Magnet Networks Trial

Drapper · 18-08-2005 4:52pm

nicamuke wrote:

I live in one of the devlopments with Magnet infrastructure. The fiber comes into the hall and plugs into a switch . It's CAT5 from there to the outlets.

tell me more tell me more?

BTW there is a development in Portloiase with Magnet too (using the MAN)! Pillar outside the development with switch gear and cat 5e in all houses!

nicamuke · 18-08-2005 5:03pm

I've got Tv, BB and Telebone. It's cool, I can plug my Laptop into any outlet in the house, same goes for my phone and set top box. The BB connection is 2mb uncontended and has been bullet proof for the last 6 months, It's so fast I've downloaded stuff before I click the mouse.
I saw an add on the Tv3 about a development in portlaoise, think it's called fairview or fairgreen or something, magnet as supposedly in there too..

Marcopolo85 · 18-08-2005 5:35pm

Fungus wrote:

Thier Channnel line up is dire. ( http://www.magnet.ie/television.aspx ). For a digital TV package to only include 20 stations is poor. Me sticks with NTL Digital.

Looks fairly standard alright. Just an analogue tier broadcast in Digital format.

bk · 18-08-2005 5:44pm

loyatemu wrote:

similar offering in london described here - not using fibre.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,1546147,00.html

Yes, it can be done, however it just doesn't scale as well as FTTH or cable.

1) It is only capable of transmitting Standard Definition TV, it won't be able to do High Definition. Sky and the cable companies are expected to roll out HD next year, this will be a major problem for HomeChoice.

2) You can only get/watch one channel at a time. You can't have multiple TV's in your house or record one channel while watching another!! This is a basic feature of Sky, cable and DTT and it is a major problem for HC.

Take my house for instance, we have 3 NTL digital boxes (rented house) and two analogue conenctions for PVRs (Tivo and MyTV). This flexibilty simply isn't possible with IPTV over DSL.

I have no doubt Eircom will try to do this at some stage (or alternatively package with Sky or DTT) as NTL becomes more competitive with their triple play service. They planned to do this years ago when they were going to first launch DSL, however the technology just wasn't mature and it still isn't very scalable without FFTH or FTTC.

bk · 18-08-2005 5:52pm

Marcopolo85 wrote:

I would point out, though, that this is Ireland. How many people are prepared to pay a premium for VoD? It would be interesting to see how many Sky subs actually avail of Sky Box Office? I was talking to someone recently who was in a house where Sky had been installed for a few weeks. They were still renting DVDs from Xtravision!!

Yes, but this is likely to slowly change as people get use to it. Two points which hold it back at the moment.

1) At the moment the films tend to be limited and come out much later after they are released in xtra-vision. This will likely change in time as the content industry gets more use to this new technology and see the advantages to it.

2) Sky isn't true VoD, it is Near VoD, it isn't as convenient as VoD or DVD's as you can't pause it, rewind it etc.

Colleagues of mine have proper VoD in the US with Comcast cable. All new DVD releases are on it and when you rent a movie you can re-watch it multiple times, pause, rewind, fast forward over the 24 hour rental period. It has superb picture and sound quality also. They love it and never rent DVD's anymore. This is because it is done properly there, we will get it like that here eventually.

paulm17781 · 18-08-2005 8:08pm

bk wrote:

1) It is only capable of transmitting Standard Definition TV, it won't be able to do High Definition.

NTL UK were talking of doing HDTV using VDSL. How well would that work?

TomTom · 18-08-2005 8:14pm

Fungus wrote:

Thier Channnel line up is dire. ( http://www.magnet.ie/television.aspx ). For a digital TV package to only include 20 stations is poor. Me sticks with NTL Digital.

I was told it would be 65 channels, in digital. maybe they just don't have the full line up on the website.

flamegrill · 18-08-2005 10:04pm

Tomtom - i think the trial only has 10 channels ...

TomTom · 18-08-2005 10:29pm

The letter says 65, plus video on demand. They called me tonight, they are coming out on Monday evening.

Sponge Bob · 18-08-2005 10:40pm

paulm17781 wrote:

NTL UK were talking of doing HDTV using VDSL. How well would that work?

VDSL is much faster than ADSL2 and the copper portion of the run in the UK is typically 1km or less , NTL 'rediscovered' their copper pairs recently

The reason they will run VoD over VDSL and not over Cable BB is because there are too many seriously hacked Cable boxes out there in the UK .

bk · 19-08-2005 1:16am

paulm17781 wrote:

NTL UK were talking of doing HDTV using VDSL. How well would that work?

Actually they are using ADSL2+ to start with and upgrading to VDSL in the future.

However there are some significant differences compared to regular BB due to a different network setup.

When NTL in the UK install a cable connection, they also install their own telephone twisted pair copper cable. This is completely separate from BT's network. This network is very new and very advanced. NTL UK have a fiber-coax setup. This means that they run fiber to your local node. Most people are within 1km of their node, the coax is better shielded, newer and of a better quality then most of BT's network and there aren't any splitters on it. NTL's network is almost a Fiber To The Curb network I was talking about earlier.

Therefore they will be able to get closer to the theoritical maximum speeds (ADSL2+ = 24Mbit/s, VDSL = 52Mbit/s) then on regular telephone lines, so it should (and does) work very well. I've heard they have gotten 18Mbit/s using ADSL2+ in trials without any problem. This would allow for about 4 SD feeds or 2 HD feeds. Of course they only need those feeds for VoD, not for TV, unlike what Eircom/BT would need.

BTW I don't think the NTL Dublin network has the twisted pair copper wires, so this won't be possible here. However they will be able to use the cable modem standard DOCSIS 3, which should allow for shared sppeds of up to 160Mbit/s.

flamegrill · 24-08-2005 8:17am

tomtom

did the install go ahead on monday or what??? :_) is it any good?

Paul

TomTom · 24-08-2005 10:38am

Sorry I forgot to get back to ye. They did a survey on monday as they are waiting for Eircom to unbundle. They hope to be able to install next week, thats if eircom don't hold it up.

flamegrill · 24-08-2005 12:41pm

sure keep us posted

Paul

TomTom · 24-08-2005 7:54pm

will do, the guy that came to do the survey was sound. They will try to accommodate you as best they can with the fitting inside.

Ronin · 25-08-2005 10:48am

you should be able to find the details on their website at

http://www.magnet.ie/trial.htm

P

Sponge Bob · 25-08-2005 10:50am

or here

http://www.magnet.ie/details.htm

10 TV channels
(RTE 1 RTE2, TV3, TG4, C4, UTV, Setanta, Smash Hits, Cartoon Network, CNN).

4Mb/256kb mega-speed broadband internet with a 50GB usage allowance.
(Usage over 50GB will be billed at €0.50 per GB)

Unlimited free local and national telephone calls.

TomTom · 25-08-2005 11:30am

Ronin wrote:

you should be able to find the details on their website at

http://www.magnet.ie/trial.htm

P

Details there differ slightly from the letter i recieved. The letter states 65 tv channels. but hey, its a trial and its free so i won't complain.

paulm17781 · 25-08-2005 11:49am

I'm elligialbe. Not sure if I'm bothered though. I'm quite happy with NTL/Blueface. Unless people can give me reasons to be bothered...

TomTom · 25-08-2005 12:06pm

paulm17781 wrote:

I'm elligialbe. Not sure if I'm bothered though. I'm quite happy with NTL/Blueface. Unless people can give me reasons to be bothered...

It's a free trial....
No obligation

paulm17781 · 25-08-2005 1:40pm

TomTom wrote:

It's a free trial....
No obligation

When you put it that way...

The only thing is my TV is far from my phone.

Mutant_Fruit · 25-08-2005 1:49pm

(Usage over 50GB will be billed at €0.50 per GB)

Finally, a realistic charge for going over the cap! I'd have no trouble getting that service even though its capped, because if i went over by 1 gig, i wouldn't end up €30 in debt. They'd have to be more reliable than IBB.

TomTom · 25-08-2005 2:32pm

paulm17781 wrote:

When you put it that way...

The only thing is my TV is far from my phone.

I'm in a handy situation as tv and computer are right beside each other with the phone socket in between. I don't care where the phone base goes as the phone is cordless.

Also the guy who did the survey said they try to accommodate as much as possible. They use sticky back trunking but this stuff will take off paint if left on for months. They fit everything.
It would be worth applying and getting the survey done if anything.

bk · 25-08-2005 2:40pm

paulm17781 wrote:

I'm elligialbe. Not sure if I'm bothered though. I'm quite happy with NTL/Blueface. Unless people can give me reasons to be bothered...

A few things to remember:

1) They have far fewer channels then NTL.
2) While I don't know this for fact, it is likely that you will only be able to recieve one TV channel at a time. So you won't be able to record one channel while watching another and you won't be able to get a second TV, etc.

paulm17781 · 25-08-2005 5:07pm

bk wrote:

A few things to remember:

1) They have far fewer channels then NTL.
2) While I don't know this for fact, it is likely that you will only be able to recieve one TV channel at a time. So you won't be able to record one channel while watching another and you won't be able to get a second TV, etc.

I'm quite happy with my current set up. It's just a free trial sounds nice. Can anyone see this service being superior to NTL and how?

Magnet Networks Trial

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