Broadband in Athy

pillaud

Hi,

Can anyone explain to me why Broadband is available in Athy Co Kildare but not in my area of Athy. The Ardrew exchange is not switched on is the answer I got from eircom broadband sales. But this is a new housing estate just built. You would think that Eircom Would have installed up to date equipment for this area when it was being built. Eircom have no date as to when they can have this done. :eek: :eek:

cgarvey

Athy probably has a main exchange (serving old existing areas of the town), with new small exchanges for fringe areas. Unfortunately it'll be sometime before all small exchanges are enabled. They're a business, they have return on investment to be worried about. It's the same reason very few rurual exchanges are enabled. I've not heard of the Andrew exchange, so I can't say for sure, maybe someone here with better local knowledge might be better able to advise you.

What exchange do you get when you enter your number in eircom DSL Trigger site? Anyone else in your area got DSL? Know of any local wireless broadband suppliers?

.cg

AndrewMc

Welcome to the area! You probably live around the corner from me

History: The housing estate was planned in early 2001, and the first house completed by October of that year. According to the builders Eircom would have known how many houses were to be built right from that point. For the first number of houses (100, maybe more) they were serviced from an existing exchange. Then around September/October 2003 they ran out of lines. After much arguing with them, and with IrelandOffline getting me some prime national radio time to whinge my case, the Ardrew exchange was grudgingly installed in December 2004.

Apparently the Ardrew exchange is considered very small indeed. However, the fact that it is within the Athy Urban District means that it should be enabled since Eircom "completed the roll-out of broadband to all towns" in March, so they say. For anyone else listening, Ardrew is only 500 metresish (as the crow flies) from the very centre of the town.

Without a gun to their head, Eircom don't care about anybody. Both the regulator and minister are useless (would it be true to say he's done more about postcodes than broadband?), so at the moment my best bet in the reasonably near future is to bypass Eircom entirely.

On the plus side, Torque Broadband (wireless) have been claiming they'll be moving into Athy some time soon. Being small, they probably want some firm orders before they commit themselves, but I'm thinking I might just do that next month. Digiweb and IBB(!) are just down the road in Carlow, and Clearwire's nearest point is Naas.

pillaud

Thank you for the informative reply AndrewMc. At least now I know I’m not alone in my frustration with Eircom. I will defiantly be checking out some of your suggestions for an alternative broadband supplier.

pillaud

Hi CGarvey. I tried DSL Trigger and apparently my number does not exist. And I should contact eircom. Strange they gave me the phone number. I wouldn't really call that good business. Hopefully they will think my bills don't exist aswell.

smokingman

I've just moved to Athy and was wondering if any of you fellow boardsies use wireless broadband around the fringes of the town?

I'm looking for the holy grail of low contention rates as herself works from home (lucky sod!) and needs a solid VPN connection without having to reconnect every ten minutes.

Of course, I want the low contention rates for my DS and Wii so that's why I'm taking this search on.



Any help would be very much appreciated.

Sponge Bob

digiweb metro , see

http://www.digiweb.ie/broadband_metro_index.asp