upc - will i get the speeds advertised?

Random

i'm considering getting this from upc in the near future - http://www.upc.ie/broadband/thirty/

i have dsl at the moment. i know they advertise it as "up to 24meg" etc etc but my line only supports 3meg so even if i'm the only one on it then that's all i'll get.

with upc if there's no one else on it will i get the full 30meg or does it depend on the distance etc too?

it also advertises it as "fibre power broadband" but then mentions coaxial cable. can anyone clarify what bits are fibre and what bits aren't?

thanks very much

Falcon.ie

If 3mb is the max your line can carry then that's that. Getting the 30mb line in hope you'll get the full 30mb's will only cause you problems as the 30mb will create noise on the line and seriously affect your 3mb line, probably squashing down your speeds to a crawl.

bealtine

Falcon.ie wrote: »

If 3mb is the max your line can carry then that's that. Getting the 30mb line in hope you'll get the full 30mb's will only cause you problems as the 30mb will create noise on the line and seriously affect your 3mb line, probably squashing down your speeds to a crawl.

UPC doesn't run on dsl lines....

UPC is a cable system so most likely you'll get the full amount or close enough.

Random

sorry, i should clarify.... i'm not expecting to use upc over my phone line. i know that'll be through their cables and that's why my query. thanks

Falcon.ie

bealtine wrote: »

UPC doesn't run on dsl lines....

UPC is a cable system so most likely you'll get the full amount or close enough.

Certainly not during peak periods with their contention ratio's....

Onikage

Had a chat with one of the technicians last week. He said they do have contention and you might see drops at peak times but generally when it's quiet you should get near enough to the full whack. Certainly none of the bs numbers you get on DSL.

KennyLegend

Random wrote: »

sorry, i should clarify.... i'm not expecting to use upc over my phone line. i know that'll be through their cables and that's why my query. thanks

UPC is a totally separate system to dsl. I got it in 2 wks ago and I have checked it 2-3 times a day since. I'm getting 27-30 on a
30 mb package. Cable is the way forward. Eircom will always be trailing behind. And with 100 mb only around the corner, eirco
Will be lost in upc's wake

murphym7

I have a question on the "fibre powered" bit. My old fella wants to get UPC into his house. His question is the same as mine, as a previous poster said, which part is fibre powered? I have not seen any UPC vans digging up the road in my neigbourhood or my dads laying new "fibre" cables anywhere - so where is all the fibre powered cable? Is it just still the standard coax cable that Chorus and NTL layed years ago?

bealtine

murphym7 wrote: »

so where is all the fibre powered cable? Is it just still the standard coax cable that Chorus and NTL layed years ago?

The fibre is from the roadside "cabinets" to a central location. It's mostly a marketing gimmick. The coax delivers the signal to your house as it has always done.

murphym7

bealtine wrote: »

The fibre is from the roadside "cabinets" to a central location. It's mostly a marketing gimmick. The coax delivers the signal to your house as it has always done.

Thought so, Thanks.

Ranicand

murphym7 wrote: »

Thought so, Thanks.

However it beats DSL by a long shot.

jor el

Falcon.ie wrote: »

Certainly not during peak periods with their contention ratio's....

UPC don't publish their contention ratio. Peak time performance will depend on the area you're in, and how much congestion there is. This can vary between neighbouring housing estates, depending on the kind of users on that particular loop.

I had 20Mbps, now 25Mbps, and it's normally around 15Mbps whenever I check it. I've never noticed it being un-usably slow or anything like that.

As Ranicand says, it does beat any DSL product.

bealtine

jor el wrote: »

UPC don't publish their contention ratio. Peak time performance will depend on the area you're in, and how much congestion there is. This can vary between neighbouring housing estates, depending on the kind of users on that particular loop.

17:1 is the accepted but unpublished ratio.

Random

right, so (in theory) i'll get the same speed (far away from their exchange or whatever they call it) as someone who's 10 feet from the exchange, assuming there's no one else using the network at the time?

Roland27

I got the 15Mb broadband from UPC today, and initially I thought it was working like a charm. I done a speedtest when it first became active and am continuing to do speedtests, and they're all coming it at around 14Mb. Grand job.

The query I have, and part I can't understand, is that even though my speedtest's suggest everything is fine, some sites are inexplicably just taking a long time to load. Loading times seem to fluctuate. One minute your average site would load no problem, and then the next it would take an unusually long time to load (again, even thought the speedtest tells me my download speed is good). For example, a Google page would take a few seconds when it should be instant, and even boards.ie takes a ridiculously long time to load and there seems to be a problem, then if I try it again a couple of minutes later it zips along. Has anyone experienced this? (I'm in Dublin city centre).

Unregistered.

Roland27 wrote: »

I got the 15Mb broadband from UPC today, and initially I thought it was working like a charm. I done a speedtest when it first became active and am continuing to do speedtests, and they're all coming it at around 14Mb. Grand job.

The query I have, and part I can't understand, is that even though my speedtest's suggest everything is fine, some sites are inexplicably just taking a long time to load. Loading times seem to fluctuate. One minute your average site would load no problem, and then the next it would take an unusually long time to load (again, even thought the speedtest tells me my download speed is good). For example, a Google page would take a few seconds when it should be instant, and even boards.ie takes a ridiculously long time to load and there seems to be a problem, then if I try it again a couple of minutes later it zips along. Has anyone experienced this? (I'm in Dublin city centre).

Connected over Wifi?

Roland27

Unregistered. wrote: »

Connected over Wifi?

Yep, connected over Wifi (like three feet away). I don't think that should matter, should it, I mean my speedtest is still telling me its... 14.46Mb download now?!

Hey Mr.S, good to hear someone else is having the same issue (well, not good, but you get me).

sidekick

Ditto, I experience the same problem too. My desktop connected directly via a cable is pretty solid and fast all/most of the time. Laptops connected via wifi are good but not as good as it should be. I'm using the modem supplied by UPC - is it just crappy? I'm considering buying another wifi modem/router to see if that makes a difference.

Anyone else fix this type of issue?

Roland27

Mr.S wrote: »

i have the same service in my parents house but used my own router for that and it works perfectly, got the same service installed in my flat the other week but using the UPC free wifi router and now theres some issues.

So i'm guessing that the router they supply is a bit crap.

I have digital TV and phone line along with my UPC deal, so I don't think I can change my router can I, not if my phone line feeds directly off my UPC router?

MagicMarker

Get it OP, you won't regret it. I have 15mb and 95% of the time it's perfect, not dropping below 13mb.

racerxkiwi

im with upc and im getting 13mb download speed - im on a 15mb plan. not bad considering its probably peak usage time (in rathmines).



its great as long as its working. when it goes down its no use calling them.. you just wait 40 mins on the phone (which is charged to you at a "lo-call" rate - not yr free mobile mins!!). i think they must of changed something about 6 months ago cos since then its been really good.

the free wireless router that came free is fine. mind you i dont have a very big flat!

MagicMarker

racerxkiwi wrote: »

im with upc and im getting 13mb download speed - im on a 15mb plan. not bad considering its probably peak usage time (in rathmines).



its great as long as its working. when it goes down its no use calling them.. you just wait 40 mins on the phone (which is charged to you at a "lo-call" rate - not yr free mobile mins!!). i think they must of changed something about 6 months ago cos since then its been really good.

UPC customer care is free?

Jehuty42

Roland27 wrote: »

I got the 15Mb broadband from UPC today, and initially I thought it was working like a charm. I done a speedtest when it first became active and am continuing to do speedtests, and they're all coming it at around 14Mb. Grand job.

The query I have, and part I can't understand, is that even though my speedtest's suggest everything is fine, some sites are inexplicably just taking a long time to load. Loading times seem to fluctuate. One minute your average site would load no problem, and then the next it would take an unusually long time to load (again, even thought the speedtest tells me my download speed is good). For example, a Google page would take a few seconds when it should be instant, and even boards.ie takes a ridiculously long time to load and there seems to be a problem, then if I try it again a couple of minutes later it zips along. Has anyone experienced this? (I'm in Dublin city centre).

Had a similiar issue myself, we got UPC in a house we're renting in the Grand Canal Dock area- speed tests are good but it's clear that there is a huge amount of contention judging by the number of UPC wireless SSIDs in range. Actual performance was sluggish and pings we pretty abysmal. Switching to a leased Magnet DSL line at the minute. Not blaming UPC for the problems, since there was clearly a lot of users in the area, but it's worth bearing in mind that although cable is usually a lot better than DSL, it may not be depending on your area.

Ah-Watch

Last year had a 15Meg connection and it was great- speedtest.net often showed the speed as 18 megs which is probably wrong but the speed was impressive compared to Vodafone anyway. This year I have a 30Meg connection- Only installed a few weeks but anytime I did a speedtest it read as 15-18meg, a bit disappointed but its WAY better than Voda at Home anyway, I never have a problem streaming stuff online. Go for it, you wont regret it!;)

The supplied router is lousy but if you connect via lan cable its perfect. Have the 30 meg package and it doesnt drop below 27 (in south dublin)

Here's my current speed in Drumcondra, on the 15 meg pack:



It works pretty well here most of the time. I'm using the older EPC2203 modem with my own router.

KennyLegend

PEOPLE....the supplied UPC router is fine as a wired modem but the wireless is pure crap. Search the forum. Plenty of guys with wireless problems with this cisco router.

The solution: turn off the wireless, and add another decent wireless router and let that handle the wireless routing. I have it done and so do a lot of other guys on here

racerxkiwi

MagicMarker wrote: »

UPC customer care is free?

Oh yea - they are now alright.. when I phoned them last year it wasn't.

Roland27

Mr.S wrote: »

You can, just make sure you buy a cable wireless router (if you want to change...) You can get em for like 40-50euro in Argos!

KennyLegend wrote: »

PEOPLE....the supplied UPC router is fine as a wired modem but the wireless is pure crap. Search the forum. Plenty of guys with wireless problems with this cisco router.

The solution: turn off the wireless, and add another decent wireless router and let that handle the wireless routing. I have it done and so do a lot of other guys on here

Thanks for the replies, lads. I could buy a new wireless router or even forget about using wireless and connect via lan, but to be honest I'm simply not happy with that. UPC clearly advertise their broadband as being wireless and as such I expect to be able to get the full broadband I pay for wireless, so I think I will get onto them.

To reiterate in relation to the subject of this thread, yes, I get the full speeds advertised – my 15Mb speedtests are highly impressive, 14.5+ all the time – but it simply does not connect properly and pages do not load all of time via the supplied Cisco wireless router. Its getting very annoying at this stage and I would certainly not recommend this router to anyone.

Roland27

Roland27 wrote: »

Thanks for the replies, lads. I could buy a new wireless router or even forget about using wireless and connect via lan, but to be honest I'm simply not happy with that. UPC clearly advertise their broadband as being wireless and as such I expect to be able to get the full broadband I pay for wireless, so I think I will get onto them.

To reiterate in relation to the subject of this thread, yes, I get the full speeds advertised – my 15Mb speedtests are highly impressive, 14.5+ all the time – but it simply does not connect properly and pages do not load all of time via the supplied Cisco wireless router. Its getting very annoying at this stage and I would certainly not recommend this router to anyone.

It's simply the nature of 802.11g wireless. Although it's rated at 54Mbps that's the raw data rate, the actual data rate is only about half that, making it less than ideal for the 30 meg package. Ideally they should be supplying a modem/router with 802.11n capability.

KennyLegend

Karsini wrote: »

It's simply the nature of 802.11g wireless. Although it's rated at 54Mbps that's the raw data rate, the actual data rate is only about half that, making it less than ideal for the 30 meg package. Ideally they should be supplying a modem/router with 802.11n capability.

The Epc2425's wireless let's it down to be honest. But ya..to make use of UPC's high speeds you need to get yourself a decent router.