Telus Smart Hub Question

[DJDiggler]

I recently talked my rural parents to drop their xplornet wireless and try the telus smart hub out. It seems like a pretty good deal on the Cost Assure small business plan, $75 for 3GB data and unlimited canada wide voice. (data is flex plan and goes up $10 for 5GB, $15 for 10GB). They were paying $100+ for crapy xplornet and a telus landline.

The Hub was easily setup (plug it in ), and connected with excellent signal to the 3g/4g network right away...

Now the problem is they hooked up an old wired phone and made calls just fine, however when they hook up the multi handset cordless phones they normally use there is no dial tone whatsoever! I've trouble shot everything I could think of: cable, interference, ect, but the dang Hub does not work with their phones!

Reading the HUB documentation they constantly mention "supports standard analog phones"... their set has a digital answering machine on the base, could that be the problem? I told them to pick up this Panasonic Set to try tomorrow but it says "digital" also... I think all cordless phones nowadays are digital!

Any ideas? Anyone with experience useing the Telus Smart Hub?

[mobifree]

There's a series of keys you have to dial to enable the dial tone.

One of my friends have the hub and they were given the instructions from Telus tech support.

If I can find it from him, I will post it here.

[DJDiggler]

Well for anyone else who may stumble onto this thread the problem was their old phone... the new digital panisonics without a built in answering machine work fine.

[TorontoColin]

Thanks for updating us!

[envirogeek]

I'm coming up to the end of my 2 year contract with Rogers for my Rocket Hub, so Rogers are now calling me regularly to sign a new contract.

I'm in a spot on the north side of Pigeon Lake, Alberta where it looks like cellular internet will continue to be my best choice until I put up a 60 foot tower for wireless internet, so... I am considering whether to stay with Rogers or switch to Telus.

Kind of like a frying pan/fire decision because I am not really a fan of either company, but I would appreciate feedback from anyone using the Telus Smart Hub in Alberta.

What kind of top download speed(s) have you seen?
Does the hub stay connected consistently?
How is the performance during busy time periods of the day, or on busy weekends?
Do you have full administrative access to the hub? (Rogers locks me out of things I think I should be able to control myself on the Ericsson W35)

@DJDiggler - since your address is in Leduc, are your parents also located in the Leduc County area? How have they found the performance/service for their installation?

Thanks all...

[DJDiggler]

Hi envirogeek, My parents actually live in the Grande Prairie area so I can't say what the experience will be like with the greater population/user base around the edmonton area. I am quite impressed with the telus service so far.

My parents were able to transfer over there number with some hassle, (lots of calls to telus which may be because of them not being technical in the least!). Speed is great, just did a test and got: (up visiting for christmas!)

Speedtest.net
75ms ping
3.6 Mbps Down
2.15 Mbps Up

Using the internet is very fast and there are no slowdowns that I have noticed during my visits, and not a single dropout, (they definitly would call me). They also have the voice service on the hub and it has worked flawlessly also, though a slight 5 second or so delay between dialing and connecting when making a call is kind of driving my dad nuts... he is adverse to change

No bill surprises/errors so far and very impressed with the service, MUCH better than the Xplorenet wireless IR internet they used to have! Is that what your planing on switching to? I really recommend you avoid it as the speed was crappy and they are throttling everything to extremes (xplornet is anyway, not sure about other line of sight providers).

[envirogeek]

Thanks for the reply.

Your speedtest is showing better latency and both up and down speeds than I'm getting at the moment on my Rogers connection.

Is that with or without an external antenna? Do you have an idea how far your parents are from a Telus tower?

Right now we are using the Rocket Hub at a part time residence. I'm not going to go to Xplornet if I can avoid it, but the cellular data costs are still a little stiff in comparison to cable or DSL.

Unfortunately, I'll never see a wired internet connection at this location.

[DJDiggler]

No external antenna, just the one attached to the hub. The hub shows a full 6 bars and -77dbm (strong) 3G signal strength so they must have a tower very close. I agree the cellular plans are a bit limited, but as long as you don't intend on downloading movies there is more than enough for normal browsing, updates, and getting the odd program. The auto adjusting charge of $35 for 3gb, $45 for 5gb, and $60 for 10gb is a decent deal as far as I can tell. (these are the small business cost assure prices).

I'd suggest using the Opera browser with Turbo mode on, (very good compression of web pages, reduces data use by a large amount).

As for your above question about the hub configuring options, it seems to be a fairly full featured menu and nothing is locked out as far as I can tell. My parents connect to the hub over the included wireless N interface and there have been no issues with that aspect of the hub. Here is the manual which shows all options in the menus:

Telus Smart Hub User Guide.pdf

Glad to provide more info... I went through quite a bit of research setting my parents up on this plan, they turn to me for all technical stuff and didn't want to steer them wrong!

[envirogeek]

Thanks for the feedback DJ.

If they aren't using an antenna, they must be very close to a tower.

Looks like there are some pros in favor of Telus, and some things that aren't any different (logging and admin access). Telus says that "all important system events are logged." in their setup guide - but they don't give you any control over the logging - you just have to trust them. If you look at the Netcomm un-Telus-ized version of their System Log setup PDF, you can see they show how to configure a Syslog server.

(FlameOn) The items that both Rogers and Telus are locking down annoy the HE_Double_Hockey_Sticks out of me. Especially since I am paying roughly 10% of my monthly data use for Rogers to log the fact that people are trying to break into my system, but they don't give me any control over the logging. (FlameOff)

Cons - I'm reading elsewhere that Telus don't even offer a static IP address, and that they block all incoming ports. This would prevent me from doing remote management.

I'll have to do some more research before my Rogers contract expires.

Thanks again, I appreciate the help.

[conundrum2]

How did you get the "small business cost assure" plan? It's $10 per month cheaper than their personal plan.

Did you have to pay the $35 set up fee? On their site, they say it can be waived under certain circumstances, but when they're asked, they say it's mandatory.

[DJDiggler]

My parents actually have a small home business, but since they signed up themselves I don't really know what telus requires for proof, if any. I imagine they would want some kind of verification or everyone would go to small business because it's cheaper. I can give them a call tomorrow to see what info they needed.

They did have to pay the fee, I tried to tell them to fight to get it removed but my parents really aren't the type to do much bargaining so someone else might have better luck.

As an update with the smart hub service everything is still going great... we've done some skype video calls with perfect quality and I use teamviewer frequently to remotely fix/update their computer. Works much faster than used to with xplornet, (skype never worked at all with them, to slow upload). They went over the 3gb limit in december, (my fault was up for christmas ), and the tiered billing worked as described, only $10 extra charge that month for the 5gb tier.

[conundrum2]

Have they had any problems like this? I wonder if it would be best to cut the power when it's not in use.

Still tempted, but I'm not impressed by the setup fee, or the extra $10 per month.

[timcat]

I am currently hooked with Broadband Cable 5 dwn and .5 up @ 45.00 per month. I also have a VOIP home phone through Primus for an another 30.00 a month.
I was thinking of getting this mostly so I can take my internet with me when I travel.
I also pay another 70.00 per month for my mobile Iphone with Data/voice plan.
The total is 145.00 in what I am currently paying for all three. I have 120 vac inverter power in my work van so thats not a problem. I could plug a landline cordless inside the back of my van and have my home phone and mobile wifi for my Iphone...right? What am I missing?
I make maybe 100 mins per month calls on both of my current landline and mobile.
I am not a gamer but my skype has to work!
My big question is what happens to texting on my personal phone. I use my work phone for 99% of all worked related calls. My company pays for that cell.
But how can I keep texting on my side of this with this hub?

[DJDiggler]

Yes, all you need is power and a telus signal and you have internet/home phone. Not sure about texting but if it will work over wireless your fine. Is there an app for that?

Edit: Yes there is! one here. http://www.talkatone.com/ and many others.