Imagine LTE Rural Broadband

Ardent

Weses wrote: »

My internet keeps shutting down completely after 15 mins when playing any video game. The ethernet light and wifi go off entirely and every device says there's no router even plugged in until I turn it off and back on. What could be wrong? It's fine until I start any singleplayer/multiplayer game. Is it the router? Possibly a virus? This is getting REALLY annoying.

Used to have the same issue. Their router is a pile of junk.

After numerous support tickets and calls, I just went out and bought a top of the range Netgear router. Disabled WiFi on the imagine router and all is good since.

Weses

Customer support keeps avoiding giving me a new router and they keep asking me to do useless tests. Looks like they don't like to replace routers based on your experience, Ardent. Any idea why that could be? This has been going on for FAR too long. Still paying €60 a month!!

How much money do I have to fork out for a decent router and how do I know it will work with LTE? Any suggestions or links to purchase?

Ardent

I can't say if a new router if will solve your problem, but it solved mine (so far after a few weeks anyway). I have a lot of devices connected to the internet throughout the house.

This is what I went for:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/B00HDK4GAK/ref=mp_s_a_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1523301406&sr=8-1&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=NETGEAR%2BR7000-100UKS%2BNighthawk&dpPl=1&dpID=41YrrbN1ojL&ref=plSrch&th=1&psc=1

Weses

If I were to buy, do I have to keep using the Imagine router in conjunction with that or do I just plug everything from the old router into that one and be done with it? I never had this kind of LTE connection before so I don't really know the specifics of using a new router with it.

The service was going great for a year and I just can't believe they're so stubborn about replacing the router THEY GAVE ME when it fails.

Ardent

You need to keep the imagine router AFAIK. You may need help from imagine support to disable the wifi on it.

Fatal Except1on

Athy mast gone to ****e again.
Can't even complete a speed test.

irishfeen

Speeds from Bweeng mast have really taken a nosedive over the last 2 months, we have repeatedly tried to reset by plugging in and out.

Sometimes it struggles to play a video on youtube without stopping in the evenings.

I for one just hope the NBP isn’t too far over the horizon

theoneeyedman

Weses wrote: »

Customer support keeps avoiding giving me a new router and they keep asking me to do useless tests. Looks like they don't like to replace routers based on your experience, Ardent. Any idea why that could be? This has been going on for FAR too long. Still paying €60 a month!!

How much money do I have to fork out for a decent router and how do I know it will work with LTE? Any suggestions or links to purchase?

They tell me that the router and antenna unit have to me matched/paired together.

Having a similar issue.
Signal gone to pot recently. Call. Logged 2 weeks ago, usual tests, followed by a call out to change all equipment. Turns out they only changed the cable and moved the antenna slightly. A week further on of intermittent service and repeated calls they now say they want to schedule another call out to replace antenna and router. Calling them this morning to schedule and 'there's nobody in your area, it may be 5 working days' is the response. Calling back this afternoon and looking to speak with a supervisor, see will that hurry them on.
Not impressed is an understatement... Cowboys.

DutchGoldblum

Does anyone by any chance have the login info for their white Gemtek WVRTM-127ACN router?

butsy1981

For anyone considering Imagine LTE, be aware of their stance around what's deemed acceptable speeds during peak time. I'm in Whitescross Cork and get a steady 70MB most of the day but recently from 7pm onward this drops way off to as low as 3Mb in some cases. Last night it was around 5-7Mb, so I contacted Imagine support today and below is the response.

Imagine: Okay so roughly what point in the evening are you running the speed tests were you get 5-7 mb/s?
Me: roughly 7pm-11pm
Me: last night it was around 10pm
Me: upload speed was about 1-2Mb
Imagine: Okay the LTE service is a shared wireless service, so as usage increases across the highsite in the evenings,
the bandwidth obviously gets shared much more between consumers. For most of the hours last night between 7-9 PM it was between 20-30 mb/s, at 10 PM the average was about 15 mb/s, the lowest it got was roughly around that point.
Me: My tests showed 5-7Mb and I did several from a PC connected though a LAN cable
Me: that kind of drop off because of contention is unacceptable when it's meant to be a 70Mb line
Me: Surely there has to be a guaranteed minimum speed for a product that claims fibre speeds and 7MB is a long way from that
Imagine: Its an up to 70 Mb line, not a direct constant 70 Mb/s.
Me: I understand that, but 5-7MB is a long long way from 70MB
Me: even Eir gives better contention than that
Me: I was assured when taking out the contract that the number of users on the mast would not cause these types of issues
Me: so if that's the cause then your sales reps are misleading people
Imagine: The amount of users on the mast is capped, once it reaches that point it is not oversold,
but it is still a shared service and heavy usage will occasionally cause drops like that.
Me: Just so I'm clear here, are Imagine saying that average of 5-7Mb on a 70Mb line is acceptable?
Imagine: The average of the site isn't 5-7 Mb throughout the day, its much higher than that, but peak time usage will cause possible drops on a nominal highsite like that at high usage.
Me: Funny how your sales people don't mention that when signing people up. There's no mention that speeds as low as 5Mb are deemed acceptable by Imagine during peak times.
Imagine: I can't speak for sales as I only work in Tech support, but if you feel you were mislead about the product I am sorry. But the nature of a wireless network is as I described.

Gonzo

butsy1981 wrote: »

For anyone considering Imagine LTE, be aware of their stance around what's deemed acceptable speeds during peak time. I'm in Whitescross Cork and get a steady 70MB most of the day but recently from 7pm onward this drops way off to as low as 3Mb in some cases. Last night it was around 5-7Mb, so I contacted Imagine support today and below is the response.

Imagine: Okay so roughly what point in the evening are you running the speed tests were you get 5-7 mb/s?
Me: roughly 7pm-11pm
Me: last night it was around 10pm
Me: upload speed was about 1-2Mb
Imagine: Okay the LTE service is a shared wireless service, so as usage increases across the highsite in the evenings,
the bandwidth obviously gets shared much more between consumers. For most of the hours last night between 7-9 PM it was between 20-30 mb/s, at 10 PM the average was about 15 mb/s, the lowest it got was roughly around that point.
Me: My tests showed 5-7Mb and I did several from a PC connected though a LAN cable
Me: that kind of drop off because of contention is unacceptable when it's meant to be a 70Mb line
Me: Surely there has to be a guaranteed minimum speed for a product that claims fibre speeds and 7MB is a long way from that
Imagine: Its an up to 70 Mb line, not a direct constant 70 Mb/s.
Me: I understand that, but 5-7MB is a long long way from 70MB
Me: even Eir gives better contention than that
Me: I was assured when taking out the contract that the number of users on the mast would not cause these types of issues
Me: so if that's the cause then your sales reps are misleading people
Imagine: The amount of users on the mast is capped, once it reaches that point it is not oversold,
but it is still a shared service and heavy usage will occasionally cause drops like that.
Me: Just so I'm clear here, are Imagine saying that average of 5-7Mb on a 70Mb line is acceptable?
Imagine: The average of the site isn't 5-7 Mb throughout the day, its much higher than that, but peak time usage will cause possible drops on a nominal highsite like that at high usage.
Me: Funny how your sales people don't mention that when signing people up. There's no mention that speeds as low as 5Mb are deemed acceptable by Imagine during peak times.
Imagine: I can't speak for sales as I only work in Tech support, but if you feel you were mislead about the product I am sorry. But the nature of a wireless network is as I described.

Imagine has always had this issue with contention. They had it back in the wimax days, they still have it now on the LTE service and in the future they will continue to have it with 5g and beyond. They cram as many customers as they can get away with on to the masts for a usable service which can deliver anywhere from full speed down to single digit values. I think they max out at 400 customers per mast?

They could have decided to half or even quarter the number of customers connected to each mast, giving the customer a mostly very stable service, but that would be far less profits for their business.

Imagine can get away with this because the majority of their customers have no other option. Some masts are far worse than others. Some get lucky and end up on a mast that is not overloaded. e.g. some masts are also in areas that have since received widespread rural FTTH, so less customers and less problems in those areas.

jayo99

This post should be made a sticky at the top of this thread to warn potential subscribers, because it reflects the experience of me and a lot of other imagine users on here.

butsy1981 wrote: »

For anyone considering Imagine LTE, be aware of their stance around what's deemed acceptable speeds during peak time. I'm in Whitescross Cork and get a steady 70MB most of the day but recently from 7pm onward this drops way off to as low as 3Mb in some cases. Last night it was around 5-7Mb, so I contacted Imagine support today and below is the response.

Imagine: Okay so roughly what point in the evening are you running the speed tests were you get 5-7 mb/s?
Me: roughly 7pm-11pm
Me: last night it was around 10pm
Me: upload speed was about 1-2Mb
Imagine: Okay the LTE service is a shared wireless service, so as usage increases across the highsite in the evenings,
the bandwidth obviously gets shared much more between consumers. For most of the hours last night between 7-9 PM it was between 20-30 mb/s, at 10 PM the average was about 15 mb/s, the lowest it got was roughly around that point.
Me: My tests showed 5-7Mb and I did several from a PC connected though a LAN cable
Me: that kind of drop off because of contention is unacceptable when it's meant to be a 70Mb line
Me: Surely there has to be a guaranteed minimum speed for a product that claims fibre speeds and 7MB is a long way from that
Imagine: Its an up to 70 Mb line, not a direct constant 70 Mb/s.
Me: I understand that, but 5-7MB is a long long way from 70MB
Me: even Eir gives better contention than that
Me: I was assured when taking out the contract that the number of users on the mast would not cause these types of issues
Me: so if that's the cause then your sales reps are misleading people
Imagine: The amount of users on the mast is capped, once it reaches that point it is not oversold,
but it is still a shared service and heavy usage will occasionally cause drops like that.
Me: Just so I'm clear here, are Imagine saying that average of 5-7Mb on a 70Mb line is acceptable?
Imagine: The average of the site isn't 5-7 Mb throughout the day, its much higher than that, but peak time usage will cause possible drops on a nominal highsite like that at high usage.
Me: Funny how your sales people don't mention that when signing people up. There's no mention that speeds as low as 5Mb are deemed acceptable by Imagine during peak times.
Imagine: I can't speak for sales as I only work in Tech support, but if you feel you were mislead about the product I am sorry. But the nature of a wireless network is as I described.

butsy1981

Gonzo wrote: »

Imagine has always had this issue with contention. They had it back in the wimax days, they still have it now on the LTE service and in the future they will continue to have it with 5g and beyond. They cram as many customers as they can get away with on to the masts for a usable service which can deliver anywhere from full speed down to single digit values. I think they max out at 400 customers per mast?

They could have decided to half or even quarter the number of customers connected to each mast, giving the customer a mostly very stable service, but that would be far less profits for their business.

Imagine can get away with this because the majority of their customers have no other option. Some masts are far worse than others. Some get lucky and end up on a mast that is not overloaded. e.g. some masts are also in areas that have since received widespread rural FTTH, so less customers and less problems in those areas.

I wish the Irish government would step in and follow the UKs example of making ISPs advertise their real average speeds. There should also be legislation to ensure guaranteed minimum speeds versus those advertised. I think most people expect some drop off due to contention at peak times, but the really annoying thing is that there is no cap or limit on how low they will go and still be deemed acceptable by the ISP.

butsy1981

jayo99 wrote: »

This post should be made a sticky at the top of this thread to warn potential subscribers, because it reflects the experience of me and a lot of other imagine users on here.

Agreed. I posted it on their Facebook page as well! I'm not usually one to bitch and moan online about poor service or products, but I work in IT and I'm so sick of ISPs and their false promises and crap service.

Marlow

butsy1981 wrote: »

I wish the Irish government would step in and follow the UKs example of making ISPs advertise their real average speeds. There should also be legislation to ensure guaranteed minimum speeds versus those advertised. I think most people expect some drop off due to contention at peak times, but the really annoying thing is that were is not cap or limit on how low they will go and still be deemed acceptable by the ISP.

Well .. with Imagine you've got a cap AND high contention.

It's down to the consumer really, to educate themselves.

Even if it wasn't advertised as "Up to", there would still be contention, so speeds can dip.

The thing is, that with VDSL / FTTC, the up to makes sense, because the speed you get varies on the line quality. But you're told that speed, when you sign up.

What Imagine does, is use the "up to" as a wildcard. Other fixed wireless providers will give you a figure, what your service is capable of, when they install it. That's your package speed then.

So Imagines service is essentially nothing better than an unmanaged service like what Vodafone, Meteor and Three offer on their 4G service, just with a fixed router and outdoor antenna.

/M

butsy1981

Marlow wrote: »

Well .. with Imagine you've got a cap AND high contention.
It's down to the consumer really, to educate themselves.

Even if it wasn't advertised as "Up to", there would still be contention, so speeds can dip.

/M

I agree; with the current legislation people do need to educate themselves when signing up to ISPs as they can make any kind of claim on their service and get away with not delivering it.

In my case I work in IT and am well aware of the issues around contention and real versus advertised line speeds. when I signed up with Imgaine I asked the sales rep a number of questions around this and was sold a line of bullsh1t around CAPs on the masts to all but eliminate contention issues.

Whatever about getting speeds at the advertised rate, in 2018 there should be legislation around ensuring a minimum level of service versus the ISPs advertised speeds.

Marlow

butsy1981 wrote: »

Whatever about getting speeds at the advertised rate, in 2018 there should be legislation around ensuring a minimum level of service versus the ISPs advertised speeds.

There's actually no country (that i'm aware of), where that sort of legislation exists.

It would probably require a court case, that states, if the service is fit for service or not.

The issue in Ireland is, that there's a few ISPs that will pull the piss and that Comreg doesn't regulate anything in reality apart of the money, that they take of ISPs.

That and the fact, that Ireland overall is about 10 years behind of everybody else in the likes of internet service.

It's much like irish laws: there are none or they are draconian. You have near zero usable broadband (when you need it) or you have speeds that exceed most other places in the world.

/M

butsy1981

Marlow wrote: »

There's actually no country (that i'm aware of), where that sort of legislation exists.

It would probably require a court case, that states, if the service is fit for service or not.

/M

Maybe that legislation is not in place currently, but Ofcom in the UK seem to be taking steps to bring ISPs into line. It would be great if Comreg followed suit.

"Internet providers would also have to give people a minimum, guaranteed speed at the point of sale"

taken from this articale on the Ofcom website

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/latest/media/media-releases/2017/better-information-buy-broadband

Marlow

butsy1981 wrote: »

"Internet providers would also have to give people a minimum, guaranteed speed at the point of sale"

That used to be the case in Ireland, when everybody clearly specified the upload speed and contention in their pricing.

Eircom / Eir have long made it very difficult to find the actual contention on their connections, nevermind the upload speed. But give you an example from their ADSL1 plant:

1 Mbit/s / 128 kbit/s 48:1 contention. So they guaranteed you 21.33 kbit/s download and 2.66 kbit/s upload. The only problem with that was, that they then added, that the line was "rate adaptive" based on the distance from the exchange, which meant that you'd actually may get less

So if you have a provider, that gives you a package speed (no an "up to" or other escape clauses) and contention, then you can calculate exactly what your minimum speed is. You just have to make sure, that you test it correctly, when you do.

/M

butsy1981

Marlow wrote: »

Eircom / Eir have long made it very difficult to find the actual contention on their connections, nevermind the upload speed.
/M

I've been down that road with Eir a number of years back on a business line I had... I shudder at the thoughts of it.

I guess the problem with Imagine and the wireless providers is that even if there were legislation in Ireland like ofcom are proposing in the UK; for rural Ireland, providers like Imagine have people over a barrel, because there aren't any viable alternatives in a lot of cases.

rodge123

butsy1981 wrote: »

Maybe that legislation is not in place currently, but Ofcom in the UK seem to be taking steps to bring ISPs into line. It would be great if Comreg followed suit.

"Internet providers would also have to give people a minimum, guaranteed speed at the point of sale"

taken from this articale on the Ofcom website

https://www.ofcom.org.uk/about-ofcom/latest/media/media-releases/2017/better-information-buy-broadband

I emailed ASAI a while back about that article asking them to look at introducing similar.
Dissapointing response!

In regards to your query as to whether consumer legislation should be introduced, please note that as ASAI is not a legal body we cannot comment on legislation.

We have also reviewed the article in regards to ASA and their proposed actions, however, ASAI has currently no plans to adopt the same policy.

nealmac

Can someone tell me if Imagine have a block on downloading large files? I'm having serious problems trying to download anything over the 180mb ballpark. Files look like they're downloading, at a reasonable speed, but when it hits 180mb it freezes for a couple of minutes, and then it just comes up with "failed network error".

Has anyone else had this problem?

Sorry if it was mentioned before, but a quick search of the thread drew a blank.

amadablam

nealmac wrote: »

Can someone tell me if Imagine have a block on downloading large files? I'm having serious problems trying to download anything over the 180mb ballpark. Files look like they're downloading, at a reasonable speed, but when it hits 180mb it freezes for a couple of minutes, and then it just comes up with "failed network error".

Has anyone else had this problem?

Sorry if it was mentioned before, but a quick search of the thread drew a blank.

They definitely don't. I've downloaded files of up to 50gb at times.

That's error is a network error and more than likely a signal drop or weak WiFi signal

nealmac

amadablam wrote: »

They definitely don't. I've downloaded files of up to 50gb at times.

That's error is a network error and more than likely a signal drop or weak WiFi signal

That's what I thought at first. But I'm using a wired connection. Ive also tried different devices. And each download seems to get stuck in the same place. Usually around halfway or thereabouts.

deadl0ck

nealmac wrote: »

That's what I thought at first. But I'm using a wired connection. Ive also tried different devices. And each download seems to get stuck in the same place. Usually around halfway or thereabouts.

Have you tried different sites just for a large download test? Maybe try getting a Linux image. They run around 700mb. It could be the server you're downloading from

Grab All Association

Seen Imagine putting up posters in Thurles a few weeks ago. Dublin road area. A part of town already well served by Virgin Media, Eir FTTC and FTTH soon and ADSL2+. (There was a cabinet near the pole he erected the sign on)

Touted as connecting rural Ireland but serving large towns like Thurles, Clonmel, Nenagh etc people in rural Ireland should raise this with them. You’d be absolutely bonkers to join it when VM, Eircom etc are much much cheaper in the first year.

Thankfully I’m getting FTTH installed tomorrow and hopefully never have to put up with this absolute joke of a company. My brother and sisters got burnt with the WiMAX service a number of years ago iirc.

musefan123

deadl0ck wrote: »

Have you tried different sites just for a large download test? Maybe try getting a Linux image. They run around 700mb. It could be the server you're downloading from

Yep. It happens regularly, on different sites. Usually files over 180mb in size.

deadl0ck

musefan123 wrote: »

Yep. It happens regularly, on different sites. Usually files over 180mb in size.

And have you also tried a different device ? Even your mobile ?

SkepticQuark

Grab All Association wrote: »

Seen Imagine putting up posters in Thurles a few weeks ago. Dublin road area. A part of town already well served by Virgin Media, Eir FTTC and FTTH soon and ADSL2+. (There was a cabinet near the pole he erected the sign on)

Touted as connecting rural Ireland but serving large towns like Thurles, Clonmel, Nenagh etc people in rural Ireland should raise this with them. You’d be absolutely bonkers to join it when VM, Eircom etc are much much cheaper in the first year.

Thankfully I’m getting FTTH installed tomorrow and hopefully never have to put up with this absolute joke of a company. My brother and sisters got burnt with the WiMAX service a number of years ago iirc.

To be honest I doubt they actually think they'll pick up customers in towns. They have stuff up around efibre areas where I live and it seems to be more so it catches the eye of people who are in the "****ed by every ISP in the country" zones who might be passing by the well catered for "commerically viable" zones.

Gonzo

not a hope of Imagine making many sales in towns/villages and routes where decent broadband and options is available for cheaper. Baseline 'eirfibre', Virgin media and Siro/OpenEir FTTH are all cheaper than Imagine and none of them have the daily cap.