Broadband/TV in Earlswood, Rathbourne

Johnnio13

Afternoon folks,

Moving shortly to Earlswood and I was wondering what the story with the cable tv is there. NTL have never heard of it. Also, can you get BT broadband there?
Is there anyone living there that might be in a position to let me know.

Thanks.

Sponge Bob

could be the fabulous " SKY Conway " .

Make sure there is an eircom phone line before you sign the contracts and apply for the connection today even if you did not , the wait is up to 2 years, sometimes more.

make sure the eircom line is dealt with in full as part of the snagging , its not a minor item

Glenbhoy

http://www.askaboutmoney.com/showthread.php?t=25436&highlight=earlswood

bk

FYI, your local telephone exchange (Pelletstown) is now DSL enabled. So you should be able to order BT BB now or in the next month or so. Just go to netsource.ie site and enter your phone number. If it says you can get BB, then you can get BB from a number of different companies including BT, Eircom, UTV, Digiweb, Netsource, etc.

BTW check out this post:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=51158786&postcount=11

different location, but Gibo got NTL to deliver it's service in his new estate. PM him and he can give you the contact deals of the new developments manager at NTL.

nh470

Hi there - Earlswood dweller here.

Smart Telecom have Earlswood sewn up for tv anyway - but at least they offer a Smart Vision package for €75 per month which includes loads of digital tv stations, phone line with 25 euro worth of calls and broadband internet. You could get your phone and broadband elsewhere I suppose but not the tv (or at least only from Magnet who don't have as many stations and can't access our phone line anyway). Big drawback is they don't have Sky One or the new Film Four so get ready for Simpsons withdrawal. Should be able to switch to other triple play providers if or when they ever come on line here. Would love to have NTL so if you get any joy with them, let me know! Sky is out cos you can't have a satellite dish

Best of luck and welcome to the neighbourhood. Next thing to worry about is when are they going to open that %*£#ing Spar and the cafes/pubs!

bk

nh470 wrote:

Smart Telecom have Earlswood sewn up for tv anyway - but at least they offer a Smart Vision package for €75 per month which includes loads of digital tv stations, phone line with 25 euro worth of calls and broadband internet. You could get your phone and broadband elsewhere I suppose but not the tv (or at least only from Magnet who don't have as many stations and can't access our phone line anyway). Big drawback is they don't have Sky One or the new Film Four so get ready for Simpsons withdrawal. Should be able to switch to other triple play providers if or when they ever come on line here. Would love to have NTL so if you get any joy with them, let me know! Sky is out cos you can't have a satellite dish

Hi, I'm not moving to Earlswood, but in a few months I'll be moving to a different place that has Smart Vision, so could you answer a few questions for me:

- What speed is the BB?
- Is there anywhere I can see what TV channels are available?
- Are the discovery network channels on it?

No Sky sucks, but they should add Film4, Sky don't allow the likes of Smart to carry Sky One, but it seems C4 are happy for everyone to carry Film4, so that is really Smarts fault. BTW Film4 is a great channel, good movie almost every night, worth calling Smart and fighting to get them to add it.

nh470

The only info is at http://www.smarttelecom.ie/smartvision.php

If you email them, they might send you a list of the stations - you can have sky sports and movies but you get charged per channel per month for them so it really adds up. don't think you can get Prem Plus either. No discovery - have UK Documentary and so on though.

Here's a list they sent us ages ago

RTE1
RTE2
TV3
TG4
BBC1
BBC2
UTV
Channel 4
E4
BBC3
BBC4
ITV2
ITV3
Living
Living +1
Living 2
CNN
Euro News
CNBC
ITV News
BBC News 24
24 CZ
MTV
MTV 2
MTV Hits
MTV Base
MTV Dance
VH1
VH2
VH1 Classic
TMF
POP TV
Setanta Sports
Euro Sport
Golf TV
Extreme Sport
Race World
Cartoon Network
Toonami
Tiny Pop
Paramount 1
Paramount 2
Majestic
Performance
Channel U
UKTV G2
UKTV Gold
UKTV Style
UKTV Style +1
UKTV Bright Ideas
UKTV Documentary
UKTV People
UKTV History
UKTV Food
UKTV Drama
UKTV Style & Garden
Bravo
Trouble
Channel S
TCM
Challenge
Soundtrack
Horror
Vault
Chart Show
Reality TV
True Movies
Matinee Movies
Hollywood TV
T TV
TV5
Rai Uno
RTP
ARTE
TVE
Al Jeazeera
Ocko
TVP
RTE Radio 1
RTE Radio 2
RTE RnG
Lyric FM

Our speed if generally good - 11MB or so on the broadband but that's cos its fibre to the home - not sure of their speeds otherwise. If the speed drops at all, there are problems with the tv reception. Have an issue with the RTE channels on one tv cos of that (they're high bandwidth apparently)

Actually just got on to them after the post earlier to see about Film 4 - apparently they're in talks. No news on Sky 1 though.

nh470

I have to correct something I said earlier in this thread. Smart don't offer 25 euro free calls anymore (something they never bothered to mention when they were telling us about the lowered prices). Just found this out when I got my first bill since the charges went down.

bk

Hi nh470, thanks for the interesting info and sorry to bug you but any chance you could run these two speed tests on it and let us know what they report, cheers:

http://support.smarttelecom.ie/myspeed/www/bbspeedtool.htm
http://www.irishisptest.com/runmyspeed.php
http://www.speedtest.ie

Johnnio13

Hi all
In general the quality of SmartVision is ok, I have contacted them about the amount of time the router freezes, but I haven't got a reply, something I am a little put out about.

There are a couple of stations on the list above that don't have come through, again something I mailed Smartvision about but they never replied.
Channels that aren't working are ProGolf, Extreme Sports, ITV 2+3, Reality TV and Sunday nights seem to have the worst reception.

Mister Sifter

i just moved in to the river vale block and i'm looking to get phone / broadband / cable in to the apartment. i really don't know where to start though to be honest.

Bt has a great deal on the phone and broadband - is it available in the area though?

i went on their site but it asks me to put my phone number in, and although i have an eircom socket in the apartment, i don;t have a phone number.

Also, having read the other posts, am i right in saying that if i want cable tv in i have to get it through Smart??

I'd be a little reluctant as its still up in the air whether they will stay in business or not...

any advice gratefully received!!

nh470

Hiya

Sorry I haven't replied - didn't see the new posts!

Johnnio13 Now that you mention it, I don't remember seeing those particular stations - will check over the next few days and let you know if we have them.

We have loads of problems with freezing / pixellating on one of the tvs cos both of the tv signals have to go on coaxial cos the builders broke our second phone cable and they interfere with each other - only affects the downstairs tv and only the high-bandwidth stations (irish ones and sky sports). don't know if its relevant to you. If you can get their technicians (who are sub-contractors) to call out they've been really good. I wrote a comment to a SmartVision man on another board on the various gripes we have about the service but yeah, overall could be a lot worse.

http://www.neighbours.ie/dublin15/showthread.php?p=278#post278

I've never had any joy with Smart's customer services line but they have a support blog that they have on their website on http://support.smarttelecom.ie/forums/ that seems a better bet or call the SmartVision phone numbers (not the general Smart numbers)

Graeme1982 If you're in Rivervale I think you might have Cablewatch, certainly they have Park View which I think is near you -

http://boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=275348

We're in Earlswood so we're stuck with Smart. Don't know if you can get NTL cable - we can't anyway. Also don't know if you're prevented from having satellite dishes - we are. If your connection is big enough for tv through the internet, magnet or smart are your choices though smart only provide certain developments I think and also NTL are trialling it in Adamstown - I've asked some kind souls to let me know how it goes there. Let us know what you end up with anyway - always interested in what's out there.

As far as Smart's problems, they only affect voice-only customers (so far anyway). Not sure how you'd find out your phone number - presumably the builders can point you the right way?? I know ours was Smart from the start. If your phone socket says Eircom its probably worth ringing them and seeing if they can enlighten you. Presumably til you're actually connected up with someone you don't have a number anyway.

There are a couple of bb comparison sites - http://www.callcosts.ie/home/default.asp
and
www.getbroadband.ie/
no idea how good they are.

All the best

nh470

Johnnio13 - at the tv now. We don't have ITV 2 and 3 on our list at all. Don't have ProGolf on our list - have Golf TV but nothing on that at the mo (and the guide says there should be). Don't have Extreme Sports on our list. Have Reality +1 but not Reality TV and again there is nothing on Reality +1 at the mo though there should be. Do you have all these on your list of stations? We have tv stations going up to no 118 (tv polonia) but there are gaps, e.g. we have no channels 19, 20, 22, 25, 42, 44-49 etc. are you the same?

though I set out our problems on freezing etc in other threads, I have noticed that the problems on those channels are worse during high-use times, e.g. evenings and during big matches for Sky etc.

Mister Sifter

FYI

i rang NTL last week and they told me that NTL should be live in the area by the middle of this week... they said that installation will take 5 days from this time.

still trying to get through to BT tho.

nh470

Hi Graeme1982 - I rang NTL when I saw your post but they are still telling me they have no service in the Rathborne area and we can't get cable. I would be grateful if you could post if you hear anything more from them

Cheers

Mister Sifter

Yeah, when i rang the last week, she told me that it would be available from next week (now this week). She told me i should call up in the middle of this week to order it.

So, i rang up yesterday and was told that it's not available. When i said i was told it would be available this week, she said the person must have got it worng and that i'd have to try the company which is hooked up to where i stay. Pretty annoying!

Anyway, i guess now that if i want to get cable in i have to go with smart telecom. Trouble is, it seems as though they could go bust at any time.