broadband in holland

Sam Vimes

i was in amsterdam a few weeks ago and saw the prices of broadband there. i didn't take the picture properly but look at them here:




the top one which i didnt get in the pic is 10 megabit bb for €24.95. i nearly cried

Drapper

cool I'm moving !

dude .................. this is broadband porn we will never get this in Ireland

Sam Vimes

Drapper wrote:

broadband porn

lol

zuma

I marvel at the monopoly that eircom can still posess in Ireland!!!

Speaks wonders for our government...dont you think?

1huge1

ya i dont like eircom for the way they screw us but do you honestly think any of the rest wouldnt if they had the market share eircom have
at least there losing market share fast
to much competition for them to keep such a high market share

zuma

A competent regulator(what is that???) would also work wonders!!!

Or is the "Irish solution for an Irish problem" just to grin and bear it?

joplin

I wonder why any newspapers in this country won't write about the eircom monopoly that they still try to cling on to and make it as difficult as possible for people to switch over. I switched over to Smart, took over two weeks to get connected and I was told that I was lucky that that was quick. Well, it shoudln't even take that long if Eircom wouldn't f**k up eveything. I hate them and I told them that I will never ever have anyting to do with them. I cancelled my direct debit and what did I get, a letter with a new direct debit mandate. HA HA HA. Like I would pay them when I do have a new AND cheaper ISP that actually HAVE a customer service. I have nevr had to wait for hours on hold when ringing Smart. Hope that something really bad happens to eirocom and fast= all customers leaving for better and cheaper companies. That would make my day!

White Rabbit

Why shouldn't Eircom try to maximise it's profits?

It is up the competition to organise a better offer or, in the event of a monopoly, the government to act to rectify it.

Eircom is doing it's job, that is to serve it's shareholders. Nothing more.

Tom Dunne

It's the absence of a proper regulator that limits the competition, government need to give it the powers to level the playing field.

Eircom own the exchanges - how can competitors provide a better service if they have to beg Eircom for access to their lines? There are documented cases of Eircoms frustrating Smart telecom at every turn and there's not a whole lot Smart can do, apart from bringing Eircom to court. Meanwhile, Eircom continues creaming off profits and Smart lose money paying large legal fees.

And it's not just Smart. Ask a BT rep what they think of Eircom's practices.

nadir

I lived in Utrecht in Holland for nearly 2 years, about 2 years ago at this stage, we had a connection with wanadoo, cable-modem, but it was quite expensive, 45 euro a month for a one Meg line, looks like its improved now.

But The service was great, You got 1 Meg minimum, and depending on the usage on the line I guess you would get way more, up to 3 Meg.
Quite the oposite to now, I have a 2 Meg connection with IBB and it's pretty aweful I must say, 35 K average.
Contention certainly was never mentioned in Holland.

[V3]

nadir wrote:

Contention certainly was never mentioned in Holland.

Personally I think "contention" are used by ISP providers so that they can screw us over by not providing the service which they were meant to, especially the likes of IBB.

Capt'n Midnight

Drapper wrote:

cool I'm moving !

dude .................. this is broadband porn we will never get this in Ireland

If you were in Holland you could get the real thing too.

The one on the left - what's with the free phone - does it refer to calls or handset or rental ?

tiscali - less than a tenner for 992/320 KB
what is line rental over there - can you get naked ADSL like in germany ?

OfflerCrocGod

joplin wrote:

I wonder why any newspapers in this country won't write about the eircom monopoly that they still try to cling on to and make it as difficult as possible for people to switch over.

Owners have large numbers of shares in both concerns........it's a lovely deal they have. It's ****ing Ireland over in terms of our competitiveness so it's going to have a large negative effect on the whole country in the future unless some drastic measures are taken.......bollox it really angers me.

Snowball

Have a friend in Sweden. he was explaining that Along with Sweden some of the other courtiers around there have adopted similar policies and was surprised we had nothing like it.
The government installed a Fibre network around the main cities and told the ISP's to go ahead for free. All funded by the taxes. Now ISP's don’t have to expend all that investment into building a network so the competition is tight

Goodshape

Spent a year in Prague and had a 2mb cable connection included in the rent (~€55/month... that's rent and all bills, including the broadband).

The horrible thing is that you can still look at what's been done in this country over the past couple of years and say that "we're making progress".

Won't somebody think of the children? Seriously.

Tom Dunne

Snowball wrote:

The government installed a Fibre network around the main cities and told the ISP's to go ahead for free. All funded by the taxes. Now ISP's don’t have to expend all that investment into building a network so the competition is tight

Wouldn't it be great if the government here installed a fibre network around the major towns and cities?

Oh wait, they already have! How many ISP's are using it? I am sure you can count it on two fingers.

nadir

aye, it's pathetic. No one knows any better though, people are just ignorant that we are being ripped off, as far as I can see nothing is being done.

joplin

I've had broadband in Germany. Can't remember how much I paid for it but for sure it was a lot less than here. The connection was excellent and it was UNLIMITED downloading! Smart is supposed to be "unlimited" as well but how unlimited is it really? Anybody got any experience of Smart putting a restriction?
Something that was good in germany as well was that they have "pre-dial" numbers. There is a website that updates on a daily basis the cheapest call rates. You would still pay the bill to Deutsche telecom but thanks to the pre-dial numbers (other telecom companies) it was a lot less. But then again, with Skype nowadays it's even cheaper. Skype has got to be one of the best inventiions for a while.