What's the latest on the broadband upgrade (originally for June 08)?

c0y0te

There was lots of talk about 4-6 months ago about an impending upgrade that was supposed to take place by June. I'm based in Malahide, currently getting a 3mb down/384K up DSL service via Magnet and I was wondering if this is going to change anytime soon?

paulm17781

The UPC (cable) upgrades are ongoing this month, people are definitely getting them. There is a huge thread in here about the Eircom upgrades. I think Magnet are LLU so any upgrades would be up to them.

smellslikeshoes

Eircoms upgrades won't do anything for you if you're on magnet.

BlackWizard

Yeah I got a letter in the post saying I'd be upgraded to 8mb in June.

Praetorian

Someone in the know said weekend of July 4th for the upgrades. We've no other info to the contrary.

dub45

BlackWizard wrote: »

Yeah I got a letter in the post saying I'd be upgraded to 8mb in June.

People should be very wary of this - many lines will simply not be up to those speeds.

Gonzo

it will be similar to the uk where everyone can avail of an 8meg service but in reality many are struggling to get 3meg when they run their speedtests.

Praetorian

Well the big difference is that they were using ADSL1 for a long time so practically nobody got close to 8m/bit. In our case ADSL2+ will help a lot of people. This doesn't take away from the fact that we're years behind the rest of europe, the new packages are much slower than those offered by Smart or UPC and officially we're in the dark about what's happening. All very unsatisfactory.

dub45

Gonzo wrote: »

it will be similar to the uk where everyone can avail of an 8meg service but in reality many are struggling to get 3meg when they run their speedtests.

Speaking of which:

http://http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/doubts-remain-over-broadband-speeds-as-voluntary-code-agreed-841478.html

dub45

Praetorian wrote: »

Well the big difference is that they were using ADSL1 for a long time so practically nobody got close to 8m/bit. In our case ADSL2+ will help a lot of people. This doesn't take away from the fact that we're years behind the rest of europe, the new packages are much slower than those offered by Smart or UPC and officially we're in the dark about what's happening. All very unsatisfactory.

But I can assure you that adsl2 is not a panacea - I am on Smart and have regular problems with my line as have loads of others:

http://http://support.smarttelecom.ie/forums/showthread.php?t=2052

One of the great things about Smart is that you can get individual attention through the forum/

c0y0te

I think Magnet are LLU so any upgrades would be up to them.

Anyone else here on Magnet? If so - do you know what their intentions are and whether or not the benefits of the upgrade are being passed on to customers or will it be an additional cost?

smellslikeshoes

c0y0te wrote: »

Anyone else here on Magnet? If so - do you know what their intentions are and whether or not the benefits of the upgrade are being passed on to customers or will it be an additional cost?

How can they pass benefits of of the Eircom upgrade onto their customers if they aren't going to benefit from it at all. Magnets Equipment is independent of Eircoms so the impending Eircom upgrade won't do anything for you or magnet, other than maybe push them to upgrade speeds/lower prices to compete.

kaizersoze

smellslikeshoes wrote: »

How can they pass benefits of of the Eircom upgrade onto their customers if they aren't going to benefit from it at all. Magnets Equipment is independent of Eircoms so the impending Eircom upgrade won't do anything for you or magnet, other than maybe push them to upgrade speeds/lower prices to compete.

Magnet sell Bitstream aswell as their LLU. It currently only seems to be offered to businesses but they would have alot of residential customers from the Netsource days.

tanora78

This post has been deleted.

tech

still on 2mb with BT, meant to be 3mb before month end

dubmick

tech wrote: »

still on 2mb with BT, meant to be 3mb before month end

+1

rogue-entity

Still on 3M/384 and eagerly awaiting a jump to 7.6 (for the love of all things good, eircom, why 7.6, why not just go the full 8 and be done with it).

And perhaps it would be a good idea to merge this thread with the older eircom one, since its basically two threads now, discussing the same thing, which is the speed upgrades.

Fighting Irish

Praetorian wrote: »

Someone in the know said weekend of July 4th for the upgrades. We've no other info to the contrary.

Everyone on boards likes to think they're in the know

Fighting Irish

dub45 wrote: »

People should be very wary of this - many lines will simply not be up to those speeds.

Theres no extra charge, so any upgrade is welcomed

Grumpy Bob

tech wrote: »

still on 2mb with BT, meant to be 3mb before month end

I am also on BT 2mb and asked them on the phone about 2 months ago but the guy was a script monkey and knew nothing. I asked again through their website about two weeks but BT did what they do best........they ignored me!

I know that I am not going to see a huge improvement from 2 to 3mb but it is at least in the right direction.

flamegrill

Eircoms upgrades are coming in 2 parts.

1) 1/2/3 meg existing packages are going to 2/3/7.6 on RADSL
2) 4/6 meg existing packages are going to 10/12meg on ADSL2+

The reason for 7.6meg on RADSL is line quality issues. As such I believe the upgrade was said to be postponed because some quality checking on the 3meg upgrades was prooving less than desirable results by eircoms techies.

<edit>

I meant to also mention that people on 3meg now will get very very mixed results because of line issues. So 7.6 meg might only be the reality for a small percentage of people. Only time will tell though.

</edit>

I've not heard anything to the contary since so we'll just have to wait. I myself am currently on 3meg so 7.6 will rock and according to my google skillz I should get full speed based on my line attenuation and db margins.

Paul

Gonzo

why are the residential packages still only gonna be on radsl and the business on adsl2+? Surely it would be handier to put everyone on adsl2+ which should offer a smoother service with a higher chance of getting the genuine speed?

flamegrill

Line cards cost money, residential services don't make ISPs as much money as business packages do so that's greed driving this choice. Plus a lot of the afore mentioned line cards are relatively new in a lot of places, it would be a waste of money (that could be spent elsewhere!!) upgrading everyone. Plus ADSL is good for upto 8Meg.

I had gotten an ADSL2+ modem in and all for the upgrade (only last week) but I heard that it's only the business packages on ADSL2+

smellslikeshoes

flamegrill wrote: »

Line cards cost money, residential services don't make ISPs as much money as business packages do so that's greed driving this choice. Plus a lot of the afore mentioned line cards are relatively new in a lot of places, it would be a waste of money (that could be spent elsewhere!!) upgrading everyone. Plus ADSL is good for upto 8Meg.

I had gotten an ADSL2+ modem in and all for the upgrade (only last week) but I heard that it's only the business packages on ADSL2+

It makes sense, but I have not seen this confirmed one way or the other. There has been a whole lot of speculation and I wouldn't take anything for granted unless straight from the horses mouth.

Macker1

flamegrill wrote: »

Eircoms upgrades are coming in 2 parts.

1) 1/2/3 meg existing packages are going to 2/3/7.6 on RADSL
2) 4/6 meg existing packages are going to 10/12meg on ADSL2+

The reason for 7.6meg on RADSL is line quality issues. As such I believe the upgrade was said to be postponed because some quality checking on the 3meg upgrades was prooving less than desirable results by eircoms techies.

<edit>

I meant to also mention that people on 3meg now will get very very mixed results because of line issues. So 7.6 meg might only be the reality for a small percentage of people. Only time will tell though.

</edit>





I've not heard anything to the contary since so we'll just have to wait. I myself am currently on 3meg so 7.6 will rock and according to my google skillz I should get full speed based on my line attenuation and db margins.

Paul

Not sure what my stats mean but maybe you can shed some light on what I can expect with the upgrade. I have posted my details below. I'm currently on the 3mb package. Hopefully it will improve with the upgrade.

Line State Up
Modulation DMT
Data Path Interleave


Downstream Upstream
Max Allowed Speed (kbps) 3072 384
SN Margin (dB) 12.00 17.00
Line Attenuation (dB) 18.50 12.00
CRC Errors 33 15

dub45

Fighting Irish wrote: »

Theres no extra charge, so any upgrade is welcomed

I agree that upgrades are welcome. But most people are unaware of the possible problems associated with increases in speed and for a lot of people upgrades will actually cause problems - particularly increases in the frequency of disconnects.

dub45

Macker1 wrote: »

Not sure what my stats mean but maybe you can shed some light on what I can expect with the upgrade. I have posted my details below. I'm currently on the 3mb package. Hopefully it will improve with the upgrade.

Line State Up
Modulation DMT
Data Path Interleave


Downstream Upstream
Max Allowed Speed (kbps) 3072 384
SN Margin (dB) 12.00 17.00
Line Attenuation (dB) 18.50 12.00
CRC Errors 33 15

Have a look at the links I gave here : http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=56323673&postcount=41

It is worth getting familiar with the background to the stats.

conceited

I'm sure eircom know what their doing.
If they say we are getting upgrades in june then we are getting upgrades in june.
Laugh joke and say whatever you like but you lads haven't a clue.:D

rogue-entity

Gonzo wrote: »

why are the residential packages still only gonna be on radsl and the business on adsl2+? Surely it would be handier to put everyone on adsl2+ which should offer a smoother service with a higher chance of getting the genuine speed?

Well that isnt quite true, its not a case of giving business customers DSL2+, its more the case of not wanting to spend money on the line-cards for slower speed connections, which ADSL v1 can handle, if the line conditions are good enough. DigiWeb supplies 4 and 6Mbit broadband to home users as well as business customers, and our DSL line at work is only 1Mbit.

But in any case, I wont be complaining, since the line I have is pretty decent considering.

Macker1 wrote: »

Downstream Upstream
Max Allowed Speed (kbps) 3072 384
SN Margin (dB) 12.00 17.00
Line Attenuation (dB) 18.50 12.00
CRC Errors 33 15

Downstream/Upstream
Sync: 3072/384
SN Margin (dB): 35/15
Line Attenuation (dB): 18/13

lucernarian

flamegrill wrote: »

Eircoms upgrades are coming in 2 parts.

1) 1/2/3 meg existing packages are going to 2/3/7.6 on RADSL
2) 4/6 meg existing packages are going to 10/12meg on ADSL2+

The reason for 7.6meg on RADSL is line quality issues. As such I believe the upgrade was said to be postponed because some quality checking on the 3meg upgrades was prooving less than desirable results by eircoms techies.

<edit>

I meant to also mention that people on 3meg now will get very very mixed results because of line issues. So 7.6 meg might only be the reality for a small percentage of people. Only time will tell though.

</edit>

I've not heard anything to the contary since so we'll just have to wait. I myself am currently on 3meg so 7.6 will rock and according to my google skillz I should get full speed based on my line attenuation and db margins.

Paul

So 7.6 mbps will be provided on ADSL1?? Yes indeed it's because of line quality issues. Eircom must like people going through disconnects. I don't really care if eircom are offering 7.6 mbps somehow, as the majority of people with 3mbps are going to have problems. They make a small percentage of their customer base, so eircom should cop the f**k on and put more people on more modern standard DSL equipment.

ADSL2 would have mitigated the upgrade problems. Delaying the rollout will do nothing to the fact that the majority of lines will not sync at 7.6 mbps on G992.1. Eircom techies can't overcome physical limitations any more than your average bear can.

I know at least 2 people will be contacting me to find out why their DSL reliability's gone to ****, given their attenuation currently. Thanks eircom:mad:


And one final thing: I'll laugh when people who had to downgrade from 3mbps because their line was faulty or too long, suddenly get upgraded again and give eircom support an earful.

smellslikeshoes

I'm really not convinced that they are going to have the 1,3 and 7.6 packages on Adsl and the others on Adsl2+. Where is the proof of this? Just seems like speculation to me.