Eir rural FTTH thread II

BandMember

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

That is a good point. I wonder how many people have it available but are unaware. I know eir used to send letters to homes that were passed but I don't know if they are still doing that.

I know when Eir went live in my area (albeit FTTC) there was absolutely no advertising whatsoever, either in advance or when it went live, it was all down to a few tech minded people following the roll out and then word of mouth when it went live that others in the area became aware that it was available.

If that's the approach they are taking, they can hardly complain when there's such a low uptake....

MBSnr

BandMember wrote: »

I know when Eir went live in my area (albeit FTTC) there was absolutely no advertising whatsoever, either in advance or when it went live, it was all down to a few tech minded people following the roll out and then word of mouth when it went live that others in the area became aware that it was available.

If that's the approach they are taking, they can hardly complain when there's such a low uptake....

Round our area there are/were Airwire posters on poles, a Westnet flyer in each mailbox and a visit from the Eir sales rep. Not sure how many that rep converted to actual orders. A few further neighbours are with Vodafone/Sky and may become aware of FTTH since Sky/Vodafone are now beginning to offer this product. I believe these people just aren't aware that there are other companies other than Eir/Vodafone that can supply the same service with better customer service/pricing.

Johnboy1951

BandMember wrote: »

I know when Eir went live in my area (albeit FTTC) there was absolutely no advertising whatsoever, either in advance or when it went live, it was all down to a few tech minded people following the roll out and then word of mouth when it went live that others in the area became aware that it was available.

If that's the approach they are taking, they can hardly complain when there's such a low uptake....

I doubt they are complaining about the take-up at present.

There is no shortage of installation work for all those available to do it.

It is likely to be advantageous that the take up is progressing a little slowly.

It provides time to get experience and work through the problems instead of being overwhelmed.

tuxy

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

That is a good point. I wonder how many people have it available but are unaware. I know eir used to send letters to homes that were passed but I don't know if they are still doing that.

The only letter I ever got like that was telling me VDSL was available, well they called it eir fibre.
I then them every once in a while to see when I could get it. About 16 months after the letter it went live, I then had the option of 12 mbit vdsl to replace my 15 mbit adsl. I knew all along it was going to be VDSL from the exchange which is over a kilometre away so I didn't have my hopes up.

fritzelly

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

It is likely to be advantageous that the take up is progressing a little slowly.

It provides time to get experience and work through the problems instead of being overwhelmed.

Pretty much this - a lot of areas new customers are the guinea pigs for things going wrong.

9726_9726

Plus - if they have a cash-burn of €180 on the install (€450 - €270), they might be happy to rate-limit the uptake in the first year or two.

shigllgetcha

So eirs duct was unblocked today. Rope inplace and all. Delighted

Was reported 4th sept and fixed today 20th sept. Little over two weeks which is great.

Just back from france and in dubai week after next so might try ringing eir connections tomorrow and see if i can rebook for next week install

Plugged my xbox back in and 20gb of updates thatll take 12 hours. Wont miss that

tsue921i8wljb3

Junior wrote: »

So is there anywhere reliable for Joe Soap to check for updates ?

Sorry. I missed this. No, unfortunately there is no way of keeping up to date bar checking your Eircode on the Airwire checker which is updated regularly.

medoc

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

That is a good point. I wonder how many people have it available but are unaware. I know eir used to send letters to homes that were passed but I don't know if they are still doing that.

In two separate areas near here (Offaly) where they have passed, it’s at least half the premises tgat now have a second wire heading overhead into the house. I can’t be sure but there’s a few with one wire overhead that had nothing a few months ago. Lots of rural people who really need/want good broadband are already in contracts etc. I’d say the take up would be higher than 20%.

I know I bloody can’t wair till it hit my exchange.

tuxy

My area which is 1km from town has a cluster of houses, out of 11 houses and one business myself and one neighbour has it installed. I don't think small sample sizes give any real insight.

oscarBravo

My cul-de-sac has five houses on it. Three have FTTH installed, and I'm still waiting for mine (needs some digging on the open eir side).

BandMember

Johnboy1951 wrote: »

I doubt they are complaining about the take-up at present.

There is no shortage of installation work for all those available to do it.

It is likely to be advantageous that the take up is progressing a little slowly.

It provides time to get experience and work through the problems instead of being overwhelmed.

Oh, I know that and you're absolutely spot on - but the truth like that wouldn't help their PR about unprofitable areas and how they are losing money hand over fist and doing it out of the goodness of their heart blah blah blah.........you know?

The Cush

I see from that committee discussion with eir wireless is again been seen as an option for those difficult to reach areas

Deputy Brian Stanley: I asked three questions about fibre in the home and how realistic it is.

Ms Carolan Lennon: fibre to the home is absolutely the best longer-term solution. It involves 450,000 homes but it is across 90% of the geography, and one does not want to do it twice. fibre to the home provides a long-term solution. Even though most of us do not have laptops today that can take a gigabyte, in the future we will, and once one has that connection one can take advantage of it. The ambition of the Department is right but it will probably be too difficult in the last 10% or 15%, based on where the premises are. Much progress may be made quickly on the 90% but the other 10% will be difficult and expensive. It might be an opportunity to see if there are other solutions that might work to deliver it there.

Deputy Brian Stanley: Could wireless be used in those places?

Ms Carolan Lennon: Yes, we will test some fixed wireless solutions later this year to see how they compare with fixed broadband. We will also do some trials of 5G in the second half of 2019. We are not looking at voice or handsets yet rather what can be done with data and what the equivalent is. The challenge with mobile and wireless is that it is not a direct connection into the home. If a number of homes are using it, therefore, there is some contagion at the edge but for the outer rim, the last 10% or 15%, it might make much more sense. The speed will certainly be quicker. As I said, we have led the hard way to the 300,000, but it takes time to get out there and to roll out those networks.

https://www.oireachtas.ie/en/debates/debate/joint_committee_on_communications_climate_action_and_environment/2018-09-18/

tsue921i8wljb3

The Cush wrote: »

I see from that committee discussion with eir wireless is again been seen as an option for those difficult to reach areas

I did not take from what she said that it was anything to do with the NBP. enet have their own wireless division in Airspeed anyway. It struck me as odd that they would even be testing wireless solutions unless they have some vision of undermining the NBP process yet again.

The Cush

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

It struck me as odd that they would even be testing wireless solutions unless they have some vision of undermining the NBP process yet again.

Yes, same here, when I was listening to her I wondered what that was about. They have a sizeable chunk of fixed wireless spectrum, 3.6 GHz band, sublet for the hard to reach 10-15%?

tsue921i8wljb3

The Cush wrote: »

Yes, same here, when I was listening to her I wondered what that was about. They have a sizeable chunk of fixed wireless spectrum, 3.6 GHz band, sublet for the hard to reach 10-15%?

You could be right. Although if they were subletting spectrum would they be concerned about testing technology? I would have thought that it would be up to whoever was subletting to deploy whatever solutions they wanted.

It might be a bit far fetched but I hope we don't have another announcement in a few months about eir deploying a wireless solution for hard to reach rural areas.

I don't particularly trust them when they say that they are happy for the NBP to go ahead.

oscarBravo

I'm blue in the face making this point, but anyone who thinks the last few houses that are difficult to get fibre to will magically be easy to connect wirelessly needs to get outside the Pale and actually go looking for those houses. Ideally with a mobile phone in hand.

tsue921i8wljb3

oscarBravo wrote: »

I'm blue in the face making this point, but anyone who thinks the last few houses that are difficult to get fibre to will magically be easy to connect wirelessly needs to get outside the Pale and actually go looking for those houses. Ideally with a mobile phone in hand.

Have you any idea why eir might be testing FWA technology? It seems an odd proposition with them having gone all-in with fibre.

Marlow

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

Have you any idea why eir might be testing FWA technology? It seems an odd proposition with them having gone all-in with fibre.

Eircom had a Wimax trial years ago, they connected a bunch of premises .... i know somebody in Co. Offaly, that had Eircom Wimax for years ... and abandoned it all again. It was switched off eventually.

I don't see any way whatsoever, that they're going to go down that route. At all. Alone managing a FWA network at that scale is outside of the scope of what they can handle. And the cost/benefit of doing so would also be neither here nor there for them. Sure, even the sheer amount of FTTC cabinets to manage is already a can of worms, I bet they've regretted to have opened.

Eircoms NOC used to be a very small, under-staffed and over worked team. That won't have changed much.

/M

oscarBravo

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

Have you any idea why eir might be testing FWA technology? It seems an odd proposition with them having gone all-in with fibre.

They've a chunk of 3.6GHz spectrum that doesn't make much sense for anything except FWA, and the licence conditions require that they actually use it.

There's also the fact of the relatively low FTTH uptake, which is in part explained by the fact that it's a relatively premium product. Even with widespread FTTH, they may see a market for a more entry-level broadband offering.

The Cush

Does anyone here remember a discussion that we had here about testing kerb-side wireless as the last link to the home, mentioned by Minister Naughten maybe last year, we never heard anything after that?

tsue921i8wljb3

Marlow wrote: »

Eircom had a Wimax trial years ago, they connected a bunch of premises .... i know somebody in Co. Offaly, that had Eircom Wimax for years ... and abandoned it all again. It was switched off eventually.

I don't see any way whatsoever, that they're going to go down that route. At all. Alone managing a FWA network at that scale is outside of the scope of what they can handle. And the cost/benefit of doing so would also be neither here nor there for them. Sure, even the sheer amount of FTTC cabinets to manage is already a can of worms, I bet they've regretted to have opened.

Eircoms NOC used to be a very small, under-staffed and over worked team. That won't have changed much.

/M

Well she definitely said that they will be testing FWA products later in the year. I doubt they are doing testing for the fun of it.

Marlow

The Cush wrote: »

Does anyone here remember a discussion that we had here about testing kerb-side wireless as the last link to the home, mentioned by Minister Naughten maybe last year, we never heard anything after that?

That's where 5G aims at. It can't improve over 4G on distance, but it's the exact application that it's intended for.

Short distance, kerb side installation and high bandwidth.

/M

Marlow

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

Well she definitely said that they will be testing FWA products later in the year. I doubt they are doing testing for the fun of it.

If they're of any kind of the quality, what they've provided in the past .. talking about the wireless USO phone installations and their old abandoned WiMax trial ... then I see that going nowhere.

My bet is, that it's purely a task to keep their 3.6 GHz nationwide license. As an asset.

/M

tsue921i8wljb3

The Cush wrote: »

Does anyone here remember a discussion that we had here about testing kerb-side wireless as the last link to the home, mentioned by Minister Naughten maybe last year, we never heard anything after that?

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=106849823&postcount=4553

He talked about it in an urban setting where according to him the dearest part is from the pole to the door despite there not being many poles in urban areas.

The Cush

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=106849823&postcount=4553

He talked about it in an urban setting where according to him the dearest part is from the pole to the door despite there not being many poles in urban areas.

There was something else from last year mentioned by the Minister, could've been Huawei related, gate-side/kerb-side wireless testing?


Found it - https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=104873453#post104873453

Denis Naughten: ... Why I have said that the scheme will be predominantly fibre is as follows. The only way to future-proof the network for 25 years is to roll out fibre. There is no way to future-proof it for 25 years except by using fibre. I suspect the majority of the 342,000 homes will be a fibre solution, but technology is changing. In fact, in one particular town a process is being piloted that involves fibre to the gate and a wireless connection into the home. That means the last 50 metres or 100 metres connection would use new wireless technology. To answer the Deputy's question, I expect that well over half the 342,000 homes would have pure fibre outside their gates.

https://www.kildarestreet.com/committees/?id=2017-09-27a.238#g341

tsue921i8wljb3

The Cush wrote: »

There was something else from last year mentioned by the Minister, could've been Huawei related, gate-side/kerb-side wireless testing?

From your good self! As you say there has not been much more said about it.

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=104912701&postcount=3155

The Cush

Dominique Loud Waistband wrote: »

From your good self! As you say there has not been much more said about it.

https://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=104912701&postcount=3155

Thanks, originally posted by KOR101, link in edit above.

Peppa Cig

Hi all,

The topic surrounding true unlimited with absolutely no usage caps via Eir new contracts was discussed back in July.

There was some discussion/debate on if they were providing this promise.

My Eir FTTH contract has expired. Is it now totally unlimited FUP for a new contract i.e 1TB cap abolished?

Any other providers stepped up with same offering?

Thanks

Gonzo

Peppa Cig wrote: »

Hi all,

The topic surrounding true unlimited with absolutely no usage caps via Eir new contracts was discussed back in July.

There was some discussion/debate on if they were providing this promise.

My Eir FTTH contract has expired. Is it now totally unlimited FUP for a new contract i.e 1TB cap abolished?

Any other providers stepped up with same offering?

Thanks

No you still have the 1tb cap in place. Eir will not give unlimited to any current customers unless they ring and upgrade their plan by taking out another contract AND adding an extra service such as a mobile phone plan.

Plenty of annoyed current customers on the Eir forum. Not sure anyone has been successful in changing to unlimited without taking on some extra service. https://www.boards.ie/ttfthread/2057895884