Virgin Media Rathdown Park

Blandpebbles

Hi,
Anyone signed up and using new Virgin Media service in Rathdown Park? Any good?

Sky Fibre for 3 months and every month it's down for a few days.

And not getting advertised speeds....

loyatemu

Blandpebbles wrote: »

Hi,
Anyone signed up and using new Virgin Media service in Rathdown Park? Any good?

Sky Fibre for 3 months and every month it's down for a few days.

And not getting advertised speeds....

you'll have to get out of your contract with Sky which might not be easy. The advertised speeds with Sky, Eircom etc are "up to 100Mb" but it could be as low as 7Mb in reality.

Also good to see VM is now available in Rathdown, hopefully they'll turn on the rest of Greystones soon.

Blandpebbles

loyatemu wrote: »

you'll have to get out of your contract with Sky which might not be easy. The advertised speeds with Sky, Eircom etc are "up to 100Mb" but it could be as low as 7Mb in reality.

Also good to see VM is now available in Rathdown, hopefully they'll turn on the rest of Greystones soon.

Thanks. With no full months service with a reported issue should be easier to get out of contract. Will probably cut TV as well..

loyatemu

Heathervue appears to be enabled now as well, and parts of Bellevue Park.

Harry Bosch

Glad to see you got it, loyatemu. Still not connected nearer to the entrance, but I expect that will be soon.

But how about this: I discovered a few days ago that Vodafone now provides 100Mb e-fibre in Rathdown Park (previously only some houses), so I contacted them. Vodafone, contrary to the assurances when they were advertising this before the cabinets were installed, simply did not inform us or upgrade the connection.

When I contacted them about this, know what they said?

‘We’ll upgrade you when your contract expires on 30 June.’

Know what they said when I mentioned their assurances?

‘We’ll upgrade you when your contract expires on 30 June.'

Know what I said?

‘No, you won’t, I’ll be moving to Virgin!’

loyatemu wrote: »

you'll have to get out of your contract with Sky which might not be easy. The advertised speeds with Sky, Eircom etc are "up to 100Mb" but it could be as low as 7Mb in reality.

Also good to see VM is now available in Rathdown, hopefully they'll turn on the rest of Greystones soon.

loyatemu

Harry Bosch wrote: »

Glad to see you got it, loyatemu. Still not connected nearer to the entrance, but I expect that will be soon.

unfortunately hasn't reached my gaff yet, but it's very close

eigrod

Is it correct that Virgin (UPC) TV customers everywhere else (outside of Rathdown Park) are regularly losing service and require re-tunes frequently to restore service, and this is likely to continue for months until the new service is installed in the relevant areas ?

I'm with SKY but a neighbour told me that this is happening to her and this is what she was told by the Virgin engineer (who said they are being pilloried over this and the entire thing is a mess at the moment).

loyatemu

eigrod wrote: »

Is it correct that Virgin (UPC) TV customers everywhere else (outside of Rathdown Park) are regularly losing service and require re-tunes frequently to restore service, and this is likely to continue for months until the new service is installed in the relevant areas ?

I'm with SKY but a neighbour told me that this is happening to her and this is what she was told by the Virgin engineer (who said they are being pilloried over this and the entire thing is a mess at the moment).

That's people on the old analogue service - it's always been unreliable as it's operating on kit from the1970s, and the upgrade works may have caused some extra outages.

Virgin are replacing all the old cables for the new digital service so it should be more reliable.

I'm actually amazed anyone is still using the analogue cable system, it was never great when it was run by Chorus and before that Martini. Most people I know in Greystones switched to Sky at least 10 years ago.

eigrod

loyatemu wrote: »

That's people on the old analogue service - it's always been unreliable as it's operating on kit from the1970s, and the upgrade works may have caused some extra outages.

Virgin are replacing all the old cables for the new digital service so it should be more reliable.

Thanks. Yes, it's the analogue service and it does seem the new installation is causing outages.

The new cabling was run through our estate last year but I guess it' hasn't been switched over yet. I would consider moving from SKY to Virgin if it does prove to be reliable.

loyatemu

eigrod wrote: »

Thanks. Yes, it's the analogue service and it does seem the new installation is causing outages.

The new cabling was run through our estate last year but I guess it' hasn't been switched over yet. I would consider moving from SKY to Virgin if it does prove to be reliable.

Rathdown and Heathervue seem to have been enabled on the system only in the last few days, so the other areas that have been re-cabled can't be far behind.

Harry Bosch

Loyatemu, could you update with news of your address going live, or your connection as soon as it happens?

I'll be rechecking on VM site, but I might see your update first. I'll be in like a shot. I am SOOOOO looking forward to telling Vodafone I won't be renewing my contract, or looking for their 100Mb fibre connection, which I hear is quite troublesome.

loyatemu

still not live for me, but it's live across the road - apparently there were VM guys on ladders checking connections this week so I'm guessing there's some wiring problem on this side of the street.

nickhx

Looks like fibre cable was being laid over windgates this morning - wonder if it is for Virgin

Harry Bosch

loyatemu wrote: »

still not live for me, but it's live across the road - apparently there were VM guys on ladders checking connections this week so I'm guessing there's some wiring problem on this side of the street.

Last year when Virgin/UPC first started the upgrade, their guys came to my door to ask permission to survey the existing connections. Apparently I have extra infrastructure in the form of a connection from the 'mains', so to speak, under my front garden and up to the eaves.

No doubt the same is true of other locations in RP, so that could be the reason for them being on ladders — not so much a problem, but getting their works schedule and requirements in order.

Christ, I hope they get to it soon. As I type, I see that downloading a 19.5MB disk image is going to take 48 minutes. That's the sort of crap I have to endure with Vodafone's rubbish connection, supposed to be 'up to 28Mb/sec' but never more than half a Mb in practice, no matter what Speedtest might say (never better than 3 or 4 Mb).

loyatemu

some houses act as junctions or boosters for the rest of the street I think - I know one person nearby was offered a free connection in return for have extra VM equipment on their house.

Harry Bosch

loyatemu wrote: »

some houses act as junctions or boosters for the rest of the street I think - I know one person nearby was offered a free connection in return for have extra VM equipment on their house.

Yes, we used to have that from Chorus/UPC and will be looking to renew. It's a family thing — me Da extorted a free connection at his house decades ago, so I plan to continue the tradition...

Actually, it's fairly common. I know a farmer who has some sort of mast on his land and everything is free — TV, phone, broadband. Not bad at €90 a month full price...

loyatemu

oh yeah:



me, right now:

loyatemu

also available in most of Hillside now.

Alan_P

Ok I can confirm that Virgin are available in Rathdown Park. Just went to speedtest.net, and I have 239 Mb down and 20 Mb up.

This puts the connection in the top 95% globally, and top 97% nationally, according to speedtest. (I ordered 240Mb, I couldn't for the life of me imagine what 360Mb would do that 240Mb didn't).

LEIN

Alan_P wrote: »

Ok I can confirm that Virgin are available in Rathdown Park. Just went to speedtest.net, and I have 239 Mb down and 20 Mb up.

This puts the connection in the top 95% globally, and top 97% nationally, according to speedtest. (I ordered 240Mb, I couldn't for the life of me imagine what 360Mb would do that 240Mb didn't).

It is fairly impressive.

http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/5337181463

loyatemu

I went with the 360Mb option because, hey, why not

Testing over wifi I get 120mb down, 36 up. Haven't had a chance to test wired yet.

Edit - just remember I have a Samknows box running tests every day... some improvement over my old connection

Alan_P

LEIN wrote: »

It is fairly impressive.

http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/5337181463

I'd forgotten speedtest will give you a permalink.

http://www.speedtest.net/my-result/5382011041

LEIN

loyatemu wrote: »

I went with the 360Mb option because, hey, why not

Testing over wifi I get 120mb down, 36 up. Haven't had a chance to test wired yet.

Edit - just remember I have a Samknows box running tests every day... some improvement over my old connection

[IMG][/img]

That's a very solid connection.

eigrod

Have you guys got Virgin TV too ? How is that, if so?

LEIN

eigrod wrote: »

Have you guys got Virgin TV too ? How is that, if so?

The horizon box can be painful but other than that it's fine.

loyatemu

eigrod wrote: »

Have you guys got Virgin TV too ? How is that, if so?

no, just the broadband. We're all a bit too used to the Sky system and I've been underwhelmed by what I've seen of Virgin's TV service.

loyatemu

just did another test using a laptop with ac wifi; this is using Virgin's own router/modem... I'm very impressed:

ballyargus

Is anyone using in blacklion manor? Thinking of jumping ship from sky. Would like to know people's experience

Blandpebbles

Got Virgin BB today. Woeful. Could barely get into any site tonight.

Sites not found, Netflix failing or running 240p... Clearly FUBAR'd at night time.

Terrible, terrible service. Like dial-up.

Lucky didn't cancel sky yet.

Harry Bosch

Are you in Rathdown Park, bland?

Loyatemu has been waxing lyrical about his broadband here, and the techie is arriving Monday to install ours. Hoping I haven't made a big mistake!

(14-day cooloing off period. I will be test-driving like mad!)

loyatemu

have you contacted them about it? This is the graph from my Samknows box which runs tests continuously throughout the day (wired) - as you can see it's rock solid, mostly getting the full 360Mb, never goes below 325:




the other question is which router have they given you - I heard mixed reports about the Horizon box and their old wifi router has a bad rep. The Compal router they're now supplying is much better (dual-band AC) but I think you only get it on the 360Mb package.