SIRO - ESB/Vodafone Fibre To The Home

SierraTango

Got the bad news today. SIROs contractors can't clear the blocked duct to my row of houses as they were denied permission to dig up a footpath. New build estate so the council doesn't own the paths yet. Builder said no apparently and Siro has taken us off the list. Maybe it will change when the council has the paths as they have allowed other footpaths in the town be dug up.

sibersha

b.gud wrote: »

I have one of these and it is a really great performer at a decent price point. It can also very easily be flashed with OpenWrt very easily, this is what I have done, which allows for a lot of tinkering.

Thank you for the comprehensive reply. My current router is the Huawei HG659 and by all accounts digiweb's router has better feedback on here and elsewhere hence my thought process.

I would definitely consider above router you linked as price point is reasonable. Is it plug and play with a few settings to enter and I'm off, or am I better off flashing it as you mentioned. My goal is to have reasonable speeds in relation to my connection, I have one WiFi extender and a few homeplugs attached to my current setup.

Static M.e.

+1 for b.gud post above.

I'm on VF and I've just ordered a UniFi router so I can tell you what it is like a few days. The c7 is better value for money but i wanted some of the extra features that you can get with UniFi router.

b.gud

sibersha wrote: »

Thank you for the comprehensive reply. My current router is the Huawei HG659 and by all accounts digiweb's router has better feedback on here and elsewhere hence my thought process.

I would definitely consider above router you linked as price point is reasonable. Is it plug and play with a few settings to enter and I'm off, or am I better off flashing it as you mentioned. My goal is to have reasonable speeds in relation to my connection, I have one WiFi extender and a few homeplugs attached to my current setup.

Based on this post, https://www.tp-link.com/us/support/faq/1585/, it looks like you should be able to do everything you need out of the box. A couple of things that I have done by flashing the router are running a vpn so I can connect to my network from anywhere and an ad blocker so that anyone on the network doesn't see ads. These may not be important to you and you be just as well off sticking with the standard firmware

b.gud

Static M.e. wrote: »

+1 for b.gud post above.

I'm on VF and I've just ordered a UniFi router so I can tell you what it is like a few days. The c7 is better value for money but i wanted some of the extra features that you can get with UniFi router.

Nice which one did you get? I'll be interested to hear how you get on

Static M.e.

I went with the UDM, for the built in controller and AP, rather than the UDM Pro as I won't be adding any cameras right now. Although it's not cheap, I like all of the software options it gives me and as a complete (Controller + AP + four port switch) package it is perfect for what I need right now. I was going to hold out for the UDM SE for the PoE features and the touchscreen but I expect it will be 3-4 months away before they deliver.

Happy to take any questions on it. It will probably be a week before it arrives, according to UPS.

shanec1928

Static M.e. wrote: »

I went with the UDM, for the built in controller and AP, rather than the UDM Pro as I won't be adding any cameras right now. Although it's not cheap, I like all of the software options it gives me and as a complete (Controller + AP + four port switch) package it is perfect for what I need right now. I was going to hold out for the UDM SE for the PoE features and the touchscreen but I expect it will be 3-4 months away before they deliver.

Happy to take any questions on it. It will probably be a week before it arrives, according to UPS.

ive been running mine for a few month now albeit on FFTH with no issues just make sure to turn smart queues off.

wideboyy

Hi. Technical question. With a Siro install do they bring the fiber actually through the wall, or is the little external box doing a fiber to ethernet conversion?

I ask because I already have an ethernet cable running into the house and don't want to drill another hole for a second cable if it's going to be effectively redundant.

Drilling myself because of external insulation so contractor won't do it.

oscarBravo

Fibre through the wall.

Static M.e.

wideboyy wrote: »

Hi. Technical question. With a Siro install do they bring the fiber actually through the wall, or is the little external box doing a fiber to ethernet conversion?

I ask because I already have an ethernet cable running into the house and don't want to drill another hole for a second cable if it's going to be effectively redundant.

Drilling myself because of external insulation so contractor won't do it.

Yes, the bring it from the ESB box to nice junction box on the wall and then they drill into the house and use another little box to do the Fibre to ethernet conversion. I've attached some pictures to show you. Very tidy job if that helps.

KOR101

A combination of setbacks has seen the ESB-Vodafone joint venture 'pass' 325,000 premises as of mid-2020. Of that number, 65,000 are now actually connected, meaning they're customers of a broadband retailer which resells the Siro infrastructure.

"It's been harder than we thought it would be in 2015, when we started," Keaney says, citing issues such as consent from property owners, local planning permission and road developments.

Has that led to any tension from the two founding shareholders, ESB and Vodafone? "They understand unforeseen issues that happen during a build," Keaney says. "They're comfortable where we are and they remain ambitious."

Keaney says that despite the company's "challenges", Siro is on track to get into the black soon. "By the end of this year, we will be making an operating profit," he says.

Do they remain fully committed to the build-out and to Siro's funding? "Absolutely. They have decades of experience of investing in infrastructure so they know that there are challenges. But they're in it for the long haul."

Virgin may yet shift gears on its Irish footprint, which has been traditionally contained to the cities and conurbations.

And then there is the unknown effect of Ireland's 5G mobile build-out. While this is slow, mobile operators have some plans to target chunks of the market with easy-toinstall 5G broadband boxes which may rival entry-level fibre broadband services.

https://www.independent.ie/business/technology/siro-boss-keaneys-upbeat-and-ready-to-roll-out-despite-obstacles-on-way-to-building-fibre-broadband-network-39239430.html

Airwire: MartinL

We have updated the database on our availability checker today.

South Dublin - over 1600 new premises
Ennis - 32 new premises
Galway - 548 new premises

Also Limerick and Portlaoise got a few new ones added.

On SIRO, we currently cover Athlone, Clarecastle, Ennis, Galway, Limerick, Oranmore, Portlaoise, Shannon, Sixmilebridge, Sligo and South Dublin.

The availability checker can be found here: https://www.airwire.ie/avail

The Cush

KOR101 wrote: »

https://www.independent.ie/business/technology/siro-boss-keaneys-upbeat-and-ready-to-roll-out-despite-obstacles-on-way-to-building-fibre-broadband-network-39239430.html

Other than build-out barriers, Siro's looming problem is that its main competitor, Eir, has suddenly kicked into gear on its own fibre roll-out.

Aside from the 330,000 rural premises Eir has now 'passed' with full fibre broadband, it is now starting to build fibre to most of the rest of the homes and businesses in the country, pledging that 1.6 million of Ireland's 2.2 million premises will be passed in the next few years.

On top of this, the French-owned former incumbent is showing a ruthless appetite for bare-margin competition, recently announcing a price cut to its higher-tier fibre broadband products.

Eir isn't alone. Virgin may yet shift gears on its Irish footprint, which has been traditionally contained to the cities and conurbations.

"We would have built in some projections around what competitors would do," he says. "Besides, it's not like Eir will build 1.6 million premises in the next quarter. There's a lot to play for.

As we saw last year SIRO tried to get their hands on eir's rollout schedule also.

Digiweb

We've just updated our product checkers with new Siro premises released nationwide

BigGeorge

Living in a town in north wicklow & there is now siro availability on the main road 100 metres away and a house on the road has Siro now. Am just not sure what happens next.

Any know how the rollout happens? Do they just connect houses within a certain distance of the main road, just do the easy connections or poles, are connections made to all houses within an area? Guess I am trying to figure out if rollout is methodical in a area or random

Advice appreciated

Marlow

The Cush wrote: »

As we saw last year SIRO tried to get their hands on eir's rollout schedule also.

Which is probably also the reason, that we don't get any decent mapping for their build out either. They didn't mind for the 300k, where they weren't competing with another fibre operator, but they.

sibersha

b.gud wrote: »

I have one of these and it is a really great performer at a decent price point. It can also very easily be flashed with OpenWrt very easily, this is what I have done, which allows for a lot of tinkering.

So the router in your post arrived today. The setup instructions with this instruct me to link my current router to the new one and it should work. But before I do that, is there a way to bypass the hg659 and use the tplink directly?

I have tried without success, I went with pppoe connection and put in

<modemserialnumber>@vfieftth.ie
broadband

as my credentials, but it won't connect to the internet. Any suggestions?

b.gud

sibersha wrote: »

So the router in your post arrived today. The setup instructions with this instruct me to link my current router to the new one and it should work. But before I do that, is there a way to bypass the hg659 and use the tplink directly?

I have tried without success, I went with pppoe connection and put in

<modemserialnumber>@vfieftth.ie
broadband

as my credentials, but it won't connect to the internet. Any suggestions?

Did you use the link, this one https://www.tp-link.com/us/support/faq/1585/, in my other post to tag the Wan traffic to vlan 10?

sibersha

b.gud wrote: »

Did you use the link, this one https://www.tp-link.com/us/support/faq/1585/, in my other post to tag the Wan traffic to vlan 10?

So I should enter vlan ID "10"

And am I correct using pppoe with username and password instead of dynamic connection?

The above settings worked, I am up and running, thanks for your help

b.gud

sibersha wrote: »

So I should enter vlan ID "10"

And am I correct using pppoe with username and password instead of dynamic connection?

The above settings worked, I am up and running, thanks for your help

Good to hear you got up and running hopefully your performance improves.

I assume you no longer need the answers but yeah use the pppoe connection and yeah put 10 in for the vlan id

sibersha

b.gud wrote: »

Good to hear you got up and running hopefully your performance improves.

I assume you no longer need the answers but yeah use the pppoe connection and yeah put 10 in for the vlan id

Yes, big improvement in speeds, thanks again for suggestion and instructions. Now to dropkick the Huawei down the garden

millb

BigGeorge wrote: »

Living in a town in north wicklow & there is now siro availability on the main road 100 metres away and a house on the road has Siro now. Am just not sure what happens next.

Any know how the rollout happens? Do they just connect houses within a certain distance of the main road, just do the easy connections or poles, are connections made to all houses within an area? Guess I am trying to figure out if rollout is methodical in a area or random

Advice appreciated

Siro use different contractors and designers in different towns but basically they pick the easiest builds first. So if there are a bunch of easily accessed / ducted houses adjacent the "Feeders" and PoPs - they come first. Previously the agents popped-in postcards to flag availability and ease access, sometimes they inform local politicians etc.

If that fibre has splice boxes and wrapped fibre along the road then they will connect in nearby premises. Best trick is to spot an agent, surveyor or supervisor on the job and get a look at a drawing / map and ask them how it's going?

As mentioned above a blocked duct or blocking neighbour can prevent a section of the roll-out but 100m sounds like 2 or 3 poles so hopefully its good for you.

BigGeorge

Great advice - thank you , makes sense. Was thinking they would pick one building per cluster to get things moving. Much appreciated

Hedge777

My sister just got Siro/Vodaphone 1Gb FTTH installed just last Friday, so I popped around on Saturday to check it out, speed wise, that is. I live in a rural location and work on Imagines network getting an average of about 85MB download so I was interested to see how fast this Gigabit fiber is.
Plugged in the cable and did the first speed test, 79MB down ,92MB up !!. Tried it again 82Mb down 92MB up, on Ookla, tried TestMy. net, 75MB down 89MB up. Mush the same speeds at different times over the next few hours?? Got about half these speeds on wifi, which I would expect.

Is this supposed to be a 1GB connection, or is it the "Irish kind" of Gigabit? If you get less than a tenth of what you are told it is some joke! I was expecting a disappointing, maybe 300 or 250 mb speeds but not less than 100!

Is this a typical speed for most users with Vodaphone 1GB FTTH connections?

Hedge777

Hedge777 wrote: »

My sister just got Siro/Vodaphone 1Gb FTTH installed just last Friday, so I popped around on Saturday to check it out, speed wise, that is. I live in a rural location and work on Imagines network getting an average of about 85MB download so I was interested to see how fast this Gigabit fiber is.
Plugged in the cable and did the first speed test, 79MB down ,92MB up !!. Tried it again 82Mb down 92MB up, on Ookla, tried TestMy. net, 75MB down 89MB up. Mush the same speeds at different times over the next few hours?? Got about half these speeds on wifi, which I would expect.

Is this supposed to be a 1GB connection, or is it the "Irish kind" of Gigabit? If you get less than a tenth of what you are told it is some joke! I was expecting a disappointing, maybe 300 or 250 mb speeds but not less than 100!

Is this a typical speed for most users with Vodaphone 1GB FTTH connections?

I had the same complaint when I first got it. It varies wildly. It is "up to" 1gigabit but it really does take the piss. 300mb is usually the most I get. I have occasionally seen 930mb.

People on here will tell you what are you complaining about nobody needs 1 gigabit. Or that the problem is your wires, your router or your pc.

It's not. It's the service. Contention on the lines taken to the fullest extreme.

mcbert

Deleted User wrote: »

It's not. It's the service. Contention on the lines taken to the fullest extreme.

Is it more a Vodafone issue, or same for all providers in the same area I wonder?

glic83

Just said I'd report back on the process of changing over providers on siro.

I was previously on Vodafone 150/30 , wanted the new customer offer but they wouldn't agree so decided to leave. I've changed to digiweb.

Contacted the Digiweb rep here on Saturday 6th of June who organised a call back for me on Monday 8th .

Got my call on Monday and decided to go for the 500/100 package, it's on offer for the first few months and no install or connection charge as already have siro installed, 12 month contract. Got an email from Digiweb to say modem would be with me on Wednesday and the service would be changed over on the night of the 12th at 00.00
Tuesday 9th- text message with tracking info for modem.
Wednesday 10th modem arrived first thing.
Friday 12th ,(night) plugged in the modem and working away however still showing ISP as Vodafone.

Saturday 13th - dropped a message to Digiweb as ISP showing as Vodafone and speed unchanged.

Sunday 14th - Speed upgraded and ISP showing as Digiweb.
I haven't plugged in the Ethernet cable for the speed test
positive, didn't get a chance to test via Ethernet today but getting over 312 Mbps down / 102 Mbps up via the phone while other devices are connected so it's all good.

Overall it's still early days , but can't fault the customer service , it's been spot on both here on boards and via email to customer support. Also I've noticed speed has been great, and no drop outs with the ftriz modem/router and range is definetly better.

This is how the process has been for me and just my opinion but might be useful for those who are considering a change.

paulboland

Hedge777 wrote: »

My sister just got Siro/Vodaphone 1Gb FTTH installed just last Friday, so I popped around on Saturday to check it out, speed wise, that is. I live in a rural location and work on Imagines network getting an average of about 85MB download so I was interested to see how fast this Gigabit fiber is.
Plugged in the cable and did the first speed test, 79MB down ,92MB up !!. Tried it again 82Mb down 92MB up, on Ookla, tried TestMy. net, 75MB down 89MB up. Mush the same speeds at different times over the next few hours?? Got about half these speeds on wifi, which I would expect.

Is this supposed to be a 1GB connection, or is it the "Irish kind" of Gigabit? If you get less than a tenth of what you are told it is some joke! I was expecting a disappointing, maybe 300 or 250 mb speeds but not less than 100!

Is this a typical speed for most users with Vodaphone 1GB FTTH connections?

You need to make sure PC or Laptop has a Gigabit Lan connection 10/100/1000 and also make sure the cable from router to PC/Laptop in use is Cat5e or Cat 6 or Cat 7

Cat5 cable is not the same as Cat5e cable
Cat 5 cable is limited to 100 with max 98 and average speed of 92-95

It's not unusual for some laptop/pc to only have 10/100 fast ethernet lan card you will get speed only of 98 Mbps or less even if you have broadband plan of 1 GB
To get over 100 Mbps wired connection you need to make sure the PC/Laptop has a Gigabit lan card and be using correct cable

b.gud

Hedge777 wrote: »

My sister just got Siro/Vodaphone 1Gb FTTH installed just last Friday, so I popped around on Saturday to check it out, speed wise, that is. I live in a rural location and work on Imagines network getting an average of about 85MB download so I was interested to see how fast this Gigabit fiber is.
Plugged in the cable and did the first speed test, 79MB down ,92MB up !!. Tried it again 82Mb down 92MB up, on Ookla, tried TestMy. net, 75MB down 89MB up. Mush the same speeds at different times over the next few hours?? Got about half these speeds on wifi, which I would expect.

Is this supposed to be a 1GB connection, or is it the "Irish kind" of Gigabit? If you get less than a tenth of what you are told it is some joke! I was expecting a disappointing, maybe 300 or 250 mb speeds but not less than 100!

Is this a typical speed for most users with Vodaphone 1GB FTTH connections?

I have siro through Vodafone and I would say my average speeds are around 400/500 down when checking on a wired connection.

One thing to note is that Siro is a gigabit connection but Vodafone do offer a 100mb connection, it may be worth your sister confirming that she signed up for the gigabit bundle rather than the 100mb bundle. If she did indeed sign up for the gigabit bundle and the wired speeds are sub 100mb, on the Vodafone provided router*, then I would definitely get in contact with them as that is not right.

*edit I also second what paulboland said above confirm that you have a gigabit enabled card you'd be amazed the devices that aren't capable of wired gigabit connections

* I personally think the router they supply isn't great but if you are trying on a different router the first thing they will do is ask you to check on their own one as they don't provide technical support for routers they don't provide

xckjoo

Hedge777 wrote: »

My sister just got Siro/Vodaphone 1Gb FTTH installed just last Friday, so I popped around on Saturday to check it out, speed wise, that is. I live in a rural location and work on Imagines network getting an average of about 85MB download so I was interested to see how fast this Gigabit fiber is.
Plugged in the cable and did the first speed test, 79MB down ,92MB up !!. Tried it again 82Mb down 92MB up, on Ookla, tried TestMy. net, 75MB down 89MB up. Mush the same speeds at different times over the next few hours?? Got about half these speeds on wifi, which I would expect.

Is this supposed to be a 1GB connection, or is it the "Irish kind" of Gigabit? If you get less than a tenth of what you are told it is some joke! I was expecting a disappointing, maybe 300 or 250 mb speeds but not less than 100!

Is this a typical speed for most users with Vodaphone 1GB FTTH connections?

Dunno about Vodafone but I'm on Digiweb 1Gb and have a PC running a speed test at regular intervals over the day. Speeds vary between ~400Mb/s and 800 Mb/s. As others have said, make sure you're doing a proper speed test first, but you should be getting more than that.