Magnet chatter

Sniipe

Hey, was looking up Broadband for my new rented accomodation in Inchicore and www.getbroadband.ie (great site) told me about magnet. I didn't know anything about it so I rang them up. Very interesting offer:
Magnet Entertainment Lite @ €38 p/m (+line rental of €24)
4 meg download using ASDL2+ with a contention ratio of 1:1 and 512kb upload. Thats a heck of a lot faster than my Eircom 2meg line(recenlty upgraded I think).
Their telephony is cheaper than Eircom in every aspect and there is free local and national calls anytime. This would be faster internet and cheaper telephone calls.
I should be going for this BUT I have a few things niggling at me.
I don't mind extra equipment for phone but the parents wouldn't like to change numbers or any extra complications with a phone. So do I keep the same number? - NO - According to Mark from Magnet (1890535353) Eircom in the last month have dissallowed the whole keeping your number thing.
1:1 contention ratio - so if I have a 4meg line - I get almost 4 meg a sec (depending on latency).
Telephone charges : Mobiles; 23cent peak, 17c off - England; 11.5c peak, 10.53c evenings, 9.33c weekends - 1850, 1890's; regular - National, local and northern Ireland; Free anytime
I don't even know what kind of number I'll have or how much it will cost others to ring me; I presume they are normal.
100gig p/m dload limit sound good too!
I expected more recent chatter here on this...
Oh yeah, they say there budget for advertising for each month will be bigger than what Guinness spend per year...!!! yeah right, we'll see I guess.

djmarkus

1:1 contention ratio?

"I'm sceptical as you know, ted"

Sniipe

djmarkus wrote:

1:1 contention ratio?

yeah, saw that somewhere or they told me on the phone, can't find it now, but I'm pretty sure they said that.

kdouglas

1:1 contention ratio is doubtful, however afaik eircom have to let you keep your number if you want because the whole idea of being able to transfer your number is to do with anti-competitive practices.

although i could be completely wrong.

smiaras

This post has been deleted.

cgarvey

Couple of corrections..

Porting your phone number and porting your phone line (LLU) are 2 different processes, according to eircom, and are not compatible processes. This is the same problem Smart Telecom are facing. We've noone to blame other than ComReg for not coming up with an LLU process that is workable (and maybe the DCMNR for not making them do so).

There is no connection between ADSL2+ and contention, so it's incorrect to say it's uncontended because they use that technology. I very much doubt it's an uncontended service (at those prices), and if they're advertising that, I don't belive them. If anything, they may have moved the contention from the DSLAM to further up along the pipe, so that they can stream to customers at full speed (for TVoIP), but once you leave their network I'd put money on it being contended (otherwise they are implementing a completely unscalable solution). If that is the case, then techincally it's not uncontended, but compared to other telco/ISPs use of the term, it is.

.cg

Sponge Bob

Sniipe wrote:

So do I keep the same number? - NO - According to Mark from Magnet (1890535353) Eircom in the last month have disallowed the whole keeping your number thing.
1:1 contention ratio - so if I have a 4meg line - I get almost 4 meg a sec (depending on latency).

Either you took it down wrong Sniipe or Mark lied ....and I fear that as Mark sounds like a salesman I suspect him not you .

a) Eircom never allowed number portability to Magnet ever ever ever ever EVER . Its not recent .

b) 1:1 contention is rubbish of the highest order although Magnet speeds are very good and there is no congestion issue with their network . You simply do not get it for that price. The TV portion of their service is 1:1 but not the BB .

c) Transfer primarily depends on factors OTHER than latency .....such as the transfer capacity of the remote site which may not shovel data out at 4mbits so you cannot download it and other factors .

Magnet have a very good product and should train their staff to accentuate the many positive aspects of that product rather than talk salesman sh1te .

Snaga

Every ISP in the world runs a contended core IP network - this is the way it is and as long as the ISP keeps its core capacity above demand - then there is no congestion and everyone is happy.

When ISP's talk about contention they talk about network access contention. i.e. you are contended at your point of entry to the ISP's network with x number of other customers.

This is an artificial contention that is designed into (for example) the bitstream ADSL service.

Now if an ISP does not contend the customer at the access point into the network - and always ensures that their core network is uncongested (As any service provider should!) - then is this not effectiviely 1:1 contention from the customers point of view?

Blaster99

Indeed. But has anyone ever experienced congestion with Eircom? Apart from recent problems that were probably upgrade related. Eircom should really stop talking about contention and instead highlight that there is no contention with ADSL and this can be an advantage over wireless and cable where there is inherent access contention.

bk

Blaster99 wrote:

Indeed. But has anyone ever experienced congestion with Eircom? Apart from recent problems that were probably upgrade related. Eircom should really stop talking about contention and instead highlight that there is no contention with ADSL and this can be an advantage over wireless and cable where there is inherent access contention.

You know that access contention on cable and wireless is equaly as bs as core network contention. As long as it is all managed correctly there is no reason why a customer shouldn't get 100% of their advertiesed speed.

As an example with NTL cable BB you get close to 100% of the advertiesed speed, while with Eircom DSL you get about 80%. This is despite cable having "access contention" and DSL not having it.

Snaga

bk wrote:

As an example with NTL cable BB you get close to 100% of the advertiesed speed, while with Eircom DSL you get about 80%. This is despite cable having "access contention" and DSL not having it.

This is for a different reason - DSLAMS use ATM over the copper to the DSL modem. The modem converts this to ethernet for the home user. Authentication is provided by PPP which sits on top of the Ethernet portion.

Eircom provide you with a (example) 2Mb ATM connection between the DSLAM and the modem. The inefficiencies which creep in running ethernet over ATM, and then PPP over ethernet reduce your throughput by about 15%.

They could just as easily increase the ATM speed to 2Mb+15% to take this into account (Like some of the LLU operators do, BT(LLU only), Smart Telecom, possibly Magnet). But Eircom choose not to.

This has nothing to do with them not being able to

skywalker

Sponge Bob wrote:

a) Eircom never allowed number portability to Magnet ever ever ever ever EVER . Its not recent . .

The strange thing about this issue is that in the signup form on the magnet website Here, it says: "I understand that my telephone service will be provided by Magnet Entertainment and that this is a Voice over Internet service". So It should be the same process as the likes of blueface.ie surely.

Although why their charging €24 line rental for a voip service should also be brought up if thats the case.

paulm17781

Magnet use VOIP at the exchange. They just point it out as Sky boxes and traditional modems won't work. They still have to move the line where as with Blueface you are cancelling the line.

paulm17781

Something just occured to me. If Magnet use VOIP at the exchange, as Smart do. Does that not mean your line is data only?

Are data only lines not charged a very low or zero monthly rental by eircon?

If I am right, why do Magnet charge €24 for a line Smart provide for free?

Blaster99

This would seem like an elegant way of fixing Eircom's number porting problem as Magnet can port your existing number off Eircom's network and assign it to their VoIP service. I like.

skywalker

paulm17781 wrote:

Something just occured to me. If Magnet use VOIP at the exchange, as Smart do. Does that not mean your line is data only?

Are data only lines not charged a very low or zero monthly rental by eircon?

If I am right, why do Magnet charge €24 for a line Smart provide for free?

Thats exactly what I said.

Blaster99 wrote:

This would seem like an elegant way of fixing Eircom's number porting problem as Magnet can port your existing number off Eircom's network and assign it to their VoIP service. I like.

It should be in theory, but it isnt. Magnet assign you a new number as indicated on the sign up form I linked to above. However they still charge you the line rental for the priviledge it would appear.

paulm17781

skywalker wrote:

Thats exactly what I said.

Sorry, I hadn't noticed that.

Seems they are playing on the ignorance of the general public. Good to see the alternative telcos are raping customers wallets too. :rolleyes:

Snaga

The problem is Eircom use the CLI to identify the copper pair itself. Regardless of whether it has 'traditional voice' on it or not - the pair is in use and therefore Eircom must have a way of identifying it.

So it makes no difference in the 'porting sense' that Magnet use voip.

Blaster99

With LLU there are two rental policies. The LLU provider can either pay an LLU line rental or it can opt for a shared line rental which is very low and the customer continues to pay full Eircom line rental. Smart has opted for the former, it sounds like Magnet has gone for the latter.

When a number is ported off the network, Eircom needs to identify the line somehow so they will obviously assign a new random number. It wouldn't require much imagination to figure out a process around this that allows the original number to be ported off while keeping the line in service.

Blaster99

In fact, it is possible to move and keep the phone number so obviously Eircom already has a process in place to deal with this. That is essentially a number port.

tk123

Sponge Bob wrote:

Either you took it down wrong Sniipe or Mark lied ....and I fear that as Mark sounds like a salesman I suspect him not you.

Magnet have a very good product and should train their staff to accentuate the many positive aspects of that product rather than talk salesman sh1te .

I know the Mark you were talking to - he's not a salesman(he laughed when i showed him the post:v: ) he's an agent in a call centre that covers a bunch of different services including Magnet. The 1890 num is a information line - the agents use a knowlegebase/script written by Magnet to answer your questions...

cgarvey

Snaga wrote:

The problem is Eircom use the CLI to identify the copper pair itself.

I don't think they do.

What of the dry pairs, what of soft dial-tones, what of number hunting, what of centronix, etc.

They may reference the phone number for convenience, but I don't belive this is a line identifier. Further more, I believe they're using this as a lame excuse to thwart LLU efforts. If I were ComReg, I'd be saying to eircom "too bad, if you're using a non-unique identifier, that doesn't belong to you, to identify your assets, then that is your inefficiency and not another operator or cusomter's problem". "If" is in bold, because I've a sneaky suspicion that telcos & ComReg all know this is not the case, but it's not easy to prove! I'm not ComReg though.

Sponge Bob

Blaster99 wrote:

Smart has opted for the former, it sounds like Magnet has gone for the latter.

It seems that Magnet have gone for Shared LLU all right and WLR for line rental , I wonder if I should ring Mark

cormac_byrne

paulm17781 wrote:

Something just occured to me. If Magnet use VOIP at the exchange, as Smart do. Does that not mean your line is data only?

Are data only lines not charged a very low or zero monthly rental by eircon?

If I am right, why do Magnet charge €24 for a line Smart provide for free?

Magnet is VoIP at the customer end as well as the exchange, found this after signing up and was asked if I wanted an IP phone or ATA.

i.e. the line is data only

Smart give you a regular phone service, i.e analog phone connected to line via microfilter.

The smart setup should work in the event of a power failure, the Magnet won't.

However Magnet are providing IPTV so it's hard to compare the packages

Linoge

eh.... does anyone actually have Magnet BB??!!!!

I'm seriously thinking about changing over to them. Has anyone got any feedback?

bk

Linoge wrote:

eh.... does anyone actually have Magnet BB??!!!!

I'm seriously thinking about changing over to them. Has anyone got any feedback?

I don't have, I have only seen one person with it who reviewed it, do a search.

AFAIR he said the BB works well, but the TV channel lineup and picture quality aren't great.

cormac_byrne

I'm in the process of signing up, the hardware arrived today 2Wire 2700HGV wireless/router/modem + AmiNET 110 set top box + Swissvoice IP10S IP phone

Eircom line still live so I've still got a bit of waiting to do before I can test them.

Wasn't expecting the wireless modem, asked for the default one. No point in paying extra €140 as I've already got a wireless router with 2 port VoIP ATA.

Also it appears the router has a 2 port VoIP ATA built in, but only 1 RJ11 (second line on outer pair maybe?)

Will post update when it goes live

edunon

I'm enjoying Magnet for a week now, really fast, downloading +5gb a day sometimes, with no problem at all. Very, very, very happy with them. The phone support is also brilliant. Had to wait for Eircom to release the line for over 2 months thougth..

bk

cormac_byrne wrote:

I'm in the process of signing up, the hardware arrived today 2Wire 2700HGV wireless/router/modem + AmiNET 110 set top box + Swissvoice IP10S IP phone

This is interesting, it tells us a lot.

The router is ADSL2+, however the AmiNET 110 is only MPEG2.

That means that the TV service will find it difficult to scale for people who want multiple TV's (with different channels showing) and for High Definition.

This also tells us that they are using pure VoIP.

bk

edunon wrote:

I'm enjoying Magnet for a week now, really fast, downloading +5gb a day sometimes, with no problem at all. Very, very, very happy with them. The phone support is also brilliant. Had to wait for Eircom to release the line for over 2 months thougth..

What is the TV service like?
What channels do you get?
What is the picture and sound quality like?
How fast is the box at changing channels?
How many TV's do you have hooked upto the box?

Cheers

edunon

TV service is pretty good, you get a menu on the screen with anything is on and is going to be the rest of the day, I'm on the 30 channel subscription, picture quality is MPEG2, which looks fine on my 32" TV but might be a bit short on bigger or HD screens. Takes around a second to change to another channel. I only have 1 TV though.
When I was settinging it up, I talked to a technician on the phone and said the quality of my line was really good, I could handle up to 14Mb with no problem, so I suppose that could make a difference in some cases.
I'm in Donnybrook.

Sniipe

tk123 wrote:

I know the Mark you were talking to - he's not a salesman(he laughed when i showed him the post:v: ) he's an agent in a call centre that covers a bunch of different services including Magnet. The 1890 num is a information line - the agents use a knowlegebase/script written by Magnet to answer your questions...

hehe! Bastarb I have reconnected my telephone line with eircom. Have to wait for my a/c number from Eircom... in the post. Bit dissapointed to hear that Eircom didn't release the line for 2 months; is that because you had broadband on it?

Grayarea

I ordered Magnet TV (2 rooms) + BB in November 05.

We got a call in mid December letting us know that Eircom were not doing any more LLU until January.

In mid January they called back and asked me to cancel my BB with Eircom so that the order could be processed. They also informed my that they could not migrate my number 9which I had asked for) and offered me two months of full sky package for free in compensation (which I took).

Last week go a call saying they had the line details from Eircom and to phone them when it went dead.

The line was dead last night, and first thing this morning they called me (I did not get a chance to call them they were that quick) and arranged a install 10pm monday morning.

If every company in the telco segment operated like Magnet do, we would all be much happier!

PS will report back on Monday afternoon, from my home PC!

cgarvey

Yes, but the flipside is that IBB were nice to their customers at the start! At least Magnet are a bit more sensible with their rollout plans than Smart were. Sure LLU is at fault, but Smart should've know this and been realistic about it, as I've said before.

.cg

Grayarea

Hi all,

Yesterday morning at 9:15 the equipment turned up, ten minutes later the installer called to confirm our location.

At 10:00 the installer arrived and I was part way through unpacking the gear, first issue, only one STB was included even though I ordered two.

Hooked up modem and it synced up no problem, line test showed a “great line” and then internal wiring was installed and tested.

PC connected up OK (very fast), but you need one Ethernet port per device so with two STBs and a phone I only have one free port (4 port 2wire managed switch), so I have had to get a second switch to connect up my xbox and second PC.

First STB was installed and worked with small but noticeable freezeing / pixellation.

Second STB (that the installer had in his van!) installed and was very pixelated.

Phone did not work reliably.

At this point it seems that someone in north main pulled my connection. So after talking to Magnet on and off yesterday and this morning they tell me that it (the line) must have been unplugged at the exchange and this will take between 1 and 2 days to resolve.

I have to say that Magnet have been very good at keeping me informed, but so far things are not going well.

Initial impression of the STB from limited time with it, channel switch about 1 second, EPG very slow, picture quality when clear and no problems is very good. Made in china for an English company manual dated in 2003.

Later,

cgarvey

Pixelation all the time, or not (you seem to suggest both!)? I presume the router does QoS to give priority to TV/phone, in which case it'd be interesting to see what speeds you get watching 2 different channels and making a phone call!

.cg

Sponge Bob

and do you still have your phone number Grayarea as well as a 'new' Magnet one ??

bk

Grayarea wrote:

Initial impression of the STB from limited time with it, channel switch about 1 second, EPG very slow, picture quality when clear and no problems is very good. Made in china for an English company manual dated in 2003.

Maybe they are using second hand Homechoice boxes, since Homechoice have now moved to MPEG4 tech. THe problems you describe are the same problem many Homechoice customers have suffered from in the past.

Grayarea

Sponge Bob wrote:

and do you still have your phone number Grayarea as well as a 'new' Magnet one ??

My old number is engaged any time I tried it, so no. New number is unobtainable ATM.

Grayarea

cgarvey wrote:

Pixelation all the time, or not (you seem to suggest both!)? I presume the router does QoS to give priority to TV/phone, in which case it'd be interesting to see what speeds you get watching 2 different channels and making a phone call!

.cg

Yes, one STB very bad, other STB is good but not great.

Yes it will be interesting to see how things work out once it is fixed.

Grayarea

bk wrote:

Maybe they are using second hand Homechoice boxes, since Homechoice have now moved to MPEG4 tech. THe problems you describe are the same problem many Homechoice customers have suffered from in the past.

If they are second hand then they have been refurbised as all plastic windows etc came with protective sheet attached.

I believe they are new, but maybe a bulk buy for end of line hardware.

I will post name and model later.

Later,

cormac_byrne

It's an AmiNET 110 box (mpeg2), I got connected yesterday, phone works!

Occasional pixelation on screen, v slow channel change 1 -2 secs, horrible EPG.

Grayarea

cormac_byrne wrote:

It's an AmiNET 110 box (mpeg2), I got connected yesterday, phone works!

Occasional pixelation on screen, v slow channel change 1 -2 secs, horrible EPG.

Have to agree the EPG (when it was working) was very poor.

Well some good news, the modem was up when I got home, ipphone works, primary stb is fine. PC bandwidth is horrible I get only 512Kb download and 300-400Kb up.

EPG does not work at all, and I am not getting any of the channels other than the basic package.

Step in the right direction

Later,

Grayarea

Latest update.

EPG will not be working for a week or two. This is to the extent that channels are named incorrectly. This makes it very difficult to use.

Two STB still cause pixelation issues when both are powered on.

I have had about 1 day of use in the last 4, Magnet reset my switch without any notice at all, very annoying as the STB and phone then have to be indiviualy reset to get them working again.

I came home on Tuesday to a working system, but it had failed on Wednesday when Magnet had altered something on there end. It did not work again till Thursday afternoon.

The agents on the phone are very helpfull but often don't really understand the service they are supporting.

Later,

Easy Rider

Does anyone here have magnet and are using fiber optic cables?

I bought an apartment a while back and it will be ready in the next couple of weeks...every room has a magnet point hooked up to fiber optic cables (apart for bathroom and kitchen).....

I guess this should help with speed etc....I have an XBOX360 set-up for wireless, my Imac is wireless and my laptop....so I really need a wireless router from them....do they charge extra for this?

In the complex I bought Magnet are offering, broadband, 30 tv channels and free local and national calls for 20 euro for the first 6 months, so I might as well give it a go...

Also on the site it says +24 euro line rental, is this included in the rate they quote?

Grayarea

I expect that the fibre should solve some of the problems I am having.

The 2wire router they install is wireless.

Later,

cutepape

I got my Magnet yesterday, flawless installation!
Everything worked like a charm.

Tested to download a FreeBSD ISO from SUNET in sweden ( their Backbone is the biggest in sweden ), whent like a rocket compared to my old IBB that couldnt keep at max speed the whole time.

I had to wait a looong time for this.. mainly Eircoms fault since they totally f***ed up my order, my address, my account number... you name it!

Off Topic:
One thing that that I was so suprised about here was the contention ratio that everyone has. When I moved to Ireland 2 years ago, a 0.5Mbit with 4Gb Cap was around €50 a month. Contention ratio of 1:41.. INSANE!!

Before I moved, I had a 10Mbit both directions, no contention ratio ( 1:1 ) and paid €30 a month for that. No Cap what so ever.
10Mbit = 1.25MB/sec. up and down at the same time.

Nowdays my buddies back home in Sweden has 100Mbit down and 10Mbit up. Still no contention ratio.

So the speed is more dependent on the what the reciever/sender on the other side have.

The problem here is that we lack a good infrastructure for electronic communication. If the governmnet (correct me if wrong) had helped our broadband companies to build a good fiber infrastructure within and between the cities, we would be flying away.

Anyway.. Magnet has been verry helpfull and so far I only have good to say about them. First impressions on the speed is really good and I look forward
to see what the next months will show.

bk

cutepape wrote:

The problem here is that we lack a good infrastructure for electronic communication. If the governmnet (correct me if wrong) had helped our broadband companies to build a good fiber infrastructure within and between the cities, we would be flying away.

It is indirectly the governments fault. In fact there is a very large amount of fibre running between cities, around cities and towns (Metro projects) and to other countries (including 1/3rd of all fibre running between Europe and the US), in fact Ireland is one of the most highly fibered countries in Europe and in fairness most of it was paid for by the Irish government.

No the problem is with the "last mile", Eircom has a monopoly on most of the telephone lines running to each home and business in Ireland and they have used this monopoly to criple the rollout of Broadband in Ireland.

You can indirectly blame the government for leaving Eircom get away with this by not having strong enough regulation of the market and for not splitting up Eircom when they had the chance.

cutepape

bk:

Well, it seems like they have started to take away Eircoms monopoly bit by bit now. I realldy do hope that companies like Magnet and Smart manage to stay in the game an put some pressure on Eircom.

BTW.. Im still impressed with magnet.. download works like a charm.
No regrets at all...

bk

cutepape wrote:

bk:

Well, it seems like they have started to take away Eircoms monopoly bit by bit now. I realldy do hope that companies like Magnet and Smart manage to stay in the game an put some pressure on Eircom.

It would look that way from all the advertising, but the reality is that Eircom has crippled the LLU process in such a way that the mass movement of customers to LLU is very difficult.

Until the LLU process is fixed, Eircom has little to worry about.

Grayarea

Latest update;

More tweaking at Magnet end and two STBs now nearly working OK (minor breakup / pixelation). A single STB works fine on its own.

EPG still a dead dog though.

Still ... moving in the right direction.

Later,