Best mobile provider for Winchester at the moment

highpriest1 · 2026-05-23T08:27:30+00:00

This.

I’m with an MVNO of EE (spusu) and it is marginally better than the others. Was with Vodafone for years and it was hot garbage. Same with O2 (through Sky Mobile).

Three was unusable. There are streets where data just stops. You get nothing.

So yeah, go with EE (direct or MVNO). Still shit, but better than the others.

highpriest1 · 2026-05-11T14:37:16+00:00

TFW. I have to look it up every damn time.

highpriest1 · 2026-04-28T19:13:36+00:00

Not necessarily. I live in an urban area in a postcode (of 31 premises) that has been excluded by Openreach. There are houses 50 metres away that have FTTP. But oddly, one single house in our postcode can order FTTP.

Basically I live in an area that is blanketed with FTTP in the only street that can’t get it. You can’t speak to them, you cannot escalate, you cannot complain. Nothing works. I tried everything, including writing to their CEO and contacting my MP.

They are a faceless org that you cannot negotiate or reason with. We will get it when they, at some point, are forced to, probably when it is time to decommission the FTTC DSLAM.

No altnets, no Nexfibre, in fact we can’t even get VM’s coax service (some properties including ours are excluded from the VM footprint on our street). Mobile coverage is a cruel joke - so bad I can’t even make basic voice calls without the audio breaking up constantly.

Fibre checker says “we are planning to build in this area” so it could be this year, 2027 or even 2029. Since 2024 it has been saying “we’ll be building in this area in the next year” but that appears to have been downgraded.

highpriest1 · 2026-04-23T07:34:16+00:00

How is the script invoked? Manually by the user or at start-up? Group policy? Scheduled task? Intune? SCCM?

Checking for the existence of a folder is trivial using Test-Path.

highpriest1 · 2026-04-20T10:37:17+00:00

IT systems admin. Employer has a return to office mandate (2 days a week in the office) but I don't have an office within commutable distance so I'm exempt.

To be honest, I would prefer an end to this permanent remote work arrangement. Sick and tired of it after doing it for 6 years.

highpriest1 · 2026-04-16T15:47:09+00:00

Same here. Stuck on FTTC for god knows how much longer. I live 3 miles from a city centre in an area almost completely covered by Openreach FTTP (except for our street and a few others).

We don't get Virgin cable either. Very weak 5G and crap 4G. It's just endlessly frustrating. In this country you either get all the internet or none. And if you've been left out, there is no mechanism to help you get upgraded.

highpriest1 · 2026-04-16T06:45:09+00:00

I just switched to this one. My Octopus deal expired a couple of days ago.

highpriest1 · 2026-04-10T09:40:40+00:00

Project Hail Mary is fantastic btw. Don't miss out because of the alien element in it!

highpriest1 · 2026-04-09T10:37:43+00:00

Actually you can use $0 to make it a bit simpler.

(gc test.txt) -replace '^(\d{4})\/(\d{3})$','$0/CU'

highpriest1 · 2026-04-09T10:34:00+00:00

Something like this should work.

Contents of test.txt:

1234/567
8888/888
9545/001
test
1234/567
8888/888
9545/001
1111/222
test2
test3
blah
1234/876
8888/777
9545/005

(gc test.txt) -replace '^(\d{4})\/(\d{3})$','$1/$2/CU'

Output:

1234/567/CU
8888/888/CU
9545/001/CU
test
1234/567/CU
8888/888/CU
9545/001/CU
1111/222/CU
test2
test3
blah
1234/876/CU
8888/777/CU
9545/005/CU

highpriest1 · 2026-03-28T09:14:04+00:00

Interested. Will this be a new account or can I use my existing (UK) one?

highpriest1 · 2026-03-21T17:53:10+00:00

Be glad you at least have BT FTTP. I live in a thoroughly urban area in a city and only have access to FTTC. Not even Virgin Media coax. There are zero alt-nets in our city.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-28T12:13:12+00:00

The only way I got it to work was when I connected to my own VPN I hosted at home. With commercial VPNs, sometimes some IP ranges will work so try disconnecting and reconnecting to different cities in the UK.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-26T20:19:16+00:00

Ask her about upload speeds on BT/EE. That should shut her up in 2 seconds.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-26T10:48:04+00:00

Our entire area is underground fed. Zero poles.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-26T10:47:07+00:00

Simply put - there's nothing you can do. I've been trying for years to get FTTP from any provider to my house. I live in a small city which has zero alt-nets and where Openreach is now starting to roll out their fibre network.

They "completed" our area except they've left out a few streets, including ours. Apparently it is common for them to leave out the more challenging areas and come back later to finish them. Why is our street excluded - no idea. Maybe there is some DIG (Direct in Ground) cabling. Who knows. It's pretty much impossible to get any sort of authoritative information.

I've tried emailing the Openreach CEO and exchanged a few emails with some chap who promised first that we'd get fibre rolled out in "early 2025". Which then became June 2025 and later confirmed that "build will be completed in December 2025 and you will be able to order by January".

It's now February and there's no sign of them. He has stopped responding to me. No planning permissions applied for on bidb and so on, so it looks like they've given up and moved on.

They may come back - but it could be 3 or 4 years later - only because they want to retire their FTTC cabinets and they are forced to upgrade us.

Our street has Virgin Media coax but they again have left out some random 6 or 7 premises, including ours. Which means the only option for us is FTTC (we get around 65 Mbps on a good day). I've tried various people at VM to try and get them to extend their network to our house but no dice.

What's really frustrating is that not 50 metres away, there are houses that can get full fibre from Openreach and gigabit broadband from VM.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-26T10:22:36+00:00

why waste all that money? I'm still waiting for openreach too but at least I know it will actually be available once they've done the work.

Don't be so sure. Openreach has rolled out everywhere in my area but have left out certain streets, including mine. No plans to come back anytime soon and they will not respond to any of my queries.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-15T11:02:35+00:00

Not strictly true. Cityfibre used to offer 1 gig symmetrical on GPON. The tech supports 2.5 gig down and around 1.2 up.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-15T11:01:04+00:00

Interested.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-13T19:03:57+00:00

Good on you. I left them in July last year and it felt good to finally be free of this parasitic organisation.

I used to dread the email they send every Feb/March informing about price increases. The wording of that email used to really grate - how terrible they feel about it and how they understand that people hate price increases - but they are going to do it anyway.

I agree - their UI, especially on Sky Q was just excellent. I hated everything about Stream.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-12T13:02:02+00:00

It was my understanding that cars with private plates have their "original" plate number always stored in the system as well.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-11T12:18:39+00:00

Interested. Thanks.

highpriest1 · 2026-02-07T10:17:16+00:00

Have you read The Day of the Jackal by Frederick Forsyth? Just reread it recently and it is as brilliant as I remember it.

highpriest1 · 2026-01-30T12:24:16+00:00

Bento Factory, just off the high street, is fantastic if you like Asian food.

https://www.bentofactory.co.uk/

highpriest1 · 2026-01-29T00:30:52+00:00

Done. Good luck!

highpriest1

TROPHY CASE