New Netsource problems

po0k

http://www.netsource.ie/html/servicestatus.html

But aside from that, I;'ve been experiencing regular disconnections (at least 2 a day) and serious bandwidth chokage in the evenings over the last two weeks.

1) Disconnections
It requires getting the router to reconnect which is annoing first of all, but often I get "Auth. Fail" message back and have to repeatedly press Connect (often 10-15 times in a row) before success.

2) Bandwidth
In the afternoon-early morning times I get some very bad speeds, down in the low single-digit KB/sec range, sometimes into the bytes/sec which makes browsing a pain and even IRC will regularly time out.
I don't see how this could be contention as Netsource have stopped taking Residential customers and business customers wouldn't be downloading much after business hours in general.
It would seem to me that the "maintenance" might be dropping the number of lines they have, forcing everyone else onto the remaining bandwith.
Or maybe they're trying to raise their profit margins by limiting the bandwidth supply to customers?

Anyone else having similar problems?

gurramok

Sounds like your being throttled.
Your description of events is near exact to what happened to my connection last sept\oct when i was throttled last.

Maybe you went over the cap ?

My connection is grand since then and now, no problems whatsoever.

The Brigadier

I was never throttled, but I did find myself losing my connection repeatedly.

I'd dump them and go with another provider if I were you. Go Wireless if you can get a signal, from either Leap or IBB....

I am on Leap now - Yes the 512K price is 129 ex vat, but that is synchronous and compare that to the prices at Netsource, plus Domain, plus Line rental...

I have yet to drop a connection at all with Leap, and my pings are rock solid..

po0k

Originally posted by gurramok
Sounds like your being throttled.
Your description of events is near exact to what happened to my connection last sept\oct when i was throttled last.

Maybe you went over the cap ?

My connection is grand since then and now, no problems whatsoever.

We haven't been throttled, at certain times of the day we get the full ~50KB/sec.
There are 4 of us running off the line, and at the moment there is no other provider who can give us a package to suit our needs.
EsatBT Business was the closest thing, but due to Eircom leaving a ****loat of old kit in our exchange, Esat can't put their equipment in there.
Upgrading to Netsource SME would cost ~€24 more than Esat Business, with higher ping, lower quality of service and half the upload bandwidth.
I'm in the west of the country and as such there's very very little choice when it comes to broadband, not to mention living in rented accomodation (which I'll be leaving in 2 months time), so any sort of proper wireless setup is out of the qeustion.
Don't have any decent LOS anyways.
I've been looking for a way to jump off Netsource for quite a while now, and there doesn't seem to be anything else that fits the bill, unless eircom/IOL/UTV don't mind if you download about 30Gigs every month, which is pretty much what I'm looking for.
Not that I will downlaod that much, but I don't like feeling like there's a gun held to my head if I go over the cap, especially when I'm paying €20 more than the 8Gig capper crowd for a measily 8 extra gigs (which is less in reality as NS count upload as part of the cap too).

Robbo

It definitely has been *slower* in the evenings but it's still not bad. I've been pulling stuff down through apt-get from the Heanet mirror at ~30 k/sec.

Ryaner

I know eircom have been doing alot of work on the exchanges lately but I'm getting worried about ns. I thought they had fixed all their problems but all these kinda things are really worrying me. I didnt know they count upload and download in the 16gb limit. That really sucks.
I should have it up and running within the next week or so and I'm dreading to see what the pings are link. My modem has been getting better pings than some of the ns people lately:(

po0k

Date: Mon, 09 Feb 2004 12:57:33 +0000
From: Netsource Support <support@netsource.ie>
To: syxpak@**********
Subject: Netsource Acceptable User Policy



Dear Sir / Madam,

Following an analysis of your Business Broadband SOHO usage in January
please note that your usage has exceeded the acceptable traffic level
described in our Acceptable Usage Policy ( AUP ). Your download level
over these days was 22.02 GBytes.

We are writing to advise that you will be contending for network resources
with the subset of other users whose usage also exceeded the acceptable traffic
level. This contention level is at the same proportion as all our customers,
however you will experience slower service that heretofore should this subset
of users continue to download at above average levels.

We will be reviewing usage patterns again based on the month of November.

Yours Faithfully,

Netsource Support

PS : the AUP is available at http://www.netsource.ie/html/netsourcepolicies.html#aup

What a load of cock and balls.
I've been paying €66 to them since June, far and above what any other DSL in the same category costs, for a meagrely higher cap, and I never signed the new T&Cs either.

Asok

cunts

The Brigadier

You downloaded 22GB and they want to punish you...shower of ****ers!!

Nobody should touch Netsource with a barge pole!

longword

I'm not sure I see the problem here.

They're not cutting him off.

They're not imposing a limit on what he can download.

They're not charging him EUR36.30 for every gigabyte used over a fair limit.

They're just moving his connection to with users who have a similar download pattern. What's the big deal?

Tazzle

:rolleyes:

MrPinK

I think Netsource's solution to ppl who break the cap is pretty damn clever actually. The heavy users still get the full ~50Kb/s some of the time, but can't use up more that their share of the bandwidth.

po0k

Originally posted by MrPinK
I think Netsource's solution to ppl who break the cap is pretty damn clever actually. The heavy users still get the full ~50Kb/s some of the time, but can't use up more that their share of the bandwidth.

The service is now unusable, there are 4 of us on the line, 6Gigs over a 16Gig transfer limit (includes upload and download, unlike any other ISP) which I'm paying ~€20 over the competitors for a month is unacceptable.
This is a product which was and still is being advertised as having "No download limit".
http://www.netsource.ie/html/access_solutions.html

Business Broadband Solutions
As a business to business ISP, we recognise the need for businesses to have a single solution for all e-mail and Internet needs, therefore with each of our Business Broadband services, you have the option to include additional internet/e-mail services, such as a domain name, e-mail, ISDN back up, E-mail virus scanning and hosting

NETSOURCE has three broadband services available. Each broadband service includes the following as standard:

* A fixed IP address
* No download limits
* 2 month rolling contract
* Telephone and e-mail technical support

Business Broadband Service Details Price
(ex.Vat@21%)
SOHO
** min. requirement applies
*512k/128k Broadband access

A fixed IP address

2-month rolling contract term

No download limit

One free POP3 e-mail address

Installation Options:

Onsite: € 165.00
Self Install: € 81.81
Monthly Access: € 45.00
Annual Access: € 495.00
(receive last month free)

Hardware Options
(All hardware supplied pre-configured with full technical support) USB Modem
(inc. one dual & two single micro-filters)
Ethernet Modem € 119.00


€ 229.00

I have still not had the requested domain name registered, and have experienced serious connection problems over the last 2 months in Galway.
So effectively I'm paying an extra €10 a month into their hands for no increase in services.
For the preceding months we've been well under the cap and this level of "service" for the price I'm paying is unacceptable.
I never agreed or signed the new Terms & Conditions and have used the "service" within reason.
It has not been abused and I fully intend to take this matter to the court and the Ombudsman.

longword

To provide a decent quality of service to a number of 512kbit/sec users each doing 22GB a month, the underlying product would need to have a contention ratio of about 8:1 rather than the 48:1 of the current RADSL offerings. Are you prepared to pay more than six times the current rates for such a low contention ratio? Are you even prepared to pay EUR89 + VAT a month for their SME service with a 24:1 ratio? If not I'd suggest you have two choices:

1) Sit down and STFU.

2) Become a Teleco, use ULMP (unbundled wires only), and start fitting DLSAMs into exchanges yourself to kit out an 8:1 DSL service for retail at twenty quid a month. You'll have lots of customers

BKtje

as i said in the other thread perhaps you should think about moving to esat business. They are in some exchanges in galway and they never will cut you off or even have any problems with em. Tho thats cos you pay a feck load for it

Jorinn

Originally posted by longword
I'm not sure I see the problem here.

They're not cutting him off.

They're not imposing a limit on what he can download.

They're not charging him EUR36.30 for every gigabyte used over a fair limit.

They're just moving his connection to with users who have a similar download pattern. What's the big deal?

Um, the service is less than desirable, they're sending out letters when a service they advertised and still do as having no limits saying, that, um, he shouldn't of taken that to be the truth. Oh and the connection is pinging out. An yeah I noticed that during the day as well with irc timing out. Not on all servers though.

MrPinK

Originally posted by Jorinn
Um, the service is less than desirable, they're sending out letters when a service they advertised and still do as having no limits saying, that, um, he shouldn't of taken that to be the truth

They don't stop you from downloading after a certain amount. They just stick you in the heavy users playpen. I still wouldn't call it 'no limits' but the term is debatable so they can probably get away with it. It doesn't matter what the advertisement spiel says anyway. The AUP clearly says 16Gb is the acceptable transfer limit before restrictions will be impossed. He knew this, he broke this (albeit accidently), and they took action. There'd be no point in having an AUP if they didn't enforce it. And given the quality of the service before the AUP was introduced, most people would probably be glad that it is enforced.

I never agreed or signed the new Terms & Conditions and have used the "service" within reason

The customers with IOL never signed new T&C when their cap was increased from 6 to 8Gb. That doesn't mean that old limit should still apply to them. Both IOL and Netsource reserve the right to change the T&C, for good or for bad. If you find the new conditions unacceptable then you cancel the service then and there. A change in T&C would probably give you good grounds for getting out of a contract. If you are aware of the new conditions and continue using the service then you are effectively accepting them.

po0k

Originally posted by B-K-DzR
as i said in the other thread perhaps you should think about moving to esat business. They are in some exchanges in galway and they never will cut you off or even have any problems with em. Tho thats cos you pay a feck load for it

I was very very close to switching over, but my exchange is the only one of three that has no Esat presence for the business package. This is due to eircom's dodgey dealings (see the Broadband Stories thread for more on the Shantalla Exchange problem).
We've considered the SME package upgrade but the "no cap" is not worth the increase in price compared to what is available and we'd still have to pay line rental to eircom.
Also longword, for the past 3 months we've been under the cap to the best of our judgement and yet when we go over it by a small bit we get penalised at an extremely critical time (3 of us have 3rd and final year projects which require a usable connection for research).
If Netsource decided to impose a cap in the AUP, why didn't they provide some way for the customer to monitor his/her usage?
It's not right to expect the customer to fork over money for a bandwidth monitoring and logging app when it is netsource who are suppose to supply this information on demand.
Also, over the last 2 months the service has been poor (not speeds but pings and reliability being serious issues).

Going to attempt and reason with them to get back on a normal line an are currently looking for a new ISP.
On top of that I'm moving to Dublin in 6 weeks.