New Flat Rate looks good but .....

ButcherOfNog

its not much shaggin use to gamers outside dublin who dial the direct 01 numbers at the weekends. perhaps we "boggers" could organize and all mail tinet/indigo about this situation?

shank

You sure about that Buthcher, will they not cover the Dublin numbers aswell or only the 1891 nos. It wouldn't surprise me if they didn't and yeah that would really suck for you lads so get ringin telecom and harrass their a$$.

ButcherOfNog

well atm shank the discount rates only apply to the 1891 numbers. which smells even a bit for dublin users, try using the old indigo 01 number some evening shank, your ping will probably drop 20-30ms. and the flat rate won't cover you on it.

tis a bitter pill indeed. perhaps a dedicated gamers no. would be in order? i'd be willing to pay (a bit) more for a service like this. I'll be posting some stuff about this to the indigo & tinet newsgroups today so feel free to reply and cheer me on <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)">

Bates

hhhhm I think we all suffer from the illision that there are actually more people who play games over the net then there actually is. I would eat my hat if a dedicated gamers number was created for a few reasons:

1 There arnt enough people to warrant such a move by telecom

2It would be used mainly by people outside the dublin area which would cut the number down even more

3 The whole idea would be for us to save money I dont think many people would be willing to pay extra for it.

About the whole flat rate thing. I think its a bad idea. It will increase the stress on the national isp's even more (we allready complaing about how slow they are). If everyone could stay online all day for **** all think of the further congestion it would create. I know idea wise its cool but look at it from a isp's point of view its a nightmare.

Bates

Carnate

hmm i wonder where all that info came from Mr
Bates(really wanted to call him Master, doubt if the board would allow it ;}.

anyway the amount of gamers online was apparent for Quake players anyway, when the few gatherings which have been had has amounted to over 800 people attending, now thats a real figure!

with kali and quake.ie and indigo and the other isp's the number of serious gamers is on the increase.

Just thought i would add that ditty <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)">

CYA'S AT NETHOUSE TOMORROW better be dressed to impress..NOT!
bringing my new toy with me <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)">

Bates

800 internet gamers in the country?! You seem to be mistaken (or are taking into account those freaks who play wargames with little dices and pieces of card board). The estimated figure for internet gamers in this country (hard core ones anyway) is approx 150. This in any large corperations eyes is a very very small amount of people. If you are saying that after all the lan partys (i hate that term) amounted to 800 people in total your counting the same 150 people over and over! <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)">

No doubt that the people who are playing games seriously online is increaseing (but at a very small rate) this is partly due to the technical know how that is required to join a game of quake. I know its easy for us but think of the people who got a pc for christmas and they have had the ease of use of using consoles (no upgrades, no packetloss, no rate settings etc etc)

I dont mean to beat down our little community but we are still a very small minorty of internet users. Unless the pgl or cpl create a european division (or something similar is created here with strong corperate sponser backing nothing will really happen)

Ba "very serious this morning for some reason <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)"> tes

Dr_Teeth

The level of technical know-how required is changing immensely though. Look at Tribes - it requires basically *NO* configuration changes to work perfectly online. I changed my resolution, remapped one or two keys, and told it I was using a modem, but That's It.

The server browser works well also - I was playing on a server only a few minutes after I installed the game, and even now, when I know much more about the game than I did, I find there's very little that needs tweaking.

It looks like Quake3, UT and all the other new multiplayer-only games will go down the same route which it should open up online play to many more people. I can't wait. <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)">

Teeth.

Hobbes

I think Carnys count would be more correct. Your only getting that number on Quake heads. There are a lot of people who play online and have never played Quake, also never bother with any Irish servers.

UO being a good example of a fair few of Irish people playing, but the number of them that know about this board? 4-5 at the most. For that matter Tribes... this SS tribe, no one heard of <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)">

As for the ISP being congested, they will have to adapt or die. It will just mean increasing thier modem ratio.

Hobbes

What I find funny about this is that ESat can't offer the same thing because Telecom shaft them on the connection charge, so they would lose money to compete. Isn't free trade great <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/wink.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=";)">

SheroN

I reckon we send some big men around the Telecom offices and beat them up 'till my pings im prove and they stop trying to shaft me ffs:/

Bates

Hobbes fair point about people not playing on irish servers etc. Still cant see how it could amount to 800 people but hey no one has any hard facts so its hard to judge.

About isp's being congested. Its a lot more then adding more modems (well not modem but isdn ta's as thats what are used now). Its a whole issue about the internal networks being able to handle more traffic and the isp's backbone connections.

Dr Teeth excellent point got me on that one <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)">

Bates

H_K

the amount of quakers actually playing about once per week is under the 100 mark easily id say, and the amount of people outside dublin...its pretty crazy

ive been using this **** galway node for 3 years now and god i really couldnt see them having sympathy on the handfull of country gamers..

MikeS

Hi Folks,

Ok just a few points. First there actually is a HUGE amount of Quake Players all over the country and i would say its a lot more than 800 the only trouble is they HATE IT caouse in order to get any sorth of a good ping they have to dial into Dublin and the cost of that just puts them off straight away (no offence ment to Dublin) Secondly there is NOT enough variety on the Quake servrs...same levels same ppl same game etc there should be a few different levels added to keep interest going. Third ALL the irish servers are CRAP!! they cant handle any more than 8ppl at a time so most ppl observe for a while get p1ssed off and leave caouse they cant get a game. Forth i dunno if its me or not but there seems to be a lot more LPB's around nowdays and when an ord joe soap joins a game wiv a 150 ping and an a few lpb's are there it goes from 150 to 700+ Oh well i say blame it on 'Charlie' he's bound to get away with it <IMG SRC="http://lacerta.ucg.ie/boards/smile.gif&quot; WIDTH=15 HEIGHT=15 BORDER=0 ALT=":)">


MikeS

ste

lads, this flat rate is a joke.

it isn't FLAT.

It's u use the net for so many hours u pay this much.
U use it for this many hours and u pay that much.
Infact it might RAISE prices for us off peak time users, cos they'll come to an agreement between peak and off peak times for the ampunt of time rates. Therefore we won't be saving money, we'll be loosing money.

GEY!

Shinji

I'm not happy with it either, but it's not as bad as ste makes out. It will cost about 20-30 pounds for 100 hours of online time, which is actually a bit cheaper than what we actually pay now in off-peak times.

I just wanna know how much you pay if you go over the 100 hours....

Ja na,
Shin-[hates Telecom Eireann]-chan