SHH into your router and lock it to a specific band.

  • You can go with 4G, which will be much faster.

    You can get Optus for $105 per month which will include a phone and 200GB data (enough for most normal users). This is not too bad given that you can cut your current $60 ADSL 2+, so you're paying essentially $45 for an unlimited phone plan with a phone. That's pretty good.

    Just WiFi hotspot and you'll be good (or USB tether for a better connection).

    • Yeah some people above ^^ has already suggested me the same thing. Someone also mentioned umm spintel wireless broadband because it's cheaper $40/month but it's capped at 12Mbps download/1Mbps upload so Optus is definitely a better deal in my eyes.

      Thanks mate!

  • I had similar issue previously with my house and end up going with telstra cable plan, if it's available in your area I'm having no issue with it. 89 dollars per month, unlimited download and my speed is normally around 100Mbps

    • Hi there mate~

      Umm may I know which one it is? If you can give me the link or something then yeah I'll absolutely love it. However, I don't think anything like that is available in my area as I don't have NBN just yet.

      Kind regards

      • +2

        Go on Telstra website > internet broadband. Enter your address. If it says ‘congratulations, you can get connected via adsl’ close the page. If it says ‘you can be connected via cable’, give them a call and get yourself on cable internet.

        • Also if Telstra cable not available check if Optus cable is. I was getting about 0.5 with tpg adsl but the main issue for me was the distance to the exchange so didn’t want to gamble on changing providers.

          Been on Optus cable around 4 years now and has been very good but there are plenty of reports in some areas where it isn’t. I’m on a 30mbps plan and mostly that is what I get. You can also transfer over when the nbn comes without breaking your contract but granted, Optus isn’t the cheapest nbn provider.

        • HI there mate, thanks again for the info!

          Yeah I just did that and it says "‘congratulations, you can get connected via adsl’" haha, so yeah no cable.

          Right right, I'll try going to the optus website later, thanks heaps!

          • @blue2609: mine:
            telstra: Great! You can get connected via ADSL
            optus: UH OH… OPTUS CABLE ISN'T AVAILABLE AT THIS ADDRESS.

            • @CyberMurning: @ChiMot,

              haha, I'll try to ummm be as patient as I can be and keep a level head about this whole issue.

              A technician from Telstra just contacted me this morning saying that they can't fix the problem because it's not an "open wire". I think there's some kind of a miscommunication and basically they're saying that if the problem is not a danger to pedestrian then they can't help us even though the cable is a Telstra cable.

              So right now I'm trying to contact TPG again and…. try to escalate the situation…, ummmm my internet is pretty much sub 1Mbps and it's disconnecting intermittently LOL. Whew….., this is yeah….

  • Note that the new Optus plans are NOT speed restricted to 12/1 or 5/1 (although resellers such as Exetel still are)…

    https://whirlpool.net.au/wiki/optus_wireless_broadband

    • Hi mate,

      Oh dude, that link in whirlpool you gave me is very very useful. It actually outlines the Q&A of which modems are compatible with the Optus Wireless Broadband service and how we don't actually have to pay the $192 upfront cost if bring our own modem.

      On top of that, someone actually also said in that link that it's okay to cancel the 24 months contract midway but we have to pay for the leftover cost of the Huawei B525 modem.

      All these information is very useful mate, thanks heaps!!

      Yeah I'll see how it goes first tomorrow because apparently a Telstra technician is coming to my area to fix the cable or something, apparently there's something wrong with it and that's why I'm only getting like sub 1Mbps upload/(non-existent upload speed)bps. sigh 😓it is what it is, all good

      Have a good one mate!

  • Hopefully the Telstra tech can fix it for you, I'd been having a similar issue where it was getting slower and slower.

    Mine had slowed to 2Mbps down but a few days after reporting it the Telstra techs had fixed it and it's now back up to 14Mbps down.

  • +2

    You mentioned speeds decreasing over time. Until recently I was with TPG on ADSL2+ and didn't notice slowdowns except during evenings ( 8 to 10 PM) and some school holidays. Are your speeds still slow at 6AM in the morning? If they are, there might be degradation in the quality of the copper line, or of the modem itself. You could contact TPG; they will send a tech out to investigate. Last time they did that, I learnt that my relatively ancient Billion modem was the issue. One thing to troubleshoot is to check out yoyr SNR and Line Attenuation values for the modem (for most router modems type http://192.168.1.1/ in your browser, then admin/admin for login and password). You want a high SNR value and a low Attenuation Value, and they differ for upstream and downstream). Low SNR like below 6 will cause frequent dropouts.

    If you think your modem is at fault, I could send you my Asus ADSL modem (~ 2 years old) that worked really well with TPG (say for $10 + shipping from Brisbane to Sydney metro?)

    • Hi there mate, I'll try your suggestion first haha, just saw your comment as it got buried and I didn't get any notification.

      I'll see first if I need a new modem.. ;)

  • Guess whose ad pops up in my browser when I read this criticism of TPG! Yep, TPG’s. What a shocker!

  • Just by the sounds of it I don't think purely changing a provider will fix your problem. It sounds like theres some major problem affecting your copper line and you may also be a long way away from you exchange.

    Have you tried talking to tpg about the speed issue?
    If they haven't responded well I would say try out belong 60/month unlimited. They are a low cost subsidary of telstra and they will surely fix your cable if that's what the problem is.

  • Ive had this problem myself and so have others in my building

    They are doing minimal maintenance on adsl right now.

    Its obvious you have a problem with the line or maybe even at the exchange.

    Lodge a complaint with TPG, give them the details you provided here and get them to sort it out.

    If you dont you will have the same problem with any other adsl provider and possibly with NBN as well so you need to get this problem FIXED!

    But to answer your question the answer is YES!

    You can go mobile broadband. $40/mth gets you 250GB

    See here:
    https://www.spintel.net.au/home/wireless-broadband

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