microfilters

[krysia]

Not sure if I should post this here or in the broadband section, but I was wondering about getting new microfilters, as I'm not sure how good the ones I have are (and the little arms that hold them in place have broken off two of them).  I've done a search, and two seem especially good:  Excelsus z-420P2J and ADSL Nation XF-IE.  Anyone know anything about either or have others to recommend?  I have 5 phones on one line, so I want something good.

[Rik]

The ADSL Nation xf-1E is the one I recommend, Krysia, I'd say they were best of breed.

You might want to check the REN numbers on your phones, btw. The line is limited to a total value of 4, and most phones have a REN of 1.

[Lance]

I too would also recommend the XF-1E's, and use these myself!

edit: getting brain in gear!

[mogden]

Can you put the modem/router near the BT master socket? Is it an NTE5 socket?

If so I can recommend the replacement faceplate from Solwise.

http://www.solwise.co.uk/adsl_splitters.htm 2nd from left. While you're at it get the insertion tool from lower in the page.

This prefilters the line before it gets to the rest of the house, making this the only ADSL filter you need. The set cost me $14.18 and put an (estimated) half meg on my ADSL speed!

So it might work out cheaper that way. HTH.

[Sebby]

Another vote for XF-1Es here.

If you have an NTE5 master socket and you could plug your router into the master socket, the ADSL Nation XTE-2005 filtered faceplate is, more than likely, going to give you better performance.

[Ann]

I too suggest changing the faceplate for the main socket if you haven't already done so.  I got mine from Clarity and had a good back and forth email conversation with the guy about it afterwards.  Very amusing it was.  Definitely one of the good guys.

http://www.clarity.it/telecoms/adsl_faceplate.htm

[krysia]

Thank you - that's really helpful.  I've ordered the ADSL Nation XF-1E microfilters, thanks to your recommendations.  I'll look into changing the faceplate, but my configuration is a bit complicated.  My original line is a BT one with 3 extensions.  When I used dial-up, I got a second line via NTL cable with two extensions.  Then when I got Broadband, I cancelled the NTL line and got an engineer to add the NTL cabling to the BT line.  All five phones on the line work, and my sync rates are okay - around 5000 during the day dropping in the evening to c. 4500, 4300, or sometimes lower (my IP profile is usually 3500 but sometimes goes up to 4000).  I know the engineer changed the socket in the study where the router is located, but I don't know if it's a master or not - it's part of the original NTL cabling, but the other NTL socket comes between it and where the wire is joined to the BT line (if that makes sense!).  I wire my desktop into the router and only use the wireless facility if I need to use the laptop elsewhere in the house (which happens rarely).

[Rik]

If you can identify the BT master socket, Krysia, and fit the filtered face plate there, using Cat 5 cable to carry the ADSL signal to the router, you'll get the best possible performance from it. (Slightly better would be to move the router to the master socket and run the ethernet connections from there, but it's likely to be a marginal gain.)