Trouble getting ADSL in the sticks

ga2re2t

Hey all,

My parents, who live about 6 km from the nearest village, want to get broadband and I've been looking into every possible (and economically feasible) solution for them, but with no success.

The nearest BB enable exchange is about 6 to 7 km away (in cable length roughly, not as the crow flies), so it's no surprise that the Eircom and Perlico websites say that BB is not available when I punch in their number. However, our near neighbours, about 400 m up the road, have Perlico BB. When I punch their number into Perlico, it's eligible for BB! So close and yet so far!!

I've looked into 3G broadband with Vodafone, O2 and 3, but again the coverage is just not good enough for where my parents live. Lastmile broadband are just way too complicated and expensive to work with. Line of sight to their base is an issue as well.

I'm still hoping that ADSL will work. I got chatting to an eircom engineer in the area and he said that our phoneline has two dedicated copper wires to the exchange, so the quality should be very good. However, the wiring in my parent's house leaves a lot to be desired ever since they got an electrician friend to put in a second phone and he butchered things a bit.

So, if anybody has any ideas where I can go from here, please let me know. I thought about sharing BB with our neighbours who have it but I can't think of a simple way to transmit a BB signal over a distance of 500 m. Wi-max maybe? I've e-mailed Perlico for further help and am awaiting their reply.

Also, if anybody knows of a good company that can repair phone lines and install high quality phone wires/sockets then let me know. I suppose we could just ask eircom, but I'm not too sure they'd be happy with what we did to the wires!

Regards.

smellslikeshoes

Good luck getting any information from Perlico or any other isp for that matter in regards this situation, its nothing to do with them and they really couldn't give a crap. I would also think that sharing their line is against Perlico T&C's, so best not mention any of that. You really are at the very limit for DSL on a good day and there is a good chance that the limit in your case is between you an your neighbors.

It's actually very feasible to have a wireless link between you and your neighbors, 400meters is nothing if you have a good line of sight. Hopefully someone who is a little more well versed on the prices and systems of wireless links will come and share their knowledge because I'm only an outside observer
If you do decide to go down the wireless link route make sure to think about the possible legal consequences and the burden of having 2 homes using the one connection especially with what I'm pretty sure would be a line on the edge as is, so would have poor speeds.

watty

Wireless ISP

Too far for decent speed DSL.

lucernarian

I strongly suggest you get on to that engineer, give him a few bob for his troubles and ask him to look at your line to see if he can get the line to pass.

Eircom won't really mind, once they're being paid either way probably.

You'll only ever get 1024/128 maximum on a line like that.

A wireless ISP could be better or could be worse. Some of them use satellite as their method of connecting the mast to the rest of the internet, and that's a disaster. Others are like ICE, which doesn't work anyway for whatever reason. Some are badly affected by contention, but will work fine at quieter times of the day.

I'm not sure what Last Mile are like, it might be worth the cost. Ask around locally if they're any other options and you might be able to get a service you didn't expect if you happen to have good LOS to a distant hill or such like.

I think the best route for your parents is to ask for the linesman's help. They want fairly simple broadband that will be cheap and if they have a phone already, DSL fits the bill.

Sponge Bob

simple idea, disconnect all internal wiring and only have main socket active and wait for monthly line test to see if they pass for BB or get amber ( amber is marginal means engineer will call out to test)

then get someone competent to connect internal wiring or bribe engineer after he installs broadband .

ga2re2t

Sponge Bob wrote: »

simple idea, disconnect all internal wiring and only have main socket active and wait for monthly line test to see if they pass for BB or get amber ( amber is marginal means engineer will call out to test)

Interesting, how does this monthly line test work? Do they "ping" the line or something?