Imagine LTE Rural Broadband

Chef-1st

I don't know about the rest of you, but imagine fibre speed has changed my life. The website was right after all.
55% faster than other users in Ireland. 55% increase in my life fulfillment!

Nonoperational

TireeTerror wrote: »

You dont use a lot of data, that doesn't mean there are loads of us who do. Imagine advertise this as if its like fibre, the fibre experience they say. Well its nothing like fibre at all, not even close.

I feel like Im constantly having to think about what I am doing, always double checking my usage, and that just spoils the experience. Its 2016 and somebody somewhere told me this is the first world.

To be honest, anyone with even a rudimentary understanding of wireless connectivity will understand that current wireless technology is always going to be dependent on spectrum available and sharing of bandwidth between users.

Three offer all you can eat data and there is an unmercifully long thread of misery here about slow speeds. I tried (in vain) to make the point on that thread that this is the price you pay for AYCE data. Imagine offer speeds that are pretty impressive for rural broadband and it is a decent stop gap until FTTC or FTTH becomes available. 20GB is a decent daily cap, especially if they offered off peak exceptions for downloading updates etc. It just isn't possible with the technology we have at present to offer unlimited and very fast wireless. You always have a trade off. The hyperbole about the first world etc is all well and good, but that is the reality of the situation at present.

Decent Skin

Gonzo wrote: »

have to agree their webpage makes it read like its Eir/Voda Fibre or Virgin Media. With the restrictions and technology it's nothing more than a fancier Meteor/Vodafone 4G just with a bigger daily allowance.

Everyone takes for granted that mobile 4G is only for light use on phones but Imagine are marketing this as if you can do everything you want on it and claim that the 20gb allowance is 'huge'.

It is precisely that, which is why it would be a godsend if I could get it. I never viewed it as "the same as "unlimited" wired / cabled, and I presume I saw the exact same ads.

The "experience" of non-buffered streaming and fast download IS the same; just because the experience isn't available 24/7 uninterrupted doesn't change that fact.

A 20 gb daily allowance is huge compared to the paltry 50gb per month allowance that Vodafone were offering for the same price, and they only upped their game when Imagine arrived.

TireeTerror

Well midnight has been and gone and I downloaded 64GB in the last 24 hours. I thought I may as well buy Arma 3 Apex before the night was out.

No warning, no throttling at all. Now to behave myself for the rest of the week.

jfcunniffe

TireeTerror wrote: »

You dont use a lot of data, that doesn't mean there are loads of us who do. Imagine advertise this as if its like fibre, the fibre experience they say. Well its nothing like fibre at all, not even close.

I feel like Im constantly having to think about what I am doing, always double checking my usage, and that just spoils the experience. Its 2016 and somebody somewhere told me this is the first world.

I could not agree more with you, feel the same way we have five people in our house all do they own thing online from gaming to watching Netflix having to check all the time to make sure not to go over the cap its a pain no enjoyment at all with Imagine LTE.

Dinerve

TireeTerror wrote: »

Well midnight has been and gone and I downloaded 64GB in the last 24 hours. I thought I may as well buy Arma 3 Apex before the night was out.

No warning, no throttling at all. Now to behave myself for the rest of the week.

Well played, I'll disregard the spamming I seem to be subject of and try the same some overnight prior going to work, that way if throttled I'll be out till 00:00 the same day and won't feel it as much...

Are you also gonna try to push past 20 to see if immediate throttling occurs?:P

guil

Gonzo wrote: »

Sky HD is around 3GB per hour

Sky On Demand in HD: most tv shows are about 2.5GB per episode and movies anything up to 4GB per movie.

Some movies are huge on sky. One of the turtles was nearly 13GB.

Decent Skin

guil wrote: »

Some movies are huge on sky. One of the turtles was nearly 13GB.

So the whole movie was 52GB ?

robert muldoon

NakQuada wrote: »

Have a concern about trees myself.
Hope I can get it when it comes to my area!

Was on to them today was informed kilcullen mast went live on 8th August and we should get instal within 14 days of notification by email which I got last Tuesday . So hopefully next week or the week after latest

NakQuada

robert muldoon wrote: »

Was on to them today was informed kilcullen mast went live on 8th August and we should get instal within 14 days of notification by email which I got last Tuesday . So hopefully next week or the week after latest

Great stuff. I know I'm too far from Kilcullen so I will have to wait for another mast to go live in the next month. Imagine said there were two additional masts to go live in the area so I'll wait and see!

SpannerMonkey

Has anyone checked if there is much of a speed difference between the wifi and wired ? Would it be worth my while running a cable to my pc instead of relieing on wifi ?

NakQuada

SpannerMonkey wrote: »

Has anyone checked if there is much of a speed difference between the wifi and wired ? Would it be worth my while running a cable to my pc instead of relieing on wifi ?

It's always worthwhile running a cable to PC, regardless of situation

morgana

That depends entirely on your wifi set-up. My wifi reception is best on my phone - where i get around 53 Mbps whereas the laptop with its crappy wifi adapter barely manages 20 - 25 Mbps, same with the other PC. Compare to wired average of 70 Mbps. (wifi provided by my own router).

mass_debater

SpannerMonkey wrote: »

Has anyone checked if there is much of a speed difference between the wifi and wired ? Would it be worth my while running a cable to my pc instead of relieing on wifi ?

You should always cable everything static, desktops, consoles, media players and leave wireless just for the devices that need mobility. It'll work better that way. The time has come for everyone to retro-cable up their houses for broadband. It makes a huge difference.

editorsean

SpannerMonkey wrote: »

Has anyone checked if there is much of a speed difference between the wifi and wired ? Would it be worth my while running a cable to my pc instead of relieing on wifi ?

For anyone using or considering using Homeplugs where the network connection is carried over the house's wiring, it's well worth doing speed tests with a laptop connected directly to the router, just like ruling out Wi-Fi for performance issues. While they do tend to give a more consistent speed than Wi-Fi, they are no match for a network cable and have seen the odd time where they brought the speed to a near crawl.

While visiting someone a few days ago chatting about broadband, they mentioned how slow their DSL connection is even though Eir claim they are connected at 6Mbps. Sure enough, their router showed a DSL sync speed of 6144Kbps, yet the speed tests were only achieving 1.6 to 1.8Mbps from their desktop PC. When I went to check its network cable, I noticed that it was plugged into a Homeplug, in turn plugged into the wall socket (not a power strip). So when I asked where their router is, they said it is in the loft in an area awkward to get at, so the only speed comparison I could do was over Wi-Fi and it gave 4.8Mbps. They were really surprised as they were told by whoever provided the Homeplugs that they would be as good as bringing a network cable back to the router and being non-technical people, they thought it was too many people downloading in their area slowing down their connection.

Decent Skin

editorsean wrote: »

For anyone using or considering using Homeplugs where the network connection is carried over the house's wiring, it's well worth doing speed tests with a laptop connected directly to the router, just like ruling out Wi-Fi for performance issues. While they do tend to give a more consistent speed than Wi-Fi, they are no match for a network cable and have seen the odd time where they brought the speed to a near crawl.

While visiting someone a few days ago chatting about broadband, they mentioned how slow their DSL connection is even though Eir claim they are connected at 6Mbps. Sure enough, their router showed a DSL sync speed of 6144Kbps, yet the speed tests were only achieving 1.6 to 1.8Mbps from their desktop PC. When I went to check its network cable, I noticed that it was plugged into a Homeplug, in turn plugged into the wall socket (not a power strip). So when I asked where their router is, they said it is in the loft in an area awkward to get at, so the only speed comparison I could do was over Wi-Fi and it gave 4.8Mbps. They were really surprised as they were told by whoever provided the Homeplugs that they would be as good as bringing a network cable back to the router and being non-technical people, they thought it was too many people downloading in their area slowing down their connection.

Is this the homeplug or the state of their electrical wiring though ?

mass_debater

Decent Skin wrote: »

Is this the homeplug or the state of their electrical wiring though ?

There is no way to test the electrical wiring as delivering data is not it's intended propose. Simple things like overlaps and twists can cause problems. The electrical circuit is also not an end to end cable, it's a daisy chain from socket to socket where you'll gave other devices and appliances plugged in.

SpannerMonkey

mass_debater wrote: »

You should always cable everything static, desktops, consoles, media players and leave wireless just for the devices that need mobility. It'll work better that way. The time has come for everyone to retro-cable up their houses for broadband. It makes a huge difference.

easier said than done when the pc is upstairs and the router downstairs and having a mrs that has a phobia about seeing wires anywhere . and to make it worse the plug in network things that use the houses wiring dont work in my house . i could do a cable at a push but it would require major hassle and a lot of drilling and routing of cables . a lot of work and not worth it unless there is a decent improvement over wifi

mass_debater

SpannerMonkey wrote: »

easier said than done when the pc is upstairs and the router downstairs and having a mrs that has a phobia about seeing wires anywhere . and to make it worse the plug in network things that use the houses wiring dont work in my house . i could do a cable at a push but it would require major hassle and a lot of drilling and routing of cables . a lot of work and not worth it unless there is a decent improvement over wifi

It's usually not that hard, put some thought into it. Most houses can easily be cabled neatly. Drill a single hole at skirting level and run your cables outside around under the plaster plinth and cable tie it up behind a downpipe and in through the soffit to a central location somewhere like the attic. Wireless installers are doing this type of work every day.

A cable will always be a huge improvement over wireless, it has separate strands for send and receive to each device (full duplex) where wireless uses a single frequency to talk to all devices using the same band (half duplex). So while your wireless router is sending information to one device it's not sending to any others, one at a time

http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com/answer/The-difference-between-half-duplex-and-full-duplex

momo_32

Dero wrote: »

To be honest, I'm more concerned with the network config and being able to bridge their modem properly, but I don't hold out much hope for that either.

Imagine wrote:

Unfortunately, at the moment the WN-600 is required for the service to function as we do not have any stand POE devices yet. However, we are looking into getting them in the future.

I have just come off the phone from Imagine Tech Support and Magnet (I'm a Magnet customer). So the latest in this config saga is that Tech Support, when asked to forward two ports initially appeared to be happy enough. Though he wanted to have me use 81 for an http server "because we use 80".

Then when I added that I still don't have a static IP address he swerved and said I had to speak to Magnet - for the port forwarding too! Ok, rang Magnet. And now: The whole shebang is locked down - by Imagine. They _will_not_forward_ports - end of story. He started to give a list of things Imagine won't allow (changing wifi passwords for instance, changing SSID) - for their own domestic customers nor for for Magnet business customers; I stopped him, I think he was reading from a list I had compiled two weeks ago and sent them. He agreed he could give me a static IP address - and we both said together "not that that's much use without the rest". He agreed that it was an unuseable service for anything other than browsing and downloading - I don't know about game playing, isn't there a need to forward ports sometimes?

(The POE issue is easily sorted and I'm using my own router. The POE is non-standard -12vdc on the unused pairs - and can be split off easily and non-destructively with 3 RJ45 sockets)

I think I will be cancelling the contract.

Edited to add: (although I can use my own router and take back control of my own network, the port forwarding issue related to the locked down antenna which does NAT)

Dero

momo_32 wrote: »

I have just come off the phone from Imagine Tech Support and Magnet (I'm a Magnet customer). So the latest in this config saga is that Tech Support, when asked to forward two ports initially appeared to be happy enough. Though he wanted to have me use 81 for an http server "because we use 80".

Then when I added that I still don't have a static IP address he swerved and said I had to speak to Magnet - for the port forwarding too! Ok, rang Magnet. And now: The whole shebang is locked down - by Imagine. They _will_not_forward_ports - end of story. He started to give a list of things Imagine won't allow (changing wifi passwords for instance, changing SSID) - for their own domestic customers nor for for Magnet business customers; I stopped him, I think he was reading from a list I had compiled two weeks ago and sent them. He agreed he could give me a static IP address - and we both said together "not that that's much use without the rest". He agreed that it was an unuseable service for anything other than browsing and downloading - I don't know about game playing, isn't there a need to forward ports sometimes?

(The POE issue is easily sorted and I'm using my own router. The POE is non-standard -12vdc on the unused pairs - and can be split off easily and non-destructively with 3 RJ45 sockets)

I think I will be cancelling the contract.

Edited to add: (although I can use my own router and take back control of my own network, the port forwarding issue related to the locked down antenna which does NAT)

Jesus H. Christ. What a clusterf**k.

They sound more and more like a crowd of incompetent cowboys every day. Why though? Why go through so much grief from customers who (quite reasonably) request what is straight-forward form other providers? What on Earth do Imagine get from it?

What I take from that is that the chance of having the public IP assigned to my own network gear is pretty much zero.

I don't actually want much in the way of port forwarding -- I could probably get away with 22 if I *had* to, but still, it's my network, and I want to manage it how *I* want.

So disappointed, and so not looking forward to having these same arguments with them if I actually get it installed. :mad:

What is the real root reason though? Why will they not bridge the modem? They're actually making life more awkward for themselves. I think I can figure out why, but if I'm right, then I despair about their network design.

Did anyone ever have their WiMAX service? Was that the same?

I reckon that behind it all is a fairly shoddy network that they just threw together to make a quick few quid off poor desperate souls like us until the NBP (hopefully) comes along to kill them off for good.

robert muldoon

Dero wrote: »

Jesus H. Christ. What a clusterf**k.

They sound more and more like a crowd of incompetent cowboys every day. Why though? Why go through so much grief from customers who (quite reasonably) request what is straight-forward form other providers? What on Earth do Imagine get from it?

What I take from that is that the chance of having the public IP assigned to my own network gear is pretty much zero.

I don't actually want much in the way of port forwarding -- I could probably get away with 22 if I *had* to, but still, it's my network, and I want to manage it how *I* want.

So disappointed, and so not looking forward to having these same arguments with them if I actually get it installed. :mad:

What is the real root reason though? Why will they not bridge the modem? They're actually making life more awkward for themselves. I think I can figure out why, but if I'm right, then I despair about their network design.

Did anyone ever have their WiMAX service? Was that the same?

I reckon that behind it all is a fairly shoddy network that they just threw together to make a quick few quid off poor desperate souls like us until the NBP (hopefully) comes along to kill them off for good.

This is all gobbledygook to me and I think the less I know about it the better

momo_32

Dero wrote: »

Did anyone ever have their WiMAX service? Was that the same?

I reckon that behind it all is a fairly shoddy network that they just threw together to make a quick few quid off poor desperate souls like us until the NBP (hopefully) comes along to kill them off for good.

I had the Irish Broadband (became Imagine) 4Mb Breeze service until July when I was "upgraded" (!?). It worked perfectly. Only 4Mb and usually got around 3.5-3.7, but very few dropouts and the antenna/POE injector/CPE kit was much more robust and professional than the current offering. No issue at all with configuration, all done through my own router. I would go straight back to this but they've withdrawn the service to make way for the ... upgrade.

NakQuada

Would anyone with LTE installed do me a massive favour please?

Can you do a traceroute to google.ie via command prompt and post the result here.
I have an ongoing issue with my ISP for 2 years and I know it's because they route the traffic through the UK first

Tracing route to google.ie [172.217.23.3]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.3.1
2 4 ms 3 ms 3 ms 10.12.141.1
3 4 ms 6 ms 6 ms 10.12.27.1
4 12 ms 15 ms 8 ms 10.12.137.1
5 23 ms 22 ms 22 ms 185.32.94.254
6 23 ms 25 ms 23 ms te0-0-1-1.224.nr11.b020478-0.dub02.atlas.cogentco.com [149.11.37.113]
7 24 ms 23 ms 22 ms be2041.rcr21.dub02.atlas.cogentco.com [154.25.1.149]
8 27 ms 30 ms 23 ms be2530.rcr21.dub01.atlas.cogentco.com [130.117.2.229]
9 33 ms 41 ms 46 ms be2527.ccr42.lon13.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.37.245]
10 32 ms 33 ms 42 ms be2869.ccr22.lon01.atlas.cogentco.com [154.54.57.162]
11 32 ms 41 ms 34 ms ae23-xcr1.lns.cw.net [195.2.19.121]
12 30 ms 32 ms 42 ms 72.14.197.234
13 31 ms 34 ms 33 ms 216.239.48.77
14 37 ms 32 ms 45 ms 108.170.233.199
15 32 ms 59 ms 37 ms lhr35s01-in-f3.1e100.net [172.217.23.3]

mailburner

NakQuada wrote: »

Would anyone with LTE installed do me a massive favour please?

Can you do a traceroute to google.ie via command prompt and post the result here.
I have an ongoing issue with my ISP for 2 years and I know it's because they route the traffic through the UK first

Tracing route to google.ie [89.127.198.248]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.22.1
2 2 ms 1 ms 1 ms 192.168.1.1
3 * * * Request timed out.
4 34 ms 22 ms 32 ms DN07-ae4-442-ibis-gw-1.irishbroadband.ie [89.127.192.29]
5 36 ms 32 ms 24 ms DN07-ae0-2-ibis-dc-1.irishbroadband.ie [89.127.197.2]
6 41 ms 23 ms 22 ms DN07-05.ge-1-3-0-281.rtr.imagine.ie [89.127.199.117]
7 24 ms 38 ms 34 ms 89.127.198.248

Trace complete

morgana

Tracing route to GOOGLE.IE [89.127.198.248]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms router.asus.com [192.168.1.1]
2 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.22.1
3 * * * Request timed out.
4 * * * Request timed out.
5 43 ms 35 ms 41 ms 89.127.192.73
6 29 ms 38 ms 36 ms DN07-ae0-2-ibis-dc-2.irishbroadband.ie [89.127.197.6]
7 28 ms 33 ms 50 ms DN07-05.ge-0-3-0-282.rtr.imagine.ie [89.127.199.121]
8 41 ms 39 ms 24 ms 89.127.198.248

amadablam

TireeTerror wrote: »

Well midnight has been and gone and I downloaded 64GB in the last 24 hours. I thought I may as well buy Arma 3 Apex before the night was out.

No warning, no throttling at all. Now to behave myself for the rest of the week.

That bodes well.

I had excited excellent speeds earlier today after receiving the warning email to tell me that I was at 75% of my daily allowance. Just a few game updates during the night.

Don't think I have exceeded it, am almost sure of this, but I am below 2mbps all evening. Maybe I am paranoid but it looks like my speed was cut although I had those speeds on Wednesday after the installation.

A big drop from 40-85mbps that I had most of the day.

I'm hoping I will be back to full speed at 12:00 am! Really would be great if they gave you the ability to see what your usage and whether or not you have been throttled.

NakQuada

morgana wrote: »

Tracing route to GOOGLE.IE [89.127.198.248]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms router.asus.com [192.168.1.1]
2 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.22.1
3 * * * Request timed out.
4 * * * Request timed out.
5 43 ms 35 ms 41 ms 89.127.192.73
6 29 ms 38 ms 36 ms DN07-ae0-2-ibis-dc-2.irishbroadband.ie [89.127.197.6]
7 28 ms 33 ms 50 ms DN07-05.ge-0-3-0-282.rtr.imagine.ie [89.127.199.121]
8 41 ms 39 ms 24 ms 89.127.198.248

Jaysus, what the hell are my ISP doing routing traffic through the UK etc. No wonder I have terrible issues.

Johnboy1951

Those traces are reaching

89.127.198.248

which is an Imagine IP and not google.

What is the explanation?

editorsean

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

Those traces are reaching

89.127.198.248

which is an Imagine IP and not google.

What is the explanation?

I think it's a cache server, similar to how ISPs host YouTube cache servers.

For example, if you go to http://89.127.198.248/ it brings up the Google homepage.