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

GIMickey

Over the past few days i have seen KN Networks working in Letterkenny, they are laying down more orange cable. I thought Letterkenny was complete.

arctan

To_be_confirmed wrote: »

Ah. Will this have immediate consequences for BT's plans in Dun Laoghaire?

BT will launch when Eircom launch there

bealtine wrote: »

Isn't that the whole point of Comreg to give eircom everything they want?

I lol'd

bealtine wrote: »

Yes I am serious and I fail to see what UPC has to do with eircom's fairly limited roll out of FTTC. Comreg gave eircom control of all the FTTC cabinets and basically killed off SLU and possibly even LLU. So no unbundling in most of the country. Comreg did everything the rest of the industry didn't want them to do and there can only be one beneficiary. I believe that BT's plan are now in tatters
Sure eircom now have to share ducts but unless an OAO is willing to invest in cabinets they are now stuck with bitstream type access,
.

I don't see how this kills off unbundling .... it'll still be done but now out at the roadside cab? (may be called something different, but will still be in place) BT for example (aka Vodafone & Sky) will have their own DSLAM in the Eircom FTTC cabs .... it'll be the operators who dont invest in equipment roadside, they will have to use bitstream

Sponge Bob

chriss745 wrote: »

Where did you read this 13th of May? I cannot see it anywhere in the publication.

Sorry, launch not allowed before 20th May, search for 20 or 20th in the PDF.

GIMickey

And there is no way that comreg can wave this time period. Now its comreg being a balls

lucernarian

arctan wrote: »

I don't see how this kills off unbundling .... it'll still be done but now out at the roadside cab? (may be called something different, but will still be in place) BT for example (aka Vodafone & Sky) will have their own DSLAM in the Eircom FTTC cabs .... it'll be the operators who dont invest in equipment roadside, they will have to use bitstream

It will if vectoring is employed. There cannot be other types of DSLAM in the cabinets, otherwise the point of vectoring would be lost. Multiple DSLAMs will have to have compatible standards to coordinate vectoring over the same physical bundle of cables and I don't believe those standards even exist yet.

http://www2.alcatel-lucent.com/techzine/vdsl2-vectoring-in-a-multi-operator-environment-separating-fact-from-fiction/

The only alternative is that BT build out SLU instead of eircom (only BT FTTC cabinets in use), and the comreg document above suggests that would only be the case if eircom permit it.

irishgeo

chirst does BT in england have to go through all of this crap.

chriss745

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Sorry, launch not allowed before 20th May, search for 20 or 20th in the PDF.

Thanks, yes, I found it at section 8.21:

"On the 20th November 2012, Eircom published on its wholesale website,
pricing and non-pricing information for NGA services. Therefore, in
accordance with the provisions of these Decision Documents and as
consulted on in ComReg Consultation 12/27, wholesale service may be
launched no sooner than 20 May 2013, except by derogation. Should
significant problems emerge during the planned trial of NGA this date may
need to be postponed. Furthermore, Eircom Retail may launch services any
time after wholesale services are launched."

That is totally ridiculous! This country is way behind in broadband services comparing with another countries in the region and its own government blocking the development of the national telco company. Shame!

GIMickey

chriss745 wrote: »

Thanks, yes, I found it at section 8.21:

"On the 20th November 2012, Eircom published on its wholesale website,
pricing and non-pricing information for NGA services. Therefore, in
accordance with the provisions of these Decision Documents and as
consulted on in ComReg Consultation 12/27, wholesale service may be
launched no sooner than 20 May 2013, except by derogation. Should
significant problems emerge during the planned trial of NGA this date may
need to be postponed. Furthermore, Eircom Retail may launch services any
time after wholesale services are launched."

That is totally ridiculous! This country is way behind in broadband services comparing with another countries in the region and its own government blocking the development of the national telco company. Shame!

This is just a joke at this stage. Waitin long enuf. Now have to wait another 3 nd a half months minimum

SeaSide

chriss745 wrote: »

That is totally ridiculous! This country is way behind in broadband services comparing with another countries in the region and its own government blocking the development of the national telco company. Shame!

As opposed to the national telco blocking broadband services.

Sponge Bob

chriss745 wrote: »

Wholesale service may be
launched no sooner than 20 May 2013, except by derogation. Should
significant problems emerge during the planned trial of NGA this date may
need to be postponed. Furthermore, Eircom Retail may launch services any
time after wholesale services are launched."

That is totally ridiculous! This country is way behind in broadband services comparing with another countries in the region and its own government blocking the development of the national telco company. Shame!

They are not the NATIONAL telephone company, they are a piece of spat out chewing gum left behind by O Reilly Soros Ozzie Bankers and the Unions.

If the trial (4 exchanges have been indicated to me as trial exchanges and they are NOT some of the pilot exchanges) goes well the possibility is that the like of Vodafone and BT together may request the derogation mentioned above thereby leading to a launch before the 20th of May.

But if the final niggles are not sorted out then things could go to the wire and beyond. H2 2013 is a safe enough assumption given the serial silly buggery that eircom are known for when it comes to regulatory matters.

We have not heard what BTs position on the SLU issue is, eg what happens if BT offer to put cabinets into certain areas and at the end of eircom fibre and nearer the customer. ????

I'm not entirely happy with the pricing of naked DSL at €17.50 per month ( wholesale and that listed on the eircom wholesale site not Comreg) where it is naked VDSL and a mere €6.98 a month if taken in conjunction with an eircom telephony service and I suspect someone like BT or Voda who are probably moving to Class V Voip switches are not impressed either.

I could see a spot of grief over that, we'll know soon enough

bealtine

arctan wrote: »

I don't see how this kills off unbundling .... it'll still be done but now out at the roadside cab? (may be called something different, but will still be in place) BT for example (aka Vodafone & Sky) will have their own DSLAM in the Eircom FTTC cabs .... it'll be the operators who dont invest in equipment roadside, they will have to use bitstream

Obviously the vectoring technology isn't well understood as it is so new.

The vectoring kit goes in the roadside cabinets and to work effectively MUST be in control of the whole cabinet so no SLU can be done at that cabinet as that defeats the purpose of the vectoring technology.

That's my understanding anyway but I'm open to correction.

Sponge Bob

Vectoring is explained rather well and at some length here

http://www.scholarpedia.org/article/Digital_subscriber_line_%28DSL%29

With VDSL you WILL get interference and you must manage it. The problem is that if someone puts a cabinet next to yours and unbundles lines to their cabinet then the interference is not managed. Only one vector/interference manager can be used per bundle of 100 or 200 lines which is the sort of cables that are plugged into a cabinet.

The grey area is whether the interference manager can differentiate between eircom and say BT customers and prioritise one over the other. That would be very very very naughty.

lucernarian

Sponge Bob wrote: »

The grey area is whether the interference manager can differentiate between eircom and say BT customers and prioritise one over the other. That would be very very very naughty.

I'm not sure how eircom customers could be prioritised over BT customers. That would defeat the whole point behind an "interference manager". Any other deployment of VDSL will severely disrupt vectoring to the point that it would no longer offer any real gain over regular VDSL. The lines served by the cabinet would be dragged down to the performance of basic VDSL or VDSL2.

The only way that other operators could be specifically hindered by an interference manager is if vectoring allowed for some lines to eliminate crosstalk at the expense of other lines. That would take the form of other lines being forced to take a hit on some channels. I'm not sure how to explain it but it would be the interference equivalent of using dynamic spectrum management to hinder the performance of some lines over others.

In other words, I cannot believe that such a specific scenario could or would be allowed to happen.

ctlsleh

I just realised that my local cabinet is at my local exchange, I had previously thought I had a closer cabinet. The local exchange is 700m away so when FTTC gets rolled out, I will be too far away to see any benefit........Is there an official way to lobby eircom to build out new cabinets closer to the house?

GIMickey

ctlsleh wrote: »

I just realised that my local cabinet is at my local exchange, I had previously thought I had a closer cabinet. The local exchange is 700m away so when FTTC gets rolled out, I will be too far away to see any benefit........Is there an official way to lobby eircom to build out new cabinets closer to the house?

No not at the min. U will see an increase but it mite not be a huge 1. Consider how much a cabinet costs I doubt it.

smellslikeshoes

ctlsleh wrote: »

I just realised that my local cabinet is at my local exchange, I had previously thought I had a closer cabinet. The local exchange is 700m away so when FTTC gets rolled out, I will be too far away to see any benefit........Is there an official way to lobby eircom to build out new cabinets closer to the house?

At 700 meters you should still see a pretty large upgrade, far side of 30Mbit assuming the lines path to you is direct. As far as lobbying Eircom, don't waste your time.

RUSTEDCORE

How will this compare with UPC 150 down 10 up?
will it serve UPC areas in Dublin?

Will it be theoretically possible to pass 10 up with eircoms proposed hardware as thats UPCs upload limit even though they could do 4gb down

Solair

RUSTEDCORE wrote: »

How will this compare with UPC 150 down 10 up?
will it serve UPC areas in Dublin?

Will it be theoretically possible to pass 10 up with eircoms proposed hardware as thats UPCs upload limit even though they could do 4gb down

There's no particular hardware / technology related reason why UPC couldn't offer a much faster upload speed.
They've taken a marketing decision not to.
The technology they're using can easily handle >100Mbit/s up. The spec suggests 122.88 (108) Mbit/s is possible without much fuss at all.
They're probably just not offering it as they obviously don't see the reason to as none of their competitors offer particularly high upload speeds.

VDSL2 can offer up to 30Mbit/s or so which is a LOT better than ADSL but, in theory still significantly slower than what EuroDOCSIS 3.0 cable or pure fibre can do.

If eircom up the ante by launching products with faster upload speeds than UPC, I'd say UPC will just respond by cranking up the speeds.

Competition is key here. Ireland's speeds have been relatively poor because until UPC came along with decent technology, there was no incentive for anyone to beat ADSL speeds.

With a vectored VDSL player + UPC we'll see some serious competition for the first time in the very high speed products. That's going to bring about a lot of changes for consumers.

We may also see some of the wireless players trying to muscle into the market too and increasing speeds with more modern technology as in many smaller towns / suburbs which have no UPC cable, eircom's VDSL product will definitely open up much better speeds.

To put it into a motoring context:

Analogue PSTN Dial up modem - Bicycle with no gears / donkey.
ISDN - Moped
ADSL - 1990s Fiat Punto.
ADSL2+/Some Wireless services - Low powered small car
Mobile 3G - Car that randomly goes fast/slow depending on what mood it's in. Sometimes it won't start.
VDSL (FTTC) - Decent modern family car that will get you up to a good speed on the motorway.
Cable (FTTC)- A high powered Merc/BMW/something decently fast.
Pure Fibre to home (FTTH) - Bugatti Veyron Super Sport

chriss745

Solair wrote: »

There's no particular hardware / technology related reason why UPC couldn't offer a much faster upload speed.
They've taken a marketing decision not to.
The technology they're using can easily handle >100Mbit/s up. The spec suggests 122.88 (108) Mbit/s is possible without much fuss at all.
They're probably just not offering it as they obviously don't see the reason to as none of their competitors offer particularly high upload speeds.

VDSL2 can offer up to 30Mbit/s or so which is a LOT better than ADSL but, in theory still significantly slower than what EuroDOCSIS 3.0 cable or pure fibre can do.

If eircom up the ante by launching products with faster upload speeds than UPC, I'd say UPC will just respond by cranking up the speeds.

Competition is key here. Ireland's speeds have been relatively poor because until UPC came along with decent technology, there was no incentive for anyone to beat ADSL speeds.

With a vectored VDSL player + UPC we'll see some serious competition for the first time in the very high speed products. That's going to bring about a lot of changes for consumers.

We may also see some of the wireless players trying to muscle into the market too and increasing speeds with more modern technology as in many smaller towns / suburbs which have no UPC cable, eircom's VDSL product will definitely open up much better speeds.

The question is when? Ireland is already 3-4 years (if not more) behind Europe.

I am coming from Hungary, which is a very poor country nowadays. Despite that when my grandma last year ordered a new telephone line to her ancient big red analog phone, she got fiber connected (FTTH) from Deutsche Telekom, although she pays only monthly 5 EUR for the service. My mom has 80down/20up unlimited (really unlimited) broadband service with over 80 digital TV channels (more than 30 channels are HD) with telephone from DIGI for 12 EUR per month. They both live in a suburb of a Cork size city.

Where is Ireland comparing to that price/performance?! :eek:

Sponge Bob

chriss745 wrote: »

Where is Ireland comparing to that price/performance?! :eek:

Ireland is nowhere. The Minister for Communications is a clown who likes to appear on TV talking about anything but his department and the EU Broadband budget was cut by over 20% last night out to 2020 meaning the clown will use that as an excuse until he finally retires on a fat pension in 3 years.

Your granny will probably have a bunch of Paddys renting her back room by then.

chriss745

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Ireland is nowhere. The Minister for Communications is a clown who likes to appear on TV talking about anything but his department and the EU Broadband budget was cut by over 20% last night out to 2020 meaning the clown will use that as an excuse until he finally retires on a fat pension in 3 years.

Your granny will probably have a bunch of Paddys renting her back room by then.

That was a good summary where we are at the moment, thanks Sponge!

swoofer

well now you know Ireland is even poorer and we are more than 3-4 years behind. And it will always be thus.

Solair

Lack of *real* competition for fixed line services here was the main reason at the access network side of things.

My own analysis of it is that because the cable companies hadn't really bothered competing until Liberty / UPC arrived on the scene in a big way.

Ireland's cable industry was very old compared to most of Europe. It dates back to the 1960s and it had always seen itself as a provider of multi-channel television (particularly UK terrestrial channels) and not telecommunications companies.

So, while most of Europe had cable companies trying to penetrate the market in the 1990s with broadband products and gain new customers, Ireland cable companies were happily sticking with their 1960s model.

Then Sky launched BBC 1/2 on Sky Digital and the cable companies were suddenly left without a barrier to entry and with a very serious TV compeditor.
It was only then that they suddenly realised they needed to re-build the networks and rollout broadband and neither Chorus nor NTL Ireland had the funds to do those projects. So, it only happened when UPC arrived.

Meanwhile, eircom was just sitting there milking money out of slow DSL networks as nobody was competing with them in a head-on way with their own infrastructure.

Eircom itself due to several leveraged takeovers also never seemed to have any interest in lashing money into its own network until quite recently.

This is all compounded by the fact that Ireland's housing stock is extremely low density, making it very hard to provide services to without running up a lot of infrastructural costs.

As for the Hungarian prices you're quoting, they are just not realistic. They're either loss-leader sales prices or they're being state subsidised. I know the kinds of costs involved and you would seriously struggle to provide those kinds of services at that kind of money and not run a huge loss.

Irish cable prices compare quite closely with Dutch and French ones for example. I don't think the market's quite that backwards anymore. It certainly was during the Celtic Tigre era though ironically enough!

The regulators *must* ensure there is real and meaningful competition in the market. Eircom, UPC, BT, or any other providers are not state bodies nor are they charities. Their main aim is to make profit. It's up to the regulators / government to ensure that a functioning market drives these services forwards.

They allowed too much foot dragging and too many obstacles to competition to occur.

For rural areas, we're going to have to look at state-funding it. I can't see how some of the very low density rural areas and even outer suburban areas won't make economic sense in on purely commercial basis for any provider!

chriss745

Solair wrote: »

Lack of *real* competition for fixed line services here was the main reason at the access network side of things.

My own analysis of it is that because the cable companies hadn't really bothered competing until Liberty / UPC arrived on the scene in a big way.

Ireland's cable industry was very old compared to most of Europe. It dates back to the 1960s and it had always seen itself as a provider of multi-channel television (particularly UK terrestrial channels) and not telecommunications companies.

So, while most of Europe had cable companies trying to penetrate the market in the 1990s with broadband products and gain new customers, Ireland cable companies were happily sticking with their 1960s model.

Then Sky launched BBC 1/2 on Sky Digital and the cable companies were suddenly left without a barrier to entry and with a very serious TV compeditor.
It was only then that they suddenly realised they needed to re-build the networks and rollout broadband and neither Chorus nor NTL Ireland had the funds to do those projects. So, it only happened when UPC arrived.

Meanwhile, eircom was just sitting there milking money out of slow DSL networks as nobody was competing with them in a head-on way with their own infrastructure.

Eircom itself due to several leveraged takeovers also never seemed to have any interest in lashing money into its own network until quite recently.

This is all compounded by the fact that Ireland's housing stock is extremely low density, making it very hard to provide services to without running up a lot of infrastructural costs.

As for the Hungarian prices you're quoting, they are just not realistic. They're either loss-leader sales prices or they're being state subsidised. I know the kinds of costs involved and you would seriously struggle to provide those kinds of services at that kind of money and not run a huge loss.

Irish cable prices compare quite closely with Dutch and French ones for example. I don't think the market's quite that backwards anymore. It certainly was during the Celtic Tigre era though ironically enough!

The regulators *must* ensure there is real and meaningful competition in the market. Eircom, UPC, BT, or any other providers are not state bodies nor are they charities. Their main aim is to make profit. It's up to the regulators / government to ensure that a functioning market drives these services forwards.

They allowed too much foot dragging and too many obstacles to competition to occur.

Regarding Hungary, all the development started around 5 years ago when DIGI came to the market, and started to provide 10x higher speeds on 3x lower prices, so you are right, that is missing from here, and now hopefully with Sky and UPC the same will happen. And DIGI is still running and growing, so these prices are real and they have profit on that.

Regarding UPC prices, if UPC can sell 120Mbit/sec in Hungary on 20 EUR, that means the real cost can be somewhere 10-15 EUR. Of course if they can sell it here for 60 EUR (and the people are happy with that), they will. Just to compare, in the Netherlands the 100Mbit is 40EUR. What do you think, how they have $23 billions to consider to buy Virgin Media in the UK? They are running on 300-400% profit, if not on higher. It is a huge business, especially here.

Solair

chriss745 wrote: »

Regarding Hungary, all the development started around 5 years ago when DIGI came to the market, and started to provide 10x higher speeds on 3x lower prices, so you are right, that is missing from here, and now hopefully with Sky and UPC the same will happen. And DIGI is still running and growing, so these prices are real and they have profit on that.

Regarding UPC prices, if UPC can sell 120Mbit/sec in Hungary on 20 EUR, that means the real cost can be somewhere 10-15 EUR. Of course if they can sell it here for 60 EUR (and the people are happy with that), they will. Just to compare, in the Netherlands the 100Mbit is 40EUR. What do you think, how they have $23 billions to consider to buy Virgin Media in the UK? They are running on 300-400% profit, if not on higher. It is a huge business, especially here.

That's all down to competition though, not the individual operators. No normal for-profit company is going to come in and say "oh we're making too much money in Ireland we better drop our prices".

They are not state bodies, nor charities and they would actually be in breech of a duty of care to their shareholders if they did that.

It's entirely up to the regulators / government to ensure a functioning marketplace without barriers to entry.

However, I still don't think those prices you're quoting are realistic in an Irish context. We could come down quite a good bit (especially on eircom's line rental which is almost an access network tax).

Rolling out fibre/FTTC/FTTH in Ireland isn't easy though. There are very few parts of the country with anything remotely comparable to continental style apartment dwellings / high density urban areas. It's more comparable to the United States and broadband prices / speeds in many areas of the US are lagging too.

The infrastructure is genuinely a lot more expensive to put in place here than it is in say France or the Netherlands and probably Hungary. That being said, the prices are still too high due to lack of competition and there's a long way to go yet.

I'm not disagreeing with you the points, but I do think that some of the figures you've quoted would be totally unrealistic in Ireland given the market, the pop density, the infrastructural costs, the higher wages etc etc.

If our prices and speeds were comparable to the the UK or France, I'd be happy.

UPC 100Mbit/s NL seems to be €42.50 vs Ireland €49 / month
Virgin Media UK 31.68 Euro (at today's rate) / Month in an 18 month contract. (and it's a bit wolly about a £14/month phone line charge.. not sure if that's optional or not)

chriss745

Solair wrote: »

That's all down to competition though, not the individual operators. No normal for-profit company is going to come in and say "oh we're making too much money in Ireland we better drop our prices".

They are not state bodies, nor charities and they would actually be in breech of a duty of care to their shareholders if they did that.

It's entirely up to the regulators / government to ensure a functioning marketplace without barriers to entry.

However, I still don't think those prices you're quoting are realistic in an Irish context. We could come down quite a good bit (especially on eircom's line rental which is almost an access network tax).

Rolling out fibre/FTTC/FTTH in Ireland isn't easy though. There are very few parts of the country with anything remotely comparable to continental style apartment dwellings / high density urban areas. It's more comparable to the United States and broadband prices / speeds in many areas of the US are lagging too.

The infrastructure is genuinely a lot more expensive to put in place here than it is in say France or the Netherlands and probably Hungary. That being said, the prices are still too high due to lack of competition and there's a long way to go yet.

I'm not disagreeing with you the points, but I do think that some of the figures you've quoted would be totally unrealistic in Ireland given the market, the pop density, the infrastructural costs, the higher wages etc etc.

If our prices and speeds were comparable to the the UK or France, I'd be happy.

Indeed, these prices wouldn't be realistic here, but neither the 6x higher price is real. Although I would gladly pay this 60 EUR, if UPC would provide service in my home. My problem is that I am living in a new housing estate in the just middle of Ballincollig, a quite big town very close to the second biggest city in Ireland. 50 meters away from my house UPC has broadband service, but they are too lazy to connect my house to the network. From Eircom point of view I am 400 meters from two VDSL cabs, but they are not enabled due to this regulatory bull****. So I am very frustrated because although I could get a good service, and on paper I am lucky comparing to other folks in Ireland, I am still nowhere, due to stupidity I am still on 5Mbit/sec for 50 EUR a month, and I have no clue when it will be better. Hopefully later this year, yeah, but this is what we are saying since a year...

Sponge Bob

chriss745 wrote: »

50 meters away from my house UPC has broadband service, but they are too lazy to connect my house to the network.

I know a few people who connected from the house BEHIND across the back garden. One example in Galway is a guy who invented 14b High Street even though he lives in Middle street which has no UPC.

The connection box is on 14 High street and the cable goes around the back. UPC had no problem with this as he ran the cable from middle street to the front of High street himself. He gets invoiced electronically and no longer has to pay to divert the post to 14b High Street to his own house in middle street.

( address is fictional for illustration purposes only to protect the guilty up near Roches , you only need a co operative neighbour behind you with UPC access)

chriss745

Sponge Bob wrote: »

I know a few people who connected from the house BEHIND across the back garden. One example in Galway is a guy who invented 14b High Street even though he lives in Middle street which has no UPC.

The connection box is on 14 High street and the cable goes around the back. UPC had no problem with this as he ran the cable from middle street to the front of High street himself. He gets invoiced electronically and no longer has to pay to divert the post to 14b High Street to his own house in middle street.

( adressed fictional for illustration purposes only, you only need a co operative neighbour behind you with UPC access)

Yeah, unfortunately it is not possible in my case, I have already investigated that, multiple neighbors between me and the UPC are in back direction. My problem is that the whole housing estate is ducted. Why the hell UPC is not coming to the housing estate to have 1-200 new customers? UPC's cable is going in the front of the housing estate, we are fully ducted. That would have the best business for them, almost zero investing and hundreds of new customers.

RUSTEDCORE

I dont care about price I just want 150 down 150 up FTTH like the spanish guy who out-hosts me on xbox and for UPC to stop giving me bricks of manure with cisco written on them and expecting me to be ok with it disconnecting every hour.

Solair

Yeah, I still think UPCs coverage, even in urban areas is a bit of a joke.

We're literally 2km from central Cork and our area is totally uncabled because Cork Multichannel skipped it in the 80s.

It's nuts that new build housing estates from the 2000s in Cork often aren't on the cable network too.

They really need to be given a requirement to pass 99% of homes in licensed areas.