Getting certainty on speed availability

adocholiday

Hi all,

I'm interested in buying a property in Wicklow and I have been through all of the national and regional Fixed/LTE providers and not a single one of them can offer me more than 5mb. This is going to be the factor that determines whether or not we buy the house now so we are grasping at all options. We both work in IT so a reasonably fast and stable signal is essential for us for working from home.

The only potentially viable options for us now are the mobile providers. The problem is that none of them can guarantee the connection (3G/4G) or the speeds of same. They want us to trial a router. The problem here is we don't own the house to do that!

Three's coverage map tells me that 4G is available outside but not inside, and 3G is available inside. Given that 3G speeds are pretty poor, I'm not sure if this is even going to cut it.

Is there any way at all to get a good idea what kind of speeds/connection we can expect at the house? If 4G is available outside but not inside can that be leveraged somehow? Would even going to the property with my phone and seeing what I get there tell me anything? I'm open to every suggestion, but we need to get some certainty around this.

smuggler.ie

First, i would not trust any "coverage map" from ISP, especially mobile(you didn't mention your current provider!) - technique to lure you into contract, then a lot of b******t excuses and lots of trouble for you.
In some instances, with some ISP's, 3G could have better speeds than 4G(yep, in this country, 4G can be worse than 3G, and people from "Three" forums know what i mean )

Checking for 3G/4G coverage around house with your phone gives good indication what you can expect, you can get speed testing app installed - proper sim capable router in theory should be more powerful to get signal and, furthermore, would have connection available for boosting signal with external antenna.

adocholiday

smuggler.ie wrote: »

First, i would not trust any "coverage map" from ISP, especially mobile(you didn't mention your current provider!) - technique to lure you into contract, then a lot of b******t excuses and lots of trouble for you.
In some instances, with some ISP's, 3G could have better speeds than 4G(yep, in this country, 4G can be worse than 3G, and people from "Three" forums know what i mean )

Checking for 3G/4G coverage around house with your phone gives good indication what you can expect, you can get speed testing app installed - proper sim capable router in theory should be more powerful to get signal and, furthermore, would have connection available for boosting signal with external antenna.

My current phone provider is eir, but my wife is with Vodafone. Based on average speeds and cost/data caps we'd be going with Vodafone anyway once we can get coverage at the house.

I have the Ookla speed test app installed so we'll go visit the house at the weekend and see what kind of phone reception we're getting at the exterior. Who'd have thought in 2018 that broadband would be an issue for buying a house that's otherwise perfect!

adm

Hi You may have seen my recent thread about Eir Mobile Broadband.

It was fine for the first Month of my contract but has gone to hell.

I got an external antenna for 4G and it worked well. Was getting 20Gb down.
But now it is gone to sh1t

I have had literally years of pain with mobile broadband (I too work sometimes at home in IT).

And now they say the NBP or whatever will take years.
My heart is actually broken with it - It is such a complete pain.

But you might be luckier than me.

If it were me proper Broadband would be an absolute necessity

srsly78

There is no guarantee for anyone. Bandwidth is SHARED between users. As more and more people start streaming Netflix (and other bandwidth intensive stuff) the service degrades for everyone.

You might move somewhere and it will be grand, then a few years later it may be awful.

Also note that speed might be great in the mornings, then go to **** in the evenings (see aforementioned Netflix).

The same also applies to wired connections, but usually not as bad. Check the openeir fiber rollout map instead - this gives a better guarantee you will get good connection.

adocholiday

srsly78 wrote: »

There is no guarantee for anyone. Bandwidth is SHARED between users. As more and more people start streaming Netflix (and other bandwidth intensive stuff) the service degrades for everyone.

You might move somewhere and it will be grand, then a few years later it may be awful.

Also note that speed might be great in the mornings, then go to **** in the evenings (see aforementioned Netflix).

The same also applies to wired connections, but usually not as bad. Check the openeir fiber rollout map instead - this gives a better guarantee you will get good connection.

Yeah I understand the contention thing, but unfortunately there is no choice for us here in terms of service. We use one of the 3 main mobile providers to give us a 4G connection and wait an unknown amount of time for fibre. Unfortunately the property is not on the eir fibre rollout map for 2018 at least, and we've exhausted every other option. The mobile broadband option is truly our last resort.

If we weren't so keen to buy this property for literally every other reason then we'd walk away over this, but I'm refusing to accept this as a deal breaker until we've exhausted all avenues.

adocholiday

Hi all,

We checked the Mobile Broadband connection at the property yesterday and on an eir mobile phone and a vodafone mobile phone we were getting between 8-13Mbps down on 4G with about 3 out of 5 bars connection. I used both OpenSignal and Ookla to do speed tests and they were fairly consistent. We couldn't check inside the property but the current occupier said that they use Vodafone broadband and the connection is patchy and speeds are poor. I think this is due to the granite walls though.

Now the question is what speeds/connection could we potentially get here with a good external antenna? Is there any other equipment we should buy?

Thud

I'm using Regional broadband in Wicklow, I'm on the wireless 20mbs package, fastest I've seen on it was 13mbs (trees in way and distance from tower were what they say cause slower speeds) they claim to be rolling out 70mbs package (fibre to their tower) but it keeps being delayed, was supposed to be October, then before Christmas, now it's before end of Q1.

I'm 1km from the fibre rollout :mad:

Maybe check with neighbours what provider they use to see if its any better?

adocholiday

Thud wrote: »

I'm using Regional broadband in Wicklow, I'm on the wireless 20mbs package, fastest I've seen on it was 13mbs (trees in way and distance from tower were what they say cause slower speeds) they claim to be rolling out 70mbs package (fibre to their tower) but it keeps being delayed, was supposed to be October, then before Christmas, now it's before end of Q1.

I'm 1km from the fibre rollout :mad:

Maybe check with neighbours what provider they use to see if its any better?

Yeah we've checked with Regional (as well as Wicklow Broadband and Permanet) and they don't cover the area the house is in at all. My parents use a similar setup though with Imagine and their speeds vary from 20-70!

Unfortunately mobile broadband is our only option right now.

smuggler.ie

adocholiday wrote: »

...but the current occupier said that they use Vodafone broadband and the connection is patchy and speeds are poor....

Is this "Vodafone broadband" over eircom phone line or "Vodafone Mobile broadband" he is using?

Potentially, with external antenna, you should be getting same/better. Depending on router/modem location(external antenna cable should not exceed 5m as signal will degrade over length) you might need to install switch(for LAN connections), and/or WiFi AP/extender to cover house with wireless. but this all after you get decent signal and speed.
Setting 4G broadband might not be as straight forward as you would like, especially in rural area.
If willing to do yourself start reading "how to" - plenty of it here on board.ie.
Check this out - editorsean - one of the members here and there is many many more folks.
You could look for someone to hire with experience and proper equipment to survey site for you, recommend ISP, modem and antenna.

adocholiday

smuggler.ie wrote: »

Is this "Vodafone broadband" over eircom phone line or "Vodafone Mobile broadband" he is using?

Potentially, with external antenna, you should be getting same/better. Depending on router/modem location(external antenna cable should not exceed 5m as signal will degrade over length) you might need to install switch(for LAN connections), and/or WiFi AP/extender to cover house with wireless. but this all after you get decent signal and speed.
Setting 4G broadband might not be as straight forward as you would like, especially in rural area.
If willing to do yourself start reading "how to" - plenty of it here on board.ie.
Check this out - editorsean - one of the members here and there is many many more folks.
You could look for someone to hire with experience and proper equipment to survey site for you, recommend ISP, modem and antenna.

Thanks Smuggler much appreciated.

The current occupier is using Vodafone Mobile broadband, but I don't know what kind of modem he's using, if it's a 3G or 4G connection, if any kind of testing was done for router placement in the house etc.

I'd be happy to pay someone to do the investigation for us, but the problem is that we'd ideally like to know even the potential before placing a bid on the house. We can't do any sort of 'on-site' testing until the Estate Agent is happy that we're serious about buying the place, so all we've been able to do is test the 4G signal at the gate of the property with our mobile phones.

The way I see it working is to get an antenna on site and wire it to the house with a switch then to allow 1 or 2 wired connections in the study for my computer. I'd want WiFi too for general coverage in the house, mainly for netflix streaming and general internet browsing.

If we could do that and get speeds of 8-10Mbps on the wired connection I'd be more than happy.

smuggler.ie

Go to ComReg SiteViewer web page, navigate to your house location on the map, check for nearest mast's in the area for service(click on mast indicator, on left pane look for ISP and services - LTE=4G, UMTS=3G, GSM=2G). This way you can check if service available from other ISP's.
As closer mast is to your (new)home the better chances to get good signal. You looking for masts in range up to 5 km for best signal. Note mast location - you will need to point you antenna towards it or set router in the room facing that direction, in case without external antenna
Of course you have to take in consideration other factors, like terrain, buildings, trees for signal and population in the area for potential congestion on mast.
Placing antenna as high as possible would help to overcome terrain/obstruction, but you won't be able to beat congestion("quite" area might become to quite if you go massacre )

Internal network layout will depend on how is the house wired currently(if any) and/or how much you ready to put in to it - renovation? - with proper planing you have almost unlimited possibilities.

Where i can not give you 100% assurance for mobile broadband stability, to me it sounds very doable with your current signal on the mobile phone.

adocholiday

Thanks again Smuggler.

According to the ComReg map there the Three network has by far the most masts within a 5km radius but the 2 closest to the house are an Eir LTE/GSM mast (2km) and a Vodafone UMTS mast (2.5km). The Vodafone mast would have the cleaner line of sight for sure. There's a forest between the house and the eir mast. There doesn't appear to be another Vodafone mast in the area, but I had a 3 bar signal with Vodafone 4G yesterday on the phone with a 10Mb download speed.

This is all great to know and gives me a lot of confidence. Also the person who currently owns the house is an electrician who completely renovated it including rewiring in 2012 so I'm hoping it will be relatively easy to do what needs to be done.

adm

If you do end up getting the house :
I would not advise using 3.
I was with them for years and last year they started traffic shaping- where they prioritise certain services (youtube, netflix)

The speed was ok during the day but would drop off a cliff at 6pm due to this.

I would also not go with Eir because it's Eir

You can try all I guess but Vodafone has the best reputation.

smuggler.ie

adocholiday wrote: »

.... and a Vodafone UMTS mast (2.5km). The Vodafone mast would have the cleaner line of sight for sure.... .... There doesn't appear to be another Vodafone mast in the area, but I had a 3 bar signal with Vodafone 4G yesterday on the phone with a 10Mb download speed.

I think UMTS = 3G, most 3,5G
I only could guess but you either connecting to further mast or Comreg site not up to date. You could call Vodafone support and ask them to confirm(not sure if they would) cell ID you connected on the spot.

ED E

Do you work for the months of the school holidays? Enjoy going to the coffee shop to use their wifi for that period if so.


I say don't buy. Demand goes up, sectors get retargeted, caps get increased, some NIMBY objects to a 10yr mast and gets it taken down. Relying on the MNOs to supply you isn't a scenario to get yourself into.

babelfish1990

Don't buy a house in Wicklow if it is not on eir's Fibre rollout map. You will only regret it. Even if Mobile Broadband is ok now, there is no way it will be able to handle 4K video streaming when everyone has it in a couple of years. The mobile operators will have to either throttle these services or charge exorbitant fees for data.

There are houses all over Wicklow in nice places on eir's fibre rollout map for 2018. You should make a point of buying one of these. The market probably hasn't yet realized the value of Fibre-to-the-home. You might get a house with FTTH for much the same price as one without. When the market realizes the importance of this in a few years, your house in an FTTH area will be worth a lot more than one which only has wireless access. The Government rural scheme will likely never happen, and if it does it probably won't be fibre. These Government backed schemes have failed in several other countries.

I too am considering buying a property here, and I am certainly going to go for an FTTH location. Wicklow looks very appealing because it has much more FTTH than Dublin, and the property prices are more reasonable.

adocholiday

Thanks all. Very disappointing to read that but I can completely see the point. Honestly right now I couldn't care less about 4k and even 1080p streaming is of little interest to me. But if and when that becomes the norm we don't want to be left behind and your point about house values is something I hadn't considered.

The primary reason for our Internet needs is for telecommuting, for which 10Mbps would be more than enough. But the long term implications of not having a stable broadband connection has to be considered and with the mobile operators as inconsistent as they are, this leaves us in a predicament.

Lots to consider here I think.

babelfish1990

adocholiday wrote: »

Thanks all. Very disappointing to read that but I can completely see the point. Honestly right now I couldn't care less about 4k and even 1080p streaming is of little interest to me. But if and when that becomes the norm we don't want to be left behind and your point about house values is something I hadn't considered.

The primary reason for our Internet needs is for telecommuting, for which 10Mbps would be more than enough. But the long term implications of not having a stable broadband connection has to be considered and with the mobile operators as inconsistent as they are, this leaves us in a predicament.

Lots to consider here I think.

Even though your demands are modest and you may not be interested in 4K, others in your area may clog up mobile/wireless broadband, reducing your available bandwidth at peak times. Wireless is totally contended, and has no means of reserving bandwidth specifically for frugal users!

Marlow

Whizzy ( https://wi.ie/ ) would also be an option in Wicklow, depending on where the property is.

3G/4G is never going to be reliable, because the contention is unknown/unmanaged. Anyone can move around at any given time and if they're all in your cell, then you're scoopered. With fixed wireless or wired providers, at least the contention is managed .. (if they're serious about their business)

So if 3G/4G is your only option, then the there is no option. It's not a broadband replacement if you depend on broadband.

/M