BT Smart Hub OR Smart Hub 2?

[HHGTTG]

I recently posted about 4g/5g routers as a possible alternative to the BT Hubs but now I have thought about things and should I want to upgrade my Hub say, due to old age, reliability etc I have now thought of perhaps buying used or refurbished Hubs from the likes of ebay or Amazon. 

To this end when considering all the bells and whistles Smart Hub 2, I realised that this one does not allow the user to split or separate the wavebands and name them accordingly. I have read that users find this annoying in that they cannot connect separately to 2.4GHz which has longer range  and give a more stable WiFi connection.

The earlier Smart Hub or Smart Hub 2's predecessor has this facility but are not so readily available now, obviously.

People on the forum have suggested alternative makes anyway, such as TP link models though I'd feel happier sticking with BT hubs.

I know if I were to contact BT regarding an upgraded Hub for my ADSL connection I would be sent the Smart Hub 2.

Decisions, decisions guys for a very old fogey who doesn't like change.

[rbz5416]

There are literally dozens on Smart Hubs currently for sale on Ebay, so not sure why you think they're in short supply. Facebook Marketplace is another place to look, where you may have the benefit of collecting locally. I used the Smart Hub for a while on both BT & Plusnet & it was decent enough. Given that they're also very cheap, I can't see any real reason for the average user not to buy one . I certainly wouldn't touch a SH2.

Can't do any harm to ask BT if they still have stocks of the Smart Hub. Maybe one of the Mods could advise?

But unless you have issues with the HH3 then as the old adage goes, if it ain't broke...

[HHGTTG]

Well my doubts about my old HH3 have arisen lately. I seem to lose the ability to connect to website and generally everything slows down either using my laptop or a couple of Android Tablets.  If I quick reset the Hub or turn it off for an few minutes and then reboot it everything works OK  for about 4/5 days and then it all starts over again and surfing becomes a pain.

This current session now is beginning to show signs of slowing down again and that is 5 days after just pressing the 'reset' button and it seems that this is becoming a regular feature now and so I assume that perhaps the HH3 is beginning to fail.

[licquorice]

If you are still on ADSL, I would be tempted to look for a HH4 which was more optimised for ADSL rather than the Smart hubs which are optimised for VDSL.

[rbz5416]

I guess swapping the HH3 for a SH would tell you soon enough if it's the HH3 at fault. Shouldn't cost more than £20 for an unused one & nearer a tenner for used. But worth a call to BT to see if they can supply one. Just beware of them trying to get you to recontract for the privilege.

[HHGTTG]

If I was much younger and knew I was going to continue living in my current house, I would go for FTTC or FTTP whatever was on offer but I'll keep with ADSL for the time being. 

[Keith_Beddoe]

The HH4 is still available new online, and also second hand.

Its bandwidth is optimised to work within the ADSL2+ frequency spectrum, and will reject any out-of-band noise that would cause any of the later home hubs to lose sync.

[jac_95]

If either is available to you (FTTC or FTTP known as Full Fibre) you maybe asked to migrate to that.

Especially if stop sells are in the area and there's a push to move customers onto fibre once it's available to them

[countrypaul]

The symptoms described about performance slowing down after 4 or 5 days is not what I would expect from a failing router but sounds much more like an issue with the ADSL line although not typical.

Have you checked the logs on your HH3 and also the Connection figures (from Settings->Advanced settings->Broadband->Connection). Compare the results you get when performance is good with those when performance is bad to see if the line is causing any issues. You could post the results on here for others to review if they mean nothing to you (most home users will not know what they mean!)

[HHGTTG]

I'm very familiar with the BT Manager and its stats. I am a frequent visitor there. Here is the current set which show particularly high number of 'events'. However this has been the case for the last few days and is not unusual for my connection.