1and1 Broadband / HNS 2Mbps Unlimited Thane West Review

[thundurus]

My thoughts and review on 1and1 broadband / HNS Thane West​

Long Story Short : After 4 years of using 1and1 i can safely say they have got a lot of new customers and dont care about existing subscribers, the connection quality has degraded and internet disconnects after every 2-3 minutes . So if you would like to suffer, go with 1and1 else switch to someone else.


Review Starts :

I have used Tikona in my area and had mixed experience with them , sometimes speed was good and consistent pings but other times high disconnections and connectivity issues . Customer care was also not quick to respond to issues , always said problem in tower and never fixed that problem i suppose .

So i decided to give 1and1 Broadband a try and I must say , it is a solid option if you are living in thane west .
They provide connection from HNS ( I selected HNS ) , 5net , Pacenet and indigital . I wanted to buy 5net but at that time i read some posts on this website saying pings were high and youtube problems , hub not working sometimes , caching problem etc . So i went for HNS .

The plan i am subscribed to is 1Mbps 2Mbps unlimited with no FUP or any other non sense speed throttle .

Connection :

It was simple , after calling the contact number of 1and1 , they sent an engineer to our building who checked feasibility and said that they give connection even if there is only one person who needs the connection in the building . All they needed was documents with society NOC to install Fibre and switch on terrace .
Connection was done in next day and quickly activated after giving the check .

Plan : Annual 4999 INR 1Mbps Unlimited .

New Plan : Annual 6999 INR 2Mbps Unlimited ( Upgraded on 29/8/2014)

Now its time for some speed tests and ping tests 😀

Speed test

New plan 2Mbps 6999 INR annual

Please note that upload speed has been reduced now (less than 2mbps) . Very disappointed 🙁

Ping test at Singapore , los angels and Paris ( Best places to host game servers )

As you guys can see , pings are awesome and perfect for online gaming , i play global offensive on steam and get 60-70 ms on official steam servers at Singapore / Honk Kong

CSGO community server browser ( filter to include servers below 50 ms ping only )

BF3 server browser

Download speed test ( Old 1 MBps plan ) [ Downloading a random file from moddb ]

Download speed is consistent and great for 1Mbps . In torrent the download speed is mostly around 140-150 KBps .

2 Mbps plan speed ( Downloading random file from MODDB )

Download speed for torrent (2 Mbps plan ) :

Torrent download speed hovers around 290-300 KBps constantly . 1 YIFY movie per hour 😛

UPDATE

Torrent cache is back up and running

Caching services

HNS provides Linux cache mirrors , CDN peering with Akamai and ofcourse google peering . Downloading anything from google/youtube/playstore gives LAN speed . Similarly websites that use Akamai as their CDN example , windows , Apple , WWE , Netflix , HP , Sony , Xbox Live , PSN , Steam , EA store origin gives LAN speed . Downloading games from these stores is just way too easy and fast .

Downloading titanfall beta from origin

Speed on steam

HNS has a HUB though (it is limited in that users cannot share among themselves at LAN speed but there is a master user from whom we can download at LAN speed ) that has most of the new stuff on it , so getting popular content is easy . (HUB no longer works)

Customer care and downtimes
Internet goes down only due to Power failure issues , calling 1and1 office , they usually know what the problem is and are quick to resolve it .

Experiencing random downtime , like connection drops randomly , and upload speed has been reduced too . Big disappointment 🙁

HNS is no longer the best , go for spectranet or mach1 broadband if available in your area . And if you do get one of them then please write a review too .

Rating : 1/5 ( Poor )

PROS :
1] Very affordable
2] Reliable connection (Since monsoon this year 2015 I am experiencing random disconnections )
3] Good ping
4] Google peering
5] Akamai Content delivery network ( CDN )
6] You get more speed when downloading torrents lol

CONS :
1] No HUB
2] No Linux cache
3] Random disconnections
4] Upload speed has been reduced a little . Why ?

The cons stated above were once included in PROS as they were provided by HNS , but now they have been discontinued 🙁


UPDATE : 24/9/2016

This is my fourth year using HNS now . Facing constant random disconnections 🙁
It is time to dump them and switch to another ISP that provides a stable connection

Hahaha it got disconnected while updating this review too 😀

 

[varun120]

I'm also from thane west. My LCO provides Honesty i.e 1&1, but he is looting customers. He's taking more than 20000 rs. for 4mbps unltd annual connection. I might negotiate with hims and threaten him that I'd take some other connection, if he doesn't reduce the price. But my area is prone to more power cuts,so there would also be disconnections. But that can't be helped.
@ Thundurus, do you also get 200+ KBps on Idm in your 1mbps connection as shown in the screenshot? It would be nice as torrents can also be downloaded via IDM in full speed, and if I opt for 4mbps connection, I might be able to get 450 KBps + on torrents.

 

[thundurus]

Your LCO must be a franchisee of 1and1 , in that case i dont think he might be ready to lower the amount , and that amount is too much , here 5 mbps is for 9999 INR annual .
Yes i get 230-250 KBps on IDM and on chrome downloads as well sometimes . You can easily get more than 450+ on 4mbps connection .
Good luck !

 

[thundurus]

Just an update , apparently the HNS torrent cache no longer works so i change my rating from 5/5 to 4/5 .
Would really appreciate if the torrent cache gets back up online , its been 1-2 weeks now 🙁
Other than torrent cache everything else is working top notch .

 

[Pranav199]

I also have 1&1/hns and 1mbps plan but the problem is i am not getting lan speeds on PSN. rest all is working good!

 

[varun120]

I wanted to get 1&1, but the lco is looting people. 2mbps unlimited annual for 12000 rs, 4 Mbps annual @ 14000 rs. He has reduced his rates, but still he's charging a lot more than 1&1. I would have to look for better & reasonable alternatives. I don't know if joister or live ftth by sify is still available in my area or not. And there is new internet provider named Capsule, doesn't know much about it.

 

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[blueman24]

Are HNS Mumbai only?

 

[thundurus]

I also have 1&1/hns and 1mbps plan but the problem is i am not getting lan speeds on PSN. rest all is working good!

Did you used to get LAN speed earlier on PSN ? How many days have gone since you are not getting LAN speed on PSN ? I checked right now that PSN is supported by akamai so you should be getting speed .

Are HNS Mumbai only?

Yes only mumbai , 5net is also good and a bit similar to HNS but have heard that their service is not going well like speed caps and ping issues etc . 5net is available in pune , dont know about kolhapur though .
@Varun , goto 1and1 office and talk directly , 1and1 gives connection directly , there is no LCO involved in it . so talk with them and see . Good luck .

 

[Pranav199]

Did you used to get LAN speed earlier on PSN ? How many days have gone since you are not getting LAN speed on PSN ? I checked right now that PSN is supported by akamai so you should be getting speed .

i got my connection 1 month ago but I never got lan speeds on PSN. I think there is some problem with connection to akamai as whenever i use "nslookup zeus.dl.playstation.net" i get address of limelight cdn.

 

[varun120]

@ thundurus I live away from their headquarters. My lco is a franchise. Will they give me connection directly, if they do I'll be glad to take their annual 4mbps unlimited connection..

 

[blueman24]

Yes only mumbai , 5net is also good and a bit similar to HNS but have heard that their service is not going well like speed caps and ping issues etc . 5net is available in pune , dont know about kolhapur though.

Thanks for the reply. Seems like I will have to stick with bsnl ;/
Btw, why do these big players like bsnl, airtel do not have peering with Google, and other popular websites? OK, there may be legal problems with torrent cache but why don't they peer with legit sites. For example, downloading through origin.

 

[x720]

Bsnl has peering with Google. Not sure about airtel. Obviously, the improved latency would only if be visible if you live in the same city as the server.

In any case, you can't exceed your line speed. That's how ADSL works.

 

[blueman24]

Bsnl has peering with Google. And my ADSL downstream is 4 mbps . Doesn't that mean that I should be able to stream youtube @ 4mbps all the time. Or does fup also limit speed with the peering?

 

[x720]

FUP limits speed. BSNL treats all traffic the same.

 

[thundurus]

We have fibre backbone till our terrace switch then ethernet to home , thats why we can get full LAN speed from peering and use it to our advantage . Now why big players dont do peering is because they have to keep local servers in their datacenter , this might become a lot of overhead for their already crowded network . Its just that national major ISP dont want to deal with overheads of peering in every city , thats why maybe .
Also torrent cache is legal for ISP because the cache is automated and not under direct influence of anyone , what users do with this cache is not ISP responsibility . For eg : HNS has torrent cache of Linux distro that many people use as a mirror for fast downloading .