Finding out an areas hardware standard?

Coriolanus

Long story short, moving back to the country for various reasons. When I last lived in the area the first bb offered wasn't available. The phone line in the house was turned off years ago since everyone used mobiles.

Now I want to get bb, but I've talked to UPC, Vodafone and Eircom, all of which have said they can't tell me what kind of speeds, service etc they will be able to offer until I get the line turned back on, which means an engineer call out blah blah $£$£$.

Thing is, I only want bb if I can get a good enough package to make gaming on an xbox and on PC worthwhile.

So I'm kind of at a dilemna since the neighbours aren't much help. Two are on vodafone bb in a box but they're both older couples so what's "grand" for them could well be barely fast enough to make browsing less than a chore.

Anyway around having to turn the line back and incurring the costs/contract that'll involve, before even knowing if its worth doing?

dub45

Nevore wrote: »

Long story short, moving back to the country for various reasons. When I last lived in the area the first bb offered wasn't available. The phone line in the house was turned off years ago since everyone used mobiles.

Now I want to get bb, but I've talked to UPC, Vodafone and Eircom, all of which have said they can't tell me what kind of speeds, service etc they will be able to offer until I get the line turned back on, which means an engineer call out blah blah $£$£$.

Thing is, I only want bb if I can get a good enough package to make gaming on an xbox and on PC worthwhile.

So I'm kind of at a dilemna since the neighbours aren't much help. Two are on vodafone bb in a box but they're both older couples so what's "grand" for them could well be barely fast enough to make browsing less than a chore.

Anyway around having to turn the line back and incurring the costs/contract that'll involve, before even knowing if its worth doing?

Its a real Catch 22 question. Even if your neighbour's line was perfect there is no guarantee that yours would be any good.

You could make a general guess and have a look at the line stats of your neighbours - take into account the distance from the exchange can you remember what sort of speed you used to get on dial up?

Coriolanus

It was years ago, don't know if it's relevant but good enough to play Unreal Tournament in 1999.
The lines have been upgraded since, it's just a question of how much.