Do Eircom use different exchanges in different areas?

Hank Scorpio

Maybe you read about my problem before now. I was paying for 2 mb for over a year but only receiving 1 mb(max allowed speed on router page, TOP line stats as the exchange is basically outside my house)

After constant engineer callouts , them saying there not able to change my line speed and telling me to ring the technical department, (this spirals on and on after maybe 4 engineer callouts).

Anyways 2 weeks ago i logged onto my router page and seen my max allowed speed had changed to 2 mb, whopeeeeeeeeee:p

I got a phonecall from eircom saying an engineer just fixed the prob, sumtin about updating the exchange.

Now im recieving full 2 mb speed and my ping times have dropped considerably.

My question is why did it take so long to change me to 2 mb. I live in a mid sized village all everyone i no was only receiving 1 mb also. Do they limit the max speed on these exchanges to 1 mb as it costs less?

Any input would be fantastic, seems impossible to get answers from eircom, and i will be upgrading to a higher package soon if all goes well..

nuxx

paulm17781

Were you paying for 2Mb all this time? Seek compensation if so.

Hank Scorpio

yep i was as part of my bundle package

but please try to answer my main question

Solair

eircom (in common with most other broadband operators) have contention issues. Basically there's a large data connection to your local exchange that should provide enough capacity to give most people a reasonable speed connection to the internet. If the exchange is under capacity and over subscribed the end users experience lower speeds.

eircom sell you a connection rate which is the speed that your modem connects to the exchange, not the actual speed of the connection from your exchange to the internet. You get 'up to 2 mbit/s'.

I suspect eircom upgraded the data link from your exchange to the core network, thus speeding up your connection.

This problem also applies to cable and to many wireless services.

The only two companies that advertise contention-free broadband are Smart Telecom and Magnet. Their DSL products are absolutely amazing compared to eircom, BT, UTV, Perlico, UPC (NTL/Chorus) etc

There's also another possibility :

DSL providers can also apply various 'line profiles' at the exchange end of your line that can improve the speed on a poor quality line but it may trade off the ping time, the stability of connection etc. It's possible that they've tweaked something to allow your connection to operate at higher speed.

Hank Scorpio

nah man , its not contention , i was limited to 1 mb on the router homepage where it clearly shows what speed eircom have allocated to you.

Solair

They've absolutely no excuse then. Ask for a refund as you were paying for 2mbit/s they capped you at 1mbit/s. There's really no technical explanation for that it's just a screw up by their sales team by the sounds of things. There are no exchanges that only provide 1mbit/s and never have been. Eircom just decide how fast a connection they're selling you and cap it at that speed.

Hank Scorpio

thx for info

just to follow my question up furthur , does the engineer set the speed at the exchange or is it operated from the eircom technical base

thx again nuxx

Solair

It's controlled centrally, the sales team basically set your cap and it's implemented by software at the DSLAM in the exchange.