Removing the DSL distance limit / Contacting Pierre

digitalsnub

So I was listening to Pierre Danon on the radio a couple of weeks ago. He was talking about how he had brought %100 broadband coverage to Northern Ireland.

Up north (as far as I know) if your too far from the exchange they will send you the dsl modem anyways and try connect you, send out an engineer, whatever it takes. Even if its not up to speed, they'll let you have the connection. A friend of mine is up north and out in the sticks at the most remote point from his exchange, and while his connection cuts out now and then, it works.

I've asked an eircom engineer about this possibility and he said it was most likely technically possible but it is eircom's 'quality control' holding it back.

But I'd consider below average speed dsl connection at a flat rate as definate quality compared to my overexpensive, underpowered dial up.

Waiting for upgrades is a joke. Who knows when or where they will appear. Particularly if you are in a rural area. My exchange was only enabled this year, I doubt somehow it's on the priority list for the next round of improvements.

Does anyone know Pierre's email and I could ask him about this? He seems to want to get things done.

watty

Then if after doing whatever and line still doesn't work they try to get you good Wireless broadband. If that doesn't work you then get two way satellite. Hardly anyone gets the satellite and very few the Wireless.

What's the incentive? Perhaps they have to charge only ADSL rates for the expensive wireless install or VERY expensive sat install & running costs? I don't know. But what incentive has eircom?

paddyp

They got almost £10m of funding specifically for this purpose, meanwhile back in the wild west eircom is only obligated to provide a phone service and they don't even do that very well.

{rant}
Our phoneline approx. 3km from the exchange is almost unintelligible. I have had an nice eircom engineer (from a different service area) out who said there was an earth on the line, low signal level and noise that he suspected was an electric fence nailed to a pole. He said a local linesman would be out to fix it. 30 mins later the fault was listed as fixed on the eircoms site despite the fact that no-one so much as looked up our road. Sheisters!

Lately when I made a phone call on a friends phone who is approx 2.5km away in the opposite direction (you can see where the wires from the exchange diverge) I found the exact same symptoms. When I mentioned it they rolled their eyes and said that they had been informed by eircom that if they ordered isdn that they might fix the line back as far as the exchange! WTF!
{/rant}