Best Broadband for Students

By Helen Storey Staff Writer Monday, 12 May 2008

Best Student Broadband The Pros and Cons of our shortlisted best student broadband providers Virgin Media Thumbs Up: • No Line Rental needed • Great bundles • Super deals Thumbs Down: • £30 set-up costs • Annoying when things go wrong Tiscali Thumbs Up: • Cheap as chips • Free Wireless router • Fast connection • Unlimited downloads Thumbs Down: • Not the best support in the world • £30 set-up costs TalkTalk Thumbs Up: • Speedy connection • Free evening and weekend calls in the UK and many International destinations Thumbs Down: • £29.99 set-up costs • 18 month contract Plusnet Thumbs Up: • Minimum contract of 1 month • Totally unlimited downloads off-peak • Good connection speed Thumbs Down • 1Gb download limit at peak times • Not the cheapest • £40 set-up costs Related Best Broadband Articles See our other recent related 'Best broadband for...' guides: Best broadband for unlimited downloads What is the best broadband package for unlimited downloads? With so many to choose from, and so much nonsense about what 'unlimited' really means, Julia Kukiewicz has waded through the small print to find the best broadband for unlimited downloads. Best broadband for online gaming IF you're tired of being on the receiving end of w00t everytime you play games online, you ought to switch over to the best broadband package for online gaming. Julia Kukiewicz does your homework for you and uncovers the UK's best broadband for online gamers. Best broadband for speed WHO offers the UK's fastes broadband! Neil Hawkins takes a look at the UK's fastest broadband deals and uncovers who offers the best broadband for speed. Best broadband and home phone package IT'S impossible to move these days without being offered a combination broadband and phone bundle. But who offers the best broadband and phone deals and is there anything to watch out for? Julia Kukiewicz gets dialling and assesses the UK's best broadband and home phone packages.

HAVING an internet connection is a must-have for all academic student types, but who offers the best broadband for students?

You’re all moved in to your new pad – the kitchen looks like a page from the Ikea catalogue, the walls are adorned with dog-eared posters of Che Guevara, and you’ve finally got your mum to leave after assuring her for the hundredth time that you know what day the bins go out.

While you’re probably worrying about having enough vodka money, or having to get up at the crack of noon for that boring lecture, at some point you’ll have to band together with your housemates and sort out your broadband connection, but where do you start?

There are loads of things to consider:

• Do you want a contract? – This all depends on the length of your tenancy – there’s no point paying for 12 months when you’re only going to be there for 10.
• How much do you want to pay? – Your student loan is for important stuff like books, beans and beer. Sort out a limit with your roomies, but most importantly, shop around.
• How fast does it need to be? – If there are 6 of you leeching off the same connection at the same time, it’s going to slow things down.
• Do you just want broadband, or a bundle? – It’s worth remembering that loads of providers offer more than just broadband. There are a fair few out there who provide a phone line and TV too.
• What’s the download limit? – Find out what the limit is. What seems like a large amount will soon dwindle once you consider the amount of people living in the house.

In light of these, we’ve rounded up what we reckon are the top 3 providers of the best broadband for students, and will put them head to head in a brutal broadband Battle Royale of not-quite-epic proportions.

Best broadband for students contender #1: Virgin Media

They’ve got Uma Thurman and Samuel L. Jackson in their ads, so they must be cool, right? Well yeah. We think so.

What we like best about Virgin Media, is that you don’t need a phone line to get their broadband.

Most other providers will need to you pay line rental on top of the broadband charges, but due to Virgin Media’s cable connection, this isn’t necessary.

Before you get giddy with excitement, it’s not available to everyone. You can check whether you can get cable in your area by going onto the website and plonking in your postcode.

You’ll need to take out a 12 month contract, but Virgin Media often offer the first year half price. Which is fab if you’re only planning on being there for a year.

At the moment, they’re offering 2 for £25 – for this you get up to 2Mb broadband (with no download limit), which is fast enough for most, and you also get their L TV package, which gets you loads more channels than freeview, and access to their glorious On Demand service which lets you choose from a library of TV, films and music.

This means you can watch Jeremy Kyle back to back for hours. Heaven! (Do it for the kids!)

Look out for Virgin Media representatives in Fresher’s Week. They can often be found around Uni campuses trying to get you to sign up to their packages, and they often have even better deals that aren’t advertised (such as TV, Phone and Broadband for £20. Delicious).

You can even get to nick a few Virgin Media biros, bottle openers and lollipops at the same time.

Best broadband for students contender #2: Tiscali

Tiscali make the shortlist for the best broadband for students because they offer the cheapest package around.

At £14.99 per month, including line rental for their Broadband and Talk Option 1, it’s a popular choice with students because it’s particularly light on the wallet.

For this, you get a commendably speedy 8Mb connection, which equals speedy internet loading for all your essay procrastinating needs.

Better still, you get no download limits with Tiscali.

This means you can look at as many Wikipedia pages as you can possibly manage (for fact verification purposes only. Honest), without having to worry about getting stung for going over your limit, or having your speed considerably reduced.

The lovely people at Tiscali are even chucking a free wireless router into the mix. Cheeky. This is ace because most other providers will charge an upgrade fee, or make you go to PC World to buy one separately.

Speaking of free, you also get free weekend calls to UK landlines, which might come in handy when you just can’t work out whether a red and white stripy top goes with the colours or the whites.

Best broadband for students contender #3: TalkTalk

Call out the instigator, because TalkTalk’s in the air. When they’re not making weird adverts of giant people made from people (huh?), TalkTalk offers a decent student broadband service at a decent price.

For a grand total of £16.39 for the month, you get a phone line (which includes line rental) and your ‘free’ broadband. Hoorah!

What else do you get? Another speedy 8Mb connection, though, as with all broadband services, this speed depends on how close you are to one of their exchanges.

You get free evening and free weekend calls to UK landlines, plus the added advantage of free international calls to over 60 countries (including mobile calls to the USA and Canada).

What’s the catch? Ah. We knew you’d ask that.

The catch here is that you need to take out an 18 month contract. If you’re planning on staying in your pad for your final 2 years, then that’ll work out just fine.

If you have the kind of housemates who eat all your cheese (though it’s best to find out this information before you move in with them – nobody likes a cheese thief), and you’re going to leave after a year, then you don’t need us to tell you this isn’t the package for you.

Best broadband for students contender #4: Plusnet

The joy of Plusnet, is that they’re more flexible than a Russian gymnast. Our favourite thing about them, by far, is that their minimum contract period is just one month. Which makes it ideal for those of you with tenancies under 12 months.

...and those who are fickle.

...or skint.

Plusnet also offers yet another key-tappingly, website-loadingly, Facebook-checkingly 8Mb connection, so no worries about speed there.

The first 3 months, which include line rental start at £14.98, then take a small vault up to £19.98 a month. Though not the cheapest of our fearsome four, it’s worth remembering that you won’t be lumbered with cancellation charges if you change your mind 6 months in.

In keeping up with the virtual Joneses, you also get free UK weekend and evening calls.

It’s not all great news though – Plusnet will sting you for a £40 installation charge.

Though they offer totally unlimited, fair-use-policy-free downloads off-peak (off-peak being 12midnight – 8am), the rest of the time it’s a rather meagre 1Gb. However, with Plusnet being as flexible and student-friendly as it is, going over the limit will just cost and extra £1 per GB. It's 75p per GB if you preload your package with extra usage.

Who’s the last man standing?

That would be Tiscali. Their low price, high speed and unlimited download allowance managed to clinch this one. The icing on the proverbial cake is the free wireless router.

Stand triumphant, Tiscali, for we declare you the winner of the best broadband for students. (Even though your “my mate really fancies you” advert is toe-curlingly annoying).

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