Newsgroup

[ffutures]

On the whole I want to continue to read newsgroups, but Virgin/NTL are really clobbering the speed of NNTP transfers (so much so that they generally time out - I've just set the timeout Turnpike uses to ten minutes, which may fix that part).

What alternatives are there for accessing newsgroups? Not Google Groups, I hasten to add, I loathe the way they're organized.

Later, for anyone who doesn't read the comments The answer turned out to be pretty simple - collect news using the HTTP protocol instead, if the news server allows it.

Comments

[autopope.livejournal.com]

You might want to check whether Virgin have classified port 119 (NNTP) as a p2p thing and are throttling it on that basis. In which case your only solutions are (a) rent a VPN connection, or (b) ditch Virgin.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

That's the impression I'm getting. Moving to BT or something is looking more and more attractive, especially since a BT line with internet works out a good deal cheaper than my current phone line plus the separate NTL service.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

On checking the news.individual.net FAQ for this it looks like it's possible to configure to use HTTP connection instead. I'll give that a try.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Appears to work very well - got sixty messages in about two seconds.