UPC - Future Upgrades

Shiny

christophicus wrote: »

I never thought I would say this, but I actually don't know what I am going to do with anymore bandwidth. I am on 20Mb atm. I have run out of things that I want to download. At this stage I download a movie( legally of course ) every once and awhile, and a beta or demo of a game whenever a decent one comes out. Everything else I do could be easily done on a 6 Mb line.

Untill decent TV channels start appearing online I Don't really think I am actually getting much of an advantage from my 20 Mb connection. Anyone feeling the same as me ?

P.S Don't get me wrong, its great to see them constantly upping their game, 5 months ago before I had the 20Mb connection I would have been extactic about the upgrades. As it is at the moment though, its simply nice.

I'm only on a 5Mb smart connection and I reached that point 6 months
ago. My old attitude was HOARD HOARD, Must download INTERNET.

Now its, meh, I can get nearly anything I want in less than 20minutes.
In the case of NTL, that would be 5 mins for 20Meg, 2mins for 50Meg.:eek:

Actually if this keeps up I might consider changing from Smart to NTL.

Edit: Just emailed them now about a price for TV+BB(20Mg)

lotas

download speed is all well and good, but what i want is Upload speed... and maybe some sort of off site backup (i know they have that for their business customers). if i had my way, i would like to see, say, 4-8mb up, and a dedicated link (symetrical) to their backup service. i dont mind paying for it (as long as its reasonable), but i do want it to be fast. I currently take quite a lot of photos, and they aint small (RAW images weigh in at 22-29mb/s for my 5D MK II). it just takes too long to upload over a 1.5mb connection... 2min per file... fill 2 4Gb cards (which is quite easy) and your talking about 12 hours to upload.... just very wrong...

Stokolan

I noticed something interesting the other day. I use usenet a fair bit and noticed something funny with speeds from it.

When i am grabbing posts i get this speed most of the time
18.7Mbps/2.3MBps


but when downloading headers i noticed i was getting this and higher
80.6Mbps/10.1MBps


Is there any reason why when downloading headers the speed increases that much? or maybe is it a sign that all they need to do is hit a switch for the rumored speed upgrades.

any ideas

lotas

what are you using? Sounds like news server? What server, and what client? can only thing it could be compression of some sort...

Astraweb now use compressed headers which supposedly makes them 10X faster.

Stokolan

cisk wrote: »

Astraweb now use compressed headers which supposedly makes them 10X faster.

Well i guess thats the answer so

and here I thought it was something nice

irishguy

Just got a call from UPC (yes i know 6pm on a Sunday) and they told me they have upgraded the lines in my area and I should have quicker speeds during peak times, then they tried to get me to sign up for there phone package. No mention of new peak speeds though

Irishpimpdude

irishguy wrote: »

Just got a call from UPC (yes i know 6pm on a Sunday) and they told me they have upgraded the lines in my area and I should have quicker speeds during peak times, then they tried to get me to sign up for there phone package. No mention of new peak speeds though

That could be what they ment by better speeds

cahirhennessy

irishguy wrote: »

Just got a call from UPC (yes i know 6pm on a Sunday) and they told me they have upgraded the lines in my area and I should have quicker speeds during peak times, then they tried to get me to sign up for there phone package. No mention of new peak speeds though

What area is that?

AlmightyCushion

irishguy wrote: »

Just got a call from UPC (yes i know 6pm on a Sunday) and they told me they have upgraded the lines in my area and I should have quicker speeds during peak times, then they tried to get me to sign up for there phone package. No mention of new peak speeds though

I assume by this he means there was a problem with contention before but this upgrade has fixed it somewhat.

RoyalMarine

christophicus wrote: »

I never thought I would say this, but I actually don't know what I am going to do with anymore bandwidth. I am on 20Mb atm. I have run out of things that I want to download. At this stage I download a movie( legally of course ) every once and awhile, and a beta or demo of a game whenever a decent one comes out. Everything else I do could be easily done on a 6 Mb line.

Untill decent TV channels start appearing online I Don't really think I am actually getting much of an advantage from my 20 Mb connection. Anyone feeling the same as me ?

P.S Don't get me wrong, its great to see them constantly upping their game, 5 months ago before I had the 20Mb connection I would have been extactic about the upgrades. As it is at the moment though, its simply nice.

i agree, there isnt a huge amount anymore is there.

ive hoarded almost 6tb's! from rapidshare. im kinda fed up with it now.

lotas

irishguy wrote: »

Just got a call from UPC (yes i know 6pm on a Sunday) and they told me they have upgraded the lines in my area and I should have quicker speeds during peak times, then they tried to get me to sign up for there phone package. No mention of new peak speeds though

that sounds like its just the backhaul... wonder what they actually have around here in Tallaght... have had their connection since it first began, and i think that was 8-10 years ago now (ahhh, back in the day when i have a 100k/s down connection...). have no idea what their backhaul is up here, but never seem to have a problem with it.

irishguy

I am in Ringsend D4. The connection was working fine I have had no probs, so I dont know why they were even ringing

Solair

UPC are rolling out fibre-to-kerb / fibre-to-last-node technology. Basically, it means that there's a box on the street somewhere that is connected to a fibre optic cable. That box connects to end users via coaxial cable, so you'll still just have a normal cable socket in your house. However, you're only sharing that line with a few other users and it's quite a short run back to the node so huge speeds are very definitely possible with EuroDOCSIS 3 modems.

Here's the press release : http://networking.cbronline.com/news/upc_netherlands_to_launch_fiber_power_broadband_services_in_europe

It mentions Netherlands, Austria and Switzerland with other EU markets later in 2009. So, we might see it sometime!

You can expect them to use terms like 'powered by our fibre network' etc.

eircom are trialling similar technology called VDSL. They basically replace those green junction box cabinets with a larger one that contains all the DSL and voice equipment which would normally be located at the exchange. This node is connected back to their network with a fibre optic line and it can offer cable-like speeds over a normal twisted pair phone line using VDSL.

There's a shot of one of the new eircom cabinets : http://www.tfl.eu.com/project2.jsp
(I think they're painted green though)

The difference is that UPC actually have this stuff in place, eircom are still playing with it.

NiSmO

This post has been deleted.

bk

Solair wrote: »

UPC are rolling out fibre-to-kerb / fibre-to-last-node technology. Basically, it means that there's a box on the street somewhere that is connected to a fibre optic cable. That box connects to end users via coaxial cable, so you'll still just have a normal cable socket in your house. However, you're only sharing that line with a few other users and it's quite a short run back to the node so huge speeds are very definitely possible with EuroDOCSIS 3 modems.

Yes, I've been saying this for years, since back when IOFFL was first formed, cable has fantastic potential to make a real next generation high speed broadband network and bring real competition to Eircom.

In fact cable has far more potential then DSL IMO. Even if Eircom roll out VDSL2, it will likely max out at 50mb/s, with cable UPC are already offering 120mb/s on DOCSIS 3 in other countries and there is lots of potential with cable for even much higher speeds.

It shows what a bad, short sighted decision it was for Smart to go with ADSL in their Fibre To The Building developments and what a good decision it was for Magnet to go for ethernet in their FTTB developments, much more future proof.

Of course UPC have many other problems to sort out, before they are considered a top quality ISP in the way that Smart is (in terms of customer support, stability of service, latency, throttling, if not in price).

UPC need to:
- Radically fix their CS
- Make sure all Irish bound traffic is peered through INEX.
- US bound traffic needs to go Ireland -> US direct
- UK traffic needs to go Ireland -> UK direct.
Basically UPC currently rely too much on their European infrastructure, which is fine for main land Europe customers, but not customers in an anglo country.
- get rid of the stupid P2P and torrents throttling (no point in having 120mb/s if these are throttled).

Also UPC need to vastly improve their TV services.
- Need much better PVR service (much better stability, session link and dual recording to start with).
- HD
- VoD and interactivity.
- Cheaper prices more in line with Sky.

wayne040576

NiSmO wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

Is your connection down this evening? Mine seems to be. Another upgrade? If so they're really pushing the competition.

kin9pin

I haven't seen anyone from UPC working in my area (Sandyford), but my broadband has been very weird since Friday.
Speed tests from speedtest.ie and speedtest.net give me anywhere between 1.5Mb and 4Mb down on a 20Mb connection. However if I start a large download off usenet I get a constant 18 to 19Mb. Pings have been hopping all over the place aswell making xbox live a bit hit and miss.

DingDong

Solair wrote: »

UPC are rolling out fibre-to-kerb / fibre-to-last-node technology. Basically, it means that there's a box on the street somewhere that is connected to a fibre optic cable. That box connects to end users via coaxial cable, so you'll still just have a normal cable socket in your house. However, you're only sharing that line with a few other users and it's quite a short run back to the node so huge speeds are very definitely possible with EuroDOCSIS 3 modems.

Here's the press release : http://networking.cbronline.com/news/upc_netherlands_to_launch_fiber_power_broadband_services_in_europe

It mentions Netherlands, Austria and Switzerland with other EU markets later in 2009. So, we might see it sometime!

You can expect them to use terms like 'powered by our fibre network' etc.

eircom are trialling similar technology called VDSL. They basically replace those green junction box cabinets with a larger one that contains all the DSL and voice equipment which would normally be located at the exchange. This node is connected back to their network with a fibre optic line and it can offer cable-like speeds over a normal twisted pair phone line using VDSL.

There's a shot of one of the new eircom cabinets : http://www.tfl.eu.com/project2.jsp
(I think they're painted green though)

The difference is that UPC actually have this stuff in place, eircom are still playing with it.

How much does the VDSL kit in the cab cost? Also how many people can it serve

skyhighflyer

My UPC connection has been weird for the past few days. Getting ridiculous ping times of 400m/s to Dublin and struggling to get over 1Mb on a 6Mb connection. Just hope it's something to do with this 'upgrade' business.

christophicus

The Dublin server for Speedtest.net is crap, or else UPC's routing to it is. Use Galway or London.

mwrf

I find frankfurt gives me the best results on speedtest.net

paulm17781

skyhighflyer wrote: »

My UPC connection has been weird for the past few days. Getting ridiculous ping times of 400m/s to Dublin and struggling to get over 1Mb on a 6Mb connection. Just hope it's something to do with this 'upgrade' business.

You're out of date! UPC offer 1, 3, 10 and 20 Mbps these days. Go to their site and look at upgrading.

skyhighflyer

christophicus wrote: »

The Dublin server for Speedtest.net is crap, or else UPC's routing to it is. Use Galway or London.

It's even worse today, never had these kind of problems before. Even pinging heanet gives me over 250m/s.

odie2020

Try this site for uPC speedtest

http://www.upc.nl/speedtest/

MagicMarker

Hey guys...

I'm currently on a 3mb connection from Eircom, that's shared over 3 laptops.

My brother is insisting we stay put, but I'm sick of the slow speeds over the last few weeks so I'm thinking of getting NTL in for myself.

Is the 20mb worth signing up for? I just need to be sure before I commit to a 12 month contract.

wayne040576

MagicMarker wrote: »

Hey guys...

I'm currently on a 3mb connection from Eircom, that's shared over 3 laptops.

My brother is insisting we stay put, but I'm sick of the slow speeds over the last few weeks so I'm thinking of getting NTL in for myself.

Is the 20mb worth signing up for? I just need to be sure before I commit to a 12 month contract.

The connection itself is usually good.

The thing to remember with ntl broadband is that you also have to get the basic tv package. I have the 20mb broadband package and with that and the tv plus vat, I get a bill every 2 months for 126 quid. If you already use tl for tv then your ok but I have sky digital so I'm paying a bit too much.

MagicMarker

wayne040576 wrote: »

The connection itself is usually good.

The thing to remember with ntl broadband is that you also have to get the basic tv package. I have the 20mb broadband package and with that and the tv plus vat, I get a bill every 2 months for 126 quid. If you already use tl for tv then your ok but I have sky digital so I'm paying a bit too much.

Yeah, just so happens that I'll be switching from analogue to digital T.V so I was thinking of order the BB while I'm at it!

wayne040576

MagicMarker wrote: »

Yeah, just so happens that I'll be switching from analogue to digital T.V so I was thinking of order the BB while I'm at it!

I had their digital package a few years ago and got rid of it. I didn't like it. Very poor bit rate leading to a very pixelated picture at times. The box also didn't have the options that are available on sky.

consultech

wayne040576 wrote: »

The connection itself is usually good.

The thing to remember with ntl broadband is that you also have to get the basic tv package. I have the 20mb broadband package and with that and the tv plus vat, I get a bill every 2 months for 126 quid. If you already use tl for tv then your ok but I have sky digital so I'm paying a bit too much.

Are you sure on this??? I was told by a sales operator yesterday that I dont need to get TV, as long as there is a cable point in my house!?? Just the €48 monthly broadband...