Eircom eFibre VDSL/FTTC rollout – plans to reach 1.6m premises by mid 2016

damienirel

jca wrote: »

No UPC bb in my area. eFibre available from next month. No UPC in Wexford town, it has eFibre. A lot of places going fibre don't have access to UPC. If UPC broadband is as bad as their TV service, they can keep it.

eFibre available from next month - hope that all works out for you!:D

SpaceTime

KOR101 wrote: »

Actually, I was stuck on 8mb.....

WORD OF WARNING

When engineer called to install fibre, his first question was whether I had any devices. After the modem was set up, I quickly checked the laptop, putting in the details for the new network, and everything seemed fine. I have an internet radio too, but it's fiddly without the keyboard, so I said I could do that myself.

Engineer left.

Within a minute all I could get on the laptop (MACbook) was the twirling coloured ball. Internet radio wouldn't accept the network. This morning technical support explained that a conflict between the IP4 and IPV6 addresses can cause this problem. I turned off the IPV6 address in network settings, and she changed something on my modem to resolve the conflict. She also said Eircom don't support internet radios, so I've given up on that.

So, my advice is don't let the engineer leave until you are well and truly satisfied that all you're devices work.

And, it took a full day of stress trying to get on top of the problems so you there's that to bear in mind as well.

There's some issue with the Zyxel modems that eircom use and older versions of Mac OS X
It seems to be 10.4 that causes it. It's currently 10.8.5 which has absolutely no issue.

This is why people need to accept software updates for their OS be it Windows, OS X, iOS or Android! Things change and need to be patched to bring them up to date with modern standards.

It's something to do with IPv6 which really is irrelevant at this time anyway as almost nothing requires it.

I'm not sure why you would have any issue with an internet radio. Perhaps your Internet radio doesn't support WPA2 encryption which would be the default standard on most modern Wi-Fi installations.

Your old router could have been using WEP or WPA1

You can log into the router and downgrade the encryption on the Wi-Fi. The only thing is that it will make your network more vulnerable to bring used by neighbours but that's up to you.

Unfortunately the internet service provider can't really help with absolutely everything as technology moves on and there are just so many possible configurations of old computers and old devices.

They do support internet radio. Who ever told you that meant they don't provide technical support for devices. That's up to you.

They should have tested the router with all commonly installed versions of windows, Mac OS, iOS and Android though.

Having a major issue with a version of Mac OS (even if it's from a few years ago) that's still quite commonly used is pretty bad. There are a hell of a lot of Macs out there these days.

kaizersoze

hellboy99 wrote: »

That's what it says on the site

Jeez. That's a long time to be stuck in a contract. Alot can happen in 2 years.

jca wrote: »

No UPC bb in my area. eFibre available from next month. No UPC in Wexford town, it has eFibre. A lot of places going fibre don't have access to UPC. If UPC broadband is as bad as their TV service, they can keep it.

Same here. No UPC only rotting cable tv service on it's last legs.

When the eircom roll-out is complete it will cover and serve a massive area and households in comparison to UPC.

SpaceTime

kaizersoze wrote: »

Jeez. That's a long time to be stuck in a contract. Alot can happen in 2 years.



Same here. No UPC only rotting cable tv service on it's last legs.

When the eircom roll-out is complete it will cover and serve a massive area and households in comparison to UPC.

UPC is kind of hard to generalise about. The areas that have been upgraded are basically totally rebuilt. They are full fibre-coax hybrid networks feed from cabinets and in a lot of cases they've replaced most of the coaxial cable with new higher spec stuff.

They've various towns with old networks that they acquired and still haven't upgraded though. They're not at all representative of the parts of the network that they've modernised that can deliver well over 100 Mbits very reliably.

Red Nissan

damienirel wrote: »

Once the ESB break into this area they will own it, Eircom are a dinosaur that's on the way out faster than they think.

Eircom are the infrastructure and service providers, the ESB or even you or I will be only service providers, providing the service from Eircom but the bill will read ESB eFibre/UPC eFibre/Vodafone eFibre and so forth and so on.

On the point about mobile offering, Eircom sold their infrastructure to Vodafone and the deal meant that Eircom could not provide infrastructure or service for a mobile network until the expiration period of a ten years or more elapsed.

So essentially ALL the infrastructure for both land line and mobile was initially BUILT physically by Eircom.

SpaceTime

Red Nissan wrote: »

Eircom are the infrastructure and service providers, the ESB or even you or I will be only service providers, providing the service from Eircom but the bill will read ESB eFibre/UPC eFibre/Vodafone eFibre and so forth and so on.

On the point about mobile offering, Eircom sold their infrastructure to Vodafone and the deal meant that Eircom could not provide infrastructure or service for a mobile network until the expiration period of a ten years or more elapsed.

So essentially ALL the infrastructure for both land line and mobile was initially BUILT physically by Eircom.

You're somewhat mistaken there.

Telecom Eireann / P&T was a state monopoly that was given exclusive rights to provide telephone service until the market was opened up to competition. That's now largely ancient history, particularly in new areas like mobile/wireless and broadband.

Eircom currently owns a large access network i.e. the PSTN phone network that runs copper wires into homes. That gives it a lot of access to homes and businesses all over the country and makes it one of the key platforms for broadband at present using ADSL (regular broadband) or VDSL (efibre) over the phone lines.

Because eircom has such a significant market position and because of its history i.e. it was a state-owned artificially protected monopoly, it was required to open its access networks (lines to houses / local exchanges) to competing companies and provide them with access at a wholesale rate.

This can be done by either having eircom forward traffic onto the other companies' networks at particular handover points or in some cases, they may have their own exchanges co-located next to eircom's equipment and customers are directly connected to them for broadband and/or voice services.

However, eircom's main competitor is now UPC which operates its own access network (the cable TV system in cities and quite a lot of larger towns). That has absolutely nothing to do with eircom's infrastructure. UPC have their own local access networks, own voice network and own backhaul system and onward international connectivity.

What ESB are proposing to do is rollout an entirely alternative platform using fibre run along their power-line infrastructure.
ESB have access to every home in the country and they can simply attach fibre to lines or push it through ducts.

Their proposal is to run such a network with a partner company where ESB would provide the infrastructure but someone else would actually develop and sell the telecoms services to end users.

..

On the mobile side of things, Telecom Eireann owned Eircell which was the first mobile network on air here. However, Eircom sold Eircell to Vodafone to profit from the cash it made on the sale.

In the meantime, the state granted licences to three other companies : O2 (Digifone then), Meteor and Three. Those companies built out and own their own infrastructure which has nothing to do with the old Eircell system.

Meteor was subsequently purchased by Eircom allowing them to re-enter the mobile market.

Eircom's the 3rd largest mobile operator in Ireland now and the other networks have absolutely nothing to do with it or with eircom infrastructure.


....

You've also got another alternative access network "wireless ISPs" (wISPs) who access people's homes via small fixed antennae placed on your roof. The likes of Digiweb Metro is an example of this.

In this case, they have their own independent infrastructure - nothing to do with eircom and can provide broadband and phone services.

..

In terms of national and international fibre networks, eircom have a very large footprint but there are quite a few other providers including BT Ireland, ESB and UPC who have their own national fibre networks and then there are quite a lot more international options via a whole mixture of companies.

Again, it means that telcos are not at all dependent on eircom if they don't want to be. Eircom does sell wholesale services but it competes with others quite heavily for customers.

So, really eircom's e-fibre network's just one of several ways of connecting to homes. It's not 1984 and Telecom Eireann's long, long, dead and buried.

Eircom's just one large player in a market that has a lot of other options nowadays.

...

The big issue at present is that a lot of households are still depending on eircom for access to broadband (especially outside of UPC's coverage areas). However, this ESB plan will really shake things up potentially.

tarakino

Called eircom to ask about going live date for Mahon in Cork as it's showing now live on their map, they said that map is not accurate and that Mahon exchange will be only live in december 2014!!! Are they bloody serious?!

damienirel

Red Nissan wrote: »

Eircom are the infrastructure and service providers, the ESB or even you or I will be only service providers, providing the service from Eircom but the bill will read ESB eFibre/UPC eFibre/Vodafone eFibre and so forth and so on.

On the point about mobile offering, Eircom sold their infrastructure to Vodafone and the deal meant that Eircom could not provide infrastructure or service for a mobile network until the expiration period of a ten years or more elapsed.

So essentially ALL the infrastructure for both land line and mobile was initially BUILT physically by Eircom.

I think you misunderstood what I was saying. By own it, I mean the whole broadband market - if ESB are going to go ahead and do what is rumored they're thinking about they will own the market because Eircom have allowed their infrastructure to collapse over the years. They own the infrastructure for dsl - big woop! - This fibre rollout that's going on at the moment will be their last push because they have tackled the wrong market by aiming at solely high pop density areas - which is already covered quite well by UPC whatever people might think of them. They haven't even vaguely considered a fibre to the home solution which would guarantee them top spot in the broadband market because it's all short term hot air as per usual from eircom. ESB are real heavyweights with massive amounts of funding behind them to push for a real Broadband for everybody scheme - the sooner it happens the better, I've had enough of eircom and their line rental rubbish.

yasa.pl

Hi guys!,

I've spotted some works by KN and other (can't remember) in Trim, Co. Meath. Anyone have any details. eFibre maps updated Trim from Oct-Dec'13 to Nov'13.

Cheers
Jacek

Red Nissan

tarakino wrote: »

Called eircom to ask about going live date for Mahon in Cork as it's showing now live on their map, they said that map is not accurate and that Mahon exchange will be only live in december 2014!!! Are they bloody serious?!

I certainly hope they are not serious. BUT, but, but ~ I was living here before the phone arrived at all and it was a special job to get me connected and much later when broadband was rolled out, I was amongst the LAST to be connected.

Red Nissan

damienirel wrote: »

ESB are real heavyweights with massive amounts of funding behind them to push for a real Broadband for everybody scheme - the sooner it happens the better, I've had enough of eircom and their line rental rubbish.

Just read that in another reply, having heard more details, I'd be a customer for sure.

jca

jeffk wrote: »

Onto eircom this morning, the work in Blanchardstown is finished in December. So any time between now and then.

Also if your getting 10Mbps then you’ll get 70Mbps

Not true unfortunately I'm getting 12meg at the moment and the 70meg box is greyed out on the eircom website. Another reason I went to Vodafone, no problem getting the 70meg profile with them.

syboit

tarakino wrote: »

Called eircom to ask about going live date for Mahon in Cork as it's showing now live on their map, they said that map is not accurate and that Mahon exchange will be only live in december 2014!!! Are they bloody serious?!

what was the date before it started to show "fibre available now" ?

Red Nissan

syboit wrote: »

what was the date before it started to show "fibre available now" ?

Aug/Sept 2013

gordonnet

tarakino wrote: »

Just checked the eircom map:Mahon, Wilton and Little Island are now live! Cork

douglas / frankfield is "live", I STILL cant order eFibre, going live is no guarantee of getting it. :mad:

tarakino

gordonnet wrote: »

douglas / frankfield is "live", I STILL cant order eFibre, going live is no guarantee of getting it. :mad:

All this eircom system is a joke...one of their rep told me that those areas are marked are live because there's 1 cabinet live!! and he said they don't have any dates for the rest of the cabinets...

Even worse, another rep told me that the map is incorrect and that she would highlight it to her manager!

My area Mahon is now live but according to their rep, the Mahon exchange would be only ready by Dec 2014 so another 15 months...bearing in mind that the 11 scheduled cabinets for Mahon have been all installed...losing hope really

ofcork

gordonnet wrote: »

douglas / frankfield is "live", I STILL cant order eFibre, going live is no guarantee of getting it. :mad:

Engineer who installed mine said douglas was one of the first areas in cork to go live.

TheChizler

gordonnet wrote: »

douglas / frankfield is "live", I STILL cant order eFibre, going live is no guarantee of getting it. :mad:

Several parts of Douglas/Rochestown have been live for months now, you're just unlucky

wheresmybeaver

Glanmire back to November. Curses! The ambition now is to have it installed before Christmas.

arctan

SpaceTime wrote: »

There's some issue with the Zyxel modems that eircom use and older versions of Mac OS X
It seems to be 10.4 that causes it. It's currently 10.8.5 which has absolutely no issue.

This is why people need to accept software updates for their OS be it Windows, OS X, iOS or Android! Things change and need to be patched to bring them up to date with modern standards.

It's something to do with IPv6 which really is irrelevant at this time anyway as almost nothing requires it.

I'm not sure why you would have any issue with an internet radio. Perhaps your Internet radio doesn't support WPA2 encryption which would be the default standard on most modern Wi-Fi installations.

Your old router could have been using WEP or WPA1

You can log into the router and downgrade the encryption on the Wi-Fi. The only thing is that it will make your network more vulnerable to bring used by neighbours but that's up to you.

Unfortunately the internet service provider can't really help with absolutely everything as technology moves on and there are just so many possible configurations of old computers and old devices.

They do support internet radio. Who ever told you that meant they don't provide technical support for devices. That's up to you.

They should have tested the router with all commonly installed versions of windows, Mac OS, iOS and Android though.

Having a major issue with a version of Mac OS (even if it's from a few years ago) that's still quite commonly used is pretty bad. There are a hell of a lot of Macs out there these days.

10.6 and lower are the ones with the issue on macs .... turn of ipV6 encapsulation on the wireless setting on the mac, then turn off ipv6 on the wired connection in the router settings and that will fix it ...

windows vista is another headache .... XP seems sturdy enough (sp3 and later versions of sp2) so I don't know why vista has the same problem ... except with vista its the encryption, it'll connect on wpa 1 and 2 to the router, but not then onto the internet. encryption needs to be set to wep for vista to work in most cases ....

SpaceTime

Seems Apple to say that OS X 10.6.7 resolves it. That was released in March 2011.

If it's any older than that definitely disable IPv6 and definitely without connecting it to the eircom router first as it will cause a kernel panic... The spinning beach ball of death.

You may need to actually unplug the router from the power socket to prevent Wi-Fi connections

Just go into - preferences - network and you'll find it in there somewhere.
If the padlock is locked click it and enter your password.
Uncheck the IPv6 stuff and click the padlock to lock it in again.

Job done!

Connect to eircom Mac murdering router without any risk.

Then, if possible update your Mac beyond 10.6.7

Morf

Not to be dismissive of anything people are saying here but the common trend of what seems to be said here is that Eircom are in complete disarray on the whole roll-out.

Vodafone, Eircom, KN engineers, sales depts., technical depts. and a mate's mate are all saying something different.

TheDriver

Mallow is now live according to online checkers.

jca

Morf wrote: »

Not to be dismissive of anything people are saying here but the common trend of what seems to be said here is that Eircom are in complete disarray on the whole roll-out.

Vodafone, Eircom, KN engineers, sales depts., technical depts. and a mate's mate are all saying something different.

I don't think that's really fair. Its a huge undertaking which involves no less than 4 different parties. In fairness to kn, they've done trojan work, after all, the installation of the vdsl cabinets and other hardware to a very high standard btw, is being done very efficiently. The rest of the stuff, activation dates,maps etc are always going to be glitchy.

jca

I see kn doing work on the bohreen hill in Enniscorthy this morning.

BobMc

Seen a KN networks van working on a box near my house, about 500mtrs away, wasnt aware there was one so near, this was at 6pm ish, any clues as to what this work typically signals?? sorry for my cluelessness, efibre is showing as available on our exchange now (athlunkard limerick) but from reading some post only one box needs to be active for them to claim that, desperately need to see an improved broadband service in our area as speeds just havent kept pace with available services that need faster bb and we've no UPC

Morf

jca wrote: »

I don't think that's really fair. Its a huge undertaking which involves no less than 4 different parties. In fairness to kn, they've done trojan work, after all, the installation of the vdsl cabinets and other hardware to a very high standard btw, is being done very efficiently. The rest of the stuff, activation dates,maps etc are always going to be glitchy.

I wasn't really making the point from a hardware point of view.

Just pointing out that most of the information posted on here about dates/revisions/etc. doesn't turn out to have much substance.

I know a lot of people are eager to get decent BB but pinches of salt all 'round.

jaffusmax

Been having problems with my online order for Dundalk which just went live today, got a date of 2/10 to get it installed Have to say the guys and gals on the phones are always as helpful as they can be even though the actual product installation can be a pain in the backside!

bk

damienirel wrote: »

As mentioned before by many posters Eircom have once again gone after the high population density areas that have moved to UPC ages ago to try and get some of their customer base, even though the product they are selling is considerably poorer.

I wouldn't necessarily say that, look at the Vodafone product 70/20mb for €32

That will be VERY attractive to many people.

The cheapest UPC product is 50/5mb for €42, so €10 more for slower upload and download speed.

Also the highest upload speed offered by UPC is 10mb, once you get over 50mb, download speed becomes pretty irrelevant as you are being throttled by the site you are downloading from. However upload speed can make a big difference.

I think many high end users would choose Vodafone 70/20mb for €32 over UPC 150mb/10mb for €52

I think UPC's competitiveness is slipping. I think they need to adjust their products as so if possible to remain competitive:

- Minimum 20mb upload across all products.
- Increase the speed of the entry level product to 70mb upload
- Reduce prices across the board.

damienirel

Morf wrote: »

Not to be dismissive of anything people are saying here but the common trend of what seems to be said here is that Eircom are in complete disarray on the whole roll-out.

Vodafone, Eircom, KN engineers, sales depts., technical depts. and a mate's mate are all saying something different.

Yeah sure everybody has different anecdotes but what are the actual measured realities? Again I'm happy that you and your mates are having such positive experiences but to my knowledge this is far from most peoples experiences.

Have a read of this and tell me that Eircom are up to the job:
http://www.irishexaminer.com/lifestyle/features/is-ireland-living-with-a-great-broadband-myth-241405.html