Broadband for the sticks in Carlow ! (Ballon)

sunny2004

Hi,
I am located in Carlow, in a small town called Ballon. What I want is not sheep, friendly Locals and a quite life. I WANT BLOODY BROADBAND

I have done some research, the only option is a company called Reach broadband, its expensive, and you cant use and wireless networks so house networks, media streamers in fact anything on the 2.4 frequence is a no no...
In addition their service is hardwired, so you get a point in your house and you can only connect to that..

So I was wondering if anyone knew of any other options ?
Or know if the exchange in the middle of ballon village is due to be upgraded?

Thank.. Sunny..

watty

Use 802.11a WiFi in the house. Not 2.4Ghz. You may need to add cards/ dongles as most builtin wifi is the b/g flavours.

OfflerCrocGod

sunny2004 wrote:

Hi,
I am located in Carlow, in a small town called Ballon. What I want is not sheep, friendly Locals and a quite life. I WANT BLOODY BROADBAND

Move to Dublin.

1huge1

^^ the sad truth is if you want some decent choice move to a city

though being in the sticks and having a choice of wireless is not the worst thing in the world, your quiet lucky to be honest

bushy...

A bit sad really , what if your neighbour has a media streamer ? no service for you then ?

thegills

Aptus Broadband and Ice Broadband operate in parts of Carlow. Not sure exactly where though.
thegills

Fergus Cassidy

You might try IFA Telecom (Irish Farmers Association) http://www.ifatelecom.ie/

They list wireless coverage for some areas around Ballon.

thegills

Aptus Broadband - One of the guys involved with Aptus passed away last week. John O'Dwyer was killed during a broadband installation in Bagnelstown. It might be a good idea not to contact them for a while just in case.
thegills

sunny2004

Cheers man, I read about that in the nationalist.. he was from what i can tell one of the partners of the company.. my thoughts are with his family..
The other options are simply to expensive..
All the best and cheers for all the help but I am still back to square one..

I wish telecom would simply get their finger out and update the ballon exchange..

sunny2004

I have been told by a guy from eircom that Ballon is on the list of 100 additional exchanges and it should be up and running within 3 months ????

thebman

sunny2004 wrote:

I have been told by a guy from eircom that Ballon is on the list of 100 additional exchanges and it should be up and running within 3 months ????

Who do you contact to find that information?

I want to find out when the Rahan exchange will be enabled.

smellslikeshoes

sunny2004 wrote:

I have been told by a guy from eircom that Ballon is on the list of 100 additional exchanges and it should be up and running within 3 months ????

Sounds like someones blowing smoke up your ass. I have been given bull****e dates on when my exchange is going to be done since that list was published.That list should be done this year but I doubt an average Eircom worker would have the slightest idea until a week or two before it happens.

sunny2004

I completely agree with you, while I have no doubt he is just another average eircom guy, he told me he had pulled into the exchange while some other guy was there working on it and the racks ?? where been fitted ?? I believe him, as much as you can anyone.. but hey we will see !!

david1971

Moved here last year and was told that Permanet would be here within a few months. Nearly a year later and still no BB, guy down the road got BB from Reach BB so I thought I would give them a try. Found the install a little too much but over time I guess its not to bad as the rental each month is very cheap. I got rid of my eircom line and now use freespeech.ie for all my calls so I now save as I have no line rental and my phone calls cost me about €10 a month. I got a Linksys wireless router so I could use the BB around the house but it messed up my connection and I had to call out Reach. They installed so boxes in the house and now I can use the BB in the bedroom and the kitchen.

To round things off, Reach are all we have and to be fair they have given me a very good service, much better than my old Eircom in Carlow and I now save as I got rid of the phone line. Yes the service has not been 100%, (was down 3 hours last weekend) but the Eircom BB in the office in Carlow was down for over a week 3 or 4 weeks ago.

sunny2004

Would prefer to use Eircom, reach have restrictions !
Well here is hoping !!!

sunny2004

anyone using 3g broadband ?

cgarvey

Moved IoffL > Broadband

sunny2004

3 braodband does not seem to work here ! :mad:

sunny2004

And I am trying to get o2 wirless to work without success !!
Is there no end to all this

bigpaddy2004

Good God I have never seen the likes of it. Everyone waiting for $ircom to come, others hanging their phones and laptops out the windows and no one would bother to try reach whom are in their area and providing a very good service. Can Eircom give you a 1 meg up & down connection for E25 a month? Can 02, 3, vodafone? No, I did'nt think so.

sunny2004

My problem with reach is that they are expensive, they monitor what you do, and they are hardwired ! your stuck with a point of access point or you can pay extra for a network across your mains power and have a few other hard wired points. Also you can not use home networks or any device on the common network frequency..
NO home network,
NO media streamer,
and I couldnt even use my pest control unit that also uses the house wiring..

Its all stated above..

So I have tried wirless 3g, no signal....
02 which at this point is also not working...

All I want for christmas apart from my 2 front teeth is for Eircom to enable the local exchange..

I left eircom, now they are trying to get me back, and I think I will be telling them that I wont be coming back unless they can supply broadband !

bigpaddy2004

Every ISP in the world monitors what you are doing, how would they ever control their network? I do hope that you do not think they can see every thing that you are doing. The only thing they can monitor is how much bandwidth you are using and how many ports you have open at any one time. This is to stop File Sharing. An access point will work no problem once you do not have it on the same channel as their AP, and keep it as far away as possible from their antenna, and you would be fine. Expensive, 25 a month for broadband out in the sticks, get real.

lucernarian

From what I've seen, €25 per month for any sort of non-satellite wireless broadband is pretty good. Most seem to start at €35 or so per month.

The main problem with the local operators is the cost of installation, and USUALLY the price is higher than what DSL can offer. I deliberetely exclude line rental as phone lines are used in the vast majority of rural households still, so it usually wouldn't be an extra cost.

sunny2004

@ bigpaddy, sure.. you are right its really cheap lol in fact its cheaper than a bog standard Eircon or other broadband ! and you are right they never told me that they monitor individual accounts.. that was a dream ! You are clearly a supporter of their service and I am not. WE clearly have both done a lot of research !

I am not interested in using a service with an instillation fee that is so high.. period.
I dont want a hardwired service. period.
I dont want to pay extra for a few extra hardwired access points. period.
I dont want a service that stops me from streaming music and video (as I do) around my house. period.
I have no desire that if I or any close neighbour uses a home network I loose my connection. period..

Is there an echo ? did I not post this at the top of the page and on the previous page as well ??

And now I am simply going to not deal with eircom.. I would love it it more around here did the same as a loss in revenue might get them to see the pros of enabling the exchange..
And to top it off I even had a question asked by my TD to the relevent minister just before the elections ! LMAO... so I am trying my best here...

While 25 a month for a single hardwired point sounds ok, and more than one have mentioned it the instillation is expensive, and its hardwired ! Please feel free to read the points mentioned above, It amazes me that I seem to be a leper for wanting what in the 21st century and in a country that is swimming with money I am lambasted for this maybe we need more people like me !

bigpaddy2004

Sunny2004 you are beginning to contradict yourself. In one of your earlier posts you said they monitor what you do, now you say that they dont monitor accounts. Is this word of mouth gossip you are picking up?

Have you ever heard the old saying "you get what you paid for". Would you prefer a free installation where a provider provides you with "el cheapo" subscriber gear or pay an installation fee for the "rolls royce" gear? There is a lot of these companys around Ireland whom are providing broadband for guys like you who just simply cannot get it all out of their own pockets with no goverment grants to get them going. you would prefer to Give Eircom E130 for installation PLUS E300+ a year for line rental PLUS E275 a year for broadband PLUS put up with their years price hikes?

Good God like I said before all you have to do is get a bog standard AP and connect it into the cable which the company provides you with. No matter what way you look at it, Eircoms broadband is also hardwired.

Can you please explain how wireless broadband effects your streaming music & videos around the house?

As far as a neighbours home network is concerned, how could it possibly effect your broadband?

lucernarian

If anyone wants truly mobile internet access in rural areas, then they should get the 3G modem from Voda or else get three's €40 per month package which will work on ordinary GPRS. Or O2's modem either. End of.

FWA and DSL basically perform the same way, except those who don't want an eircom line get a better deal with FWA. If the wireless router is configured properly, it shouldn't interfere with the broadband access point that the local company installs. Video senders are not very spectrum-friendly so mabye people should buy ones which don't use 2.4 GHz.

So why would being tied to a phone line socket be any better than being tied to the socket which the local company provides???:rolleyes:

bigpaddy2004

To_be_confirmed wrote:

If anyone wants truly mobile internet access in rural areas, then they should get the 3G modem from Voda or else get three's €40 per month package which will work on ordinary GPRS. Or O2's modem either. End of.

FWA and DSL basically perform the same way, except those who don't want an eircom line get a better deal with FWA. If the wireless router is configured properly, it shouldn't interfere with the broadband access point that the local company installs. Video senders are not very spectrum-friendly so mabye people should buy ones which don't use 2.4 GHz.

So why would being tied to a phone line socket be any better than being tied to the socket which the local company provides???:rolleyes:

Thank you, your a man after my own heart!

sunny2004

Sarcasim paddy.. I was simply being sarcastic !
YOU ARE RIGHT AND I AM WRONG !

I have tried 2 wirelss networks..

I wont be tied to a phone line, it will run on a network !

And I got my info directly from the horses mouth !

As for being off topic, I have simply expressed in a list above my reasons not to use reach !
People can make up their own mind.. as far as I am concerned I am simply trying to get broadband with a service that I am happy with..

lucernarian

Sort this among yourselves through PMs. If wireless networks are interfering with the internet connection installation then mabye the wireless company should look into it and suggest a working alternative.

sunny2004

I agree ! there is no need for PM, there is nothing for me in that, I simply wanted to discuss the situation with people in a similar situation.. as far as I am concerned the paddy situation was over when I replied !

The problem with interference is something the network provider reach cant deal with.. phone them, they will tell you the same, I would rather not even discuss their service at this point but alternatives !!

bigpaddy2004

sunny2004 wrote:

Sarcasim paddy.. I was simply being sarcastic !
YOU ARE RIGHT AND I AM WRONG !

I have tried 2 wirelss networks..

I wont be tied to a phone line, it will run on a network !

And I got my info directly from the horses mouth !

As for being off topic, I have simply expressed in a list above my reasons not to use reach !
People can make up their own mind.. as far as I am concerned I am simply trying to get broadband with a service that I am happy with..

This a Bulletin board we are all allowed to express our own views, I was expressing mine.
However i believe all your points about reach, apart from the installation costs(peoples value of money is their own business) are not valid.