Static ip address - is it worth €3.50 a month?

higster

I'm about to get 3mb package from UTV & there is an option to get a static ip address for €3.50 a month. I do a fair bit of (cough) downloading through usual sources. Is it worth it?

Up to now had a fixed wireless provider and downloads were slow.

jor el

Your IP address will have little or no baring on P2P downloading, unless you get an IP that's banned, or get yourself blocked somehow. Unless you need a static IP for some specific reason, DHCP will be just fine.

Cabaal

Personally its not worth it unless you do remote access services like VNC but even then you don't "NEED" a static IP, downloading from any source be it ftp, http or P2P is not affected by a dynamic or static IP.

One draw back from a static IP is if a game's server, website etc blocks your IP your not going to get around it too easily

Creamy Goodness

i don't see how having a static ip will benefit you for that.

static ip's just make it easier for people to remember how to connect to you.

higster

thanks lads. Won't bother based on this.

jester77

No need for it. Plus most routers have an option for Dynamic DNS which will more than do that job for giving you remote access to your network.

Moriarty

UTV are breaking RIPE regulations by charging a monthly fee for a static ip address.. they won't be happy if someone lets them know.

Cabaal

Moriarty wrote: »

UTV are breaking RIPE regulations by charging a monthly fee for a static ip address.. they won't be happy if someone lets them know.

Can they charge a one off fee for it?
Smart are also charging a monthly fee for static IP's on almost all there packages too http://www.smarttelecom.ie/residential_package.html

The_Conductor

If you want to host a website off your home server- then you'll need a static IP address.

Cabaal

smccarrick wrote: »

If you want to host a website off your home server- then you'll need a static IP address.

Maybe so however if your hosting an http, ftp, irc server off your home broadband connection your breaking your providers Terms & Conditions :pac:

Moriarty

Cabaal wrote: »

Can they charge a one off fee for it?
Smart are also charging a monthly fee for static IP's on almost all there packages too http://www.smarttelecom.ie/residential_package.html

ISPs are allowed (by no means required) to charge a one-time fee to go towards administration purposes to assign a static ip address, but it's against RIPE policies to make it an ongoing fee as RIPE maintain ownership of the ip addresses so the ISPs have no right to charge for them. It's not theirs to lease.

I'd be pretty pissed at any telco which tried to charge me for it and I'd be getting on to ripe about it too

AntiVirus

Just for anyone who doesn't know, if you want to log into your home PC all the time and don't have a static IP address you can use logmein to do this for free.

It's excellent!

https://secure.logmein.com/

royan

Moriarty wrote: »

UTV are breaking RIPE regulations by charging a monthly fee for a static ip address

I'm digging for this now in RIPE's policy documentation - I don't suppose you have a reference?

supervixen

higster wrote: »

I'm about to get 3mb package from UTV & there is an option to get a static ip address for €3.50 a month. I do a fair bit of (cough) downloading through usual sources. Is it worth it?

Up to now had a fixed wireless provider and downloads were slow.

A static IP is actually a DISADVANTAGE for downloading, let's say you download free from rapidshare and don't have an account, you have to wait plenty of time until you can download free again, if you just restart the router normally you get different IP and you can download straight away again, because waiting time is related to a certain IP, that's why I wouldn't take a static IP even for free

Moriarty

royan wrote: »

I'm digging for this now in RIPE's policy documentation - I don't suppose you have a reference?

Looks like I was out of date by a couple of years RIPE changed their policy in 2004 to effectively have no policy on the issue. ISPs/etc can decide for themselves how much if anything to charge customers for using ip addresses, so they aren't doing anything wrong.

crawler

Moriarty wrote: »

ISPs are allowed (by no means required) to charge a one-time fee to go towards administration purposes to assign a static ip address, but it's against RIPE policies to make it an ongoing fee as RIPE maintain ownership of the ip addresses so the ISPs have no right to charge for them. It's not theirs to lease.

I'd be pretty pissed at any telco which tried to charge me for it and I'd be getting on to ripe about it too

equally RIPE don't like ISP dishing out static IPV4's too often (not defending anything) and static use is an inefficient use of address space.

MY guess is that ISP's would just call it a "hosting" option and people who have static IPs tend (not always) to consume an awful lot more bandwidth.

As I said, not defending, just my own personal thoughts

watty

smccarrick wrote: »

If you want to host a website off your home server- then you'll need a static IP address.

It's cheaper often than even the Electricity and certainly cheaper for bandwidth (it's the upload that hosting needs, not the download) to get space in a Data centre for Hosting.

I don't see any need for a static IP generally. There are services like Dynamic DNS that many routers support so that when the router detects the ISP giving a new IP via DHCP, the router automatically updates dyndns.org or similar account. (You are best to have a paid account).

I don't think it's worth it for most people. If you are using media streaming to a mobile device or VPN to your own PC/Server and find Dynamic DNS service troublesome (works fine for most people) then maybe you might consider it.