Irish Broadband Ripwave still causing you problems??

Ardent

Well guys, how was your ripwave over the weekend? Apart from a few blips, mine was well behaved.

cutepape

Mine behaved well also.. ( clontarf area )
I got my green light on all the time... so thats nice

fatlog

hi,

i just got Ripwave last week. I know I know... I read all the posts but i dont really have any other option. Living in an apartment and not allowed to install an aerial so Breze is not an option. NTL is not available yet (i'm in dublin 8). so basically its eircom or Ripwave. And like most other people i'm reluctant to go near eircom.

anyways...
I setup the modem on saturday morning. I didn't get a steady signal until sunday night at 8 pm. Flashing red 99% of the time. The odd time it would get a signal which would alternate between red and amber for a few seconds before returning to its flashing red state. The signal wouldn't last more then 10-20 seconds at a time.

When i did get a signal on Sunday night it lasted about 3 hours. It stayed mostly amber but dropped to red a few times and dropped the connection a few times too. I was getting download speeds of about 25kb's.

anyway my questions...
is 25kb's about the best i can expect to get?
is there anyting i can do to improve the signal?
i noticed i am connecting to Base Station 120. what station is this?
my closest station is the Guinness Storehouse but i've read that this is already at peak capacity? is this true and am i alreday on it?

Ardent

Fatlog, to try and answer your questions:

1) I'm in Dublin 8 too, working off one of the masts near the Guinness Storehouse and I usually get 55+ k/s. It can be erratic at times and I've seen it crawl at barely dialup speeds some evenings. With more new customers like yourself this will probably become quite common.

2) There was a thread here not long ago where some guys were experimenting with a home-made satellite dish that their ripwave modem would sit in and they reckoned it improved their speeds. Do a search for "ripwave" and you should find them, pictures and all. Other than the McGuiver approach, you should place your modem near a window or as high up as possible for the best chance of connectivity. Some people find having it outside the house/apt improves things dramatically. Find a spot you think will work and leave the modem there for up to three hours for the base station to lock on solidly.

3) Not sure what the Base station IDs are.

Hope this helps.
Ardent

Eglinton

Ok folks, I'm living at the south end of Ranelagh D6. I can see the RTE mast out the window. I have Ripwave and it works as well as you'd expect it too. However I want to move closer to town so I've been looking at places around Dublin 2 and portobello area. There seems to be a gap in the coverage maps for this area so I was just wondering if anyone uses ripwave around here. I don't want to move and dins that it doesn't. I work on Leeson st and it doesn't work in the office (although its kinda isolated on ground floor)

GreeBo

well there is a tower on the sugar club so it should be ok....as long as you are high enough.
You might even get RTE from there.
I had my working on leeson St but it appeared to be connecting to RTE...

Eglinton

As far as I know the transceiver on sugar club is for breeze and not Ripwave but I'm open to correction. Its not on their coverage maps for Ripwave anyway

GreeBo

Eglinton wrote:

As far as I know the transceiver on sugar club is for breeze and not Ripwave but I'm open to correction. Its not on their coverage maps for Ripwave anyway

Its not Ripwave yet but they said they plan to do it "soon". Depending on exactly here you are you might get the RTE one from Dub 2.

Enigma365

Theres a ripwave antenna on the ESB building on fitzwilliam street(between merrion square and baggot street). It is BTS 110.

Its what I connect to from Harcourt Street with an amber signal(when its connected-which is at best 80% of the time).

fatlog

has anyone here ever seen this fabled green signal light on the ripwave modem?????

Eglinton

What do I have to do to check which mast I'm connected to and can I change this myself?

GreeBo

fatlog wrote:

has anyone here ever seen this fabled green signal light on the ripwave modem?????

Yep but it doesnt make so much difference to pings/throughput.
If you can get a solid amber and the connection is behaving (not dropping packets/timing out) then you are fine.

fatlog

hi greebo

i get a solid amber light but the download speeds only average about 25kb's. Not exactly great.

Someone further up in this post mentioned they were getting download speeds in around 50kb's.

any tips on improving performance? any point in ringing IBB?

fatlog

Eglinton wrote:

What do I have to do to check which mast I'm connected to and can I change this myself?

theres a diagnostic tool packaged with the modwm. it monitors the signal strength etc...

it also tells you which high point you are connected to.

i think you need to ring IBB to change the high point you connect to...

although someon mentioned that if you point it out a window on the other side of the building you may pick up a different high point.

Tazz T

Enigma365 wrote:

Theres a ripwave antenna on the ESB building on fitzwilliam street(between merrion square and baggot street). It is BTS 110.

Its what I connect to from Harcourt Street with an amber signal(when its connected-which is at best 80% of the time).

Really. I live maybe 500m away and connect to 3 Rock (BTS 246) over 10km away. Are you sure that's not just Breeze.

GreeBo

fatlog wrote:

hi greebo

i get a solid amber light but the download speeds only average about 25kb's. Not exactly great.

Someone further up in this post mentioned they were getting download speeds in around 50kb's.

any tips on improving performance? any point in ringing IBB?

I usually get 50Kb/s but remember that it depends on where you are downloading from.
Not much point in ringing them if you have 25kB/s they will jsut say that you are getting above the minimum service levels.

GreeBo

fatlog wrote:

theres a diagnostic tool packaged with the modwm. it monitors the signal strength etc...

it also tells you which high point you are connected to.

only if you are not using a router..

fatlog wrote:

although someon mentioned that if you point it out a window on the other side of the building you may pick up a different high point.

it will only pick up another signal if you are set to nomadic, otherwise it will only authenticate to the original site.
They might change it to nomaic for you if you have having problems, did bugger all for me tbh.

lampsie

Tazz T wrote:

Really. I live maybe 500m away and connect to 3 Rock (BTS 246) over 10km away. Are you sure that's not just Breeze.

I'm on BTS110 also, must be ripwave too (tho the website doesnt say that last time I checked)

- lamps

Ardent

Enigma365 wrote:

Theres a ripwave antenna on the ESB building on fitzwilliam street(between merrion square and baggot street). It is BTS 110.

Its what I connect to from Harcourt Street with an amber signal(when its connected-which is at best 80% of the time).

Are you sure? If you're right, then that's fugged up because I live beside the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin 8 and that's the base station I connect to!!

Edit: The Navini diagnostic thingy tells me that my distance from BTS110 is 350 meters???

ballooba

BTS 110 and 120 are Guinness.

I tried to start a sticky of the Base Station IDs but it never caught on. :?