NTL to increase speed

HarryHoudini

I received a call yesterday saying that they needed to come out to the house and replace my cable modem, which they did today.
I think I was one of the first few hundread to get NTL when it first launched so I had this old terrayon modem.

Anyway the guy said that the reason for replacing it was that they are planning on upgrading the speeds to 5Mb and 8Mb sometime in the near future, and that the old modems couldn't handle them speeds.

I asked him about prices and that kind of thing but he wasnt too sure.

sinjin_smythe

Fingers crossed

CrimE

Hope this happens. Im so glad my bt contract is up soon

Tony

i just got NTL in as IBB was so bad so this is good news.

paulm17781

When I got NTL installed (1.5 mb) I was told by the engineer that they would be doubling speeds. He was right...

Gonzo

hopefully if this turns out to be true then eircom will get the finger out and increase us properly in both directions next time around.

OfflerCrocGod

Gonzo wrote:

hopefully if this turns out to be true then eircom will get the finger out and increase us properly in both directions next time around.

Lol, eircom don't care about NTL they don't really have a large enough footprint to worry eircom - still it does seem as if eircom are thinking about speed increases; about bloody time to :mad:

Stimpyone

OfflerCrocGod wrote:

Lol, eircom don't care about NTL they don't really have a large enough footprint to worry eircom - still it does seem as if eircom are thinking about speed increases; about bloody time to :mad:

What makes you think Eircom are increasing speeds?, what have you heard?

bk

OfflerCrocGod wrote:

Lol, eircom don't care about NTL they don't really have a large enough footprint to worry eircom - still it does seem as if eircom are thinking about speed increases; about bloody time to :mad:

On the contrary, Eircom is scared s$£tless of NTL, always has been and is even more now.

When NTL is bought by Liberty. it will actually be a part of a much larger company then Eircom and will actually have far more muscle then Eircom.

NTL can offer the triple paly of video, voice and bb which is very attractive to many customers and NTL can do so at speeds and quality much higher then is currently possible on Eircoms network.

NTL TV has a very high penetration in Dublin, Galway and Wayerford, therefore it has many of the advantages of Eircom like being able to heavily advertise new services to their customers in their bills, this is a very effective method of advertising and currently only Eircom can do it.

As for footprint, NTL BB now supposedly covers all of Galway and Waterford and by the end of this year 50% of Dublin (probably aiming for 100% by end of next year). That is a very large footprint and consists of most of the most important parts of Eircoms target market.

What Eircom are really scared of is when NTL starts advertising their services nationally on radio, TV and newspapers. This is likely to happen when Chorus and NTL merge and they rebrand. Then the cat will really be out of the bag.

Don't forget that NTL:UK is the single largest BB company in the UK, it has even more customers then BT. There is no reason why the same can't happen here, in fact due to much higher cable penetration here in Dublin, it could even be worse for Eircom.

Stimpyone wrote:

What makes you think Eircom are increasing speeds?, what have you heard?

It has been mentioned in a few other threads by people who are usually correct about those sort of things. No speed details yet.

seamus

Holy moley. They'll have to up the upload speeds too though. I'm starting to find now that when I run more than 2-3 concurrent downloads, the connection quality plummets, and pings drop to 5-10 seconds :eek:

Or perhaps NTL are throttling downloads...

BigMoose

bk wrote:

and by the end of this year 50% of Dublin (probably aiming for 100% by end of next year).

Where do these figures come from since NTL themselves dont seem to know? At least wont admit what they're up to. Given we were promissed 100% of Dublin by the end of the year this time last year on various threads here, I'll not be getting too excited about comments like this just yet. I've seen sod all movement in my area!

Freddie59

HarryHoudini wrote:

I received a call yesterday saying that they needed to come out to the house and replace my cable modem, which they did today.
I think I was one of the first few hundread to get NTL when it first launched so I had this old terrayon modem.

Anyway the guy said that the reason for replacing it was that they are planning on upgrading the speeds to 5Mb and 8Mb sometime in the near future, and that the old modems couldn't handle them speeds.

I asked him about prices and that kind of thing but he wasnt too sure.

8 Megs!!!???:eek: :eek: :eek:

bk

BigMoose wrote:

Where do these figures come from since NTL themselves dont seem to know? At least wont admit what they're up to. Given we were promissed 100% of Dublin by the end of the year this time last year on various threads here, I'll not be getting too excited about comments like this just yet. I've seen sod all movement in my area!

Graham Sutherland, managing director of NTL Ireland:
"Looking ahead to the end of the year, we expect to have 160,000 homes enabled for broadband and to keep our penetration rate above 10 percent."
http://www.enn.ie/news.html?code=9630232

NTL has about 355,000 TV customers, of whom about 109,000 are MMDS, therefore they have about 246,000 cable customers, so the footprint by the end of this year will actually be about 65%.

100% by next year is just a guess, but it is a good, educated guess, NTL have reached 65% in almost 12 months, they can certainly finish the other 45% in the next 12. Also it is worth noting that NTL's new owners have a very strong policy of upgrading all their networks to support the triple play, they are not interested in just low margin TV services.

I know it can be very frustrating when there doesn't seem to be any activity in your area, but if you take a look around boards, you will see that there has been an awful lot of new areas that have come online in the past few months. Just last year I was told by an NTL engineer that it would be years before my area (D9) got BB, just a few months later I got a letter through the door saying that I could get BB from them and now I'm happily on 3m/300k

Freddie59

bk wrote:

Graham Sutherland, managing director of NTL Ireland:
"Looking ahead to the end of the year, we expect to have 160,000 homes enabled for broadband and to keep our penetration rate above 10 percent."
http://www.enn.ie/news.html?code=9630232

NTL has about 355,000 TV customers, of whom about 109,000 are MMDS, therefore they have about 246,000 cable customers, so the footprint by the end of this year will actually be about 65%.

100% by next year is just a guess, but it is a good, educated guess, NTL have reached 65% in almost 12 months, they can certainly finish the other 45% in the next 12. Also it is worth noting that NTL's new owners have a very strong policy of upgrading all their networks to support the triple play, they are not interested in just low margin TV services.

I know it can be very frustrating when there doesn't seem to be any activity in your area, but if you take a look around boards, you will see that there has been an awful lot of new areas that have come online in the past few months. Just last year I was told by an NTL engineer that it would be years before my area (D9) got BB, just a few months later I got a letter through the door saying that I could get BB from them and now I'm happily on 3m/300k

I think that might be erroneous bk - they don't have anything approaching 109,000 Digital MMDS customers. I think that's the amount of Digital customers.:)

bk

Freddie59 wrote:

I think that might be erroneous bk - they don't have anything approaching 109,000 Digital MMDS customers. I think that's the amount of Digital customers.:)

Actually you are probably right, come to think of it I have often heard the 109,000 figure being used for number of digital customers.

I got the 109,000 MMDS customer figure from ENN:
http://www.enn.ie/news.html?code=9633340

But then ENN is often inaccurate, so I can easily see how they would mix them up. Looking at other sources, they seem to imply that NTL has about 20,000 MMDS customers (around 2004). That means the BB footprint is about 50% (as I originally said), which is still very good for one years work.

I'm actually very happy that the number of MMDS customers is low, that means more people will eventually be able to get BB over cable

OfflerCrocGod

bk wrote:

On the contrary, Eircom is scared s$£tless of NTL, always has been and is even more now.

When NTL is bought by Liberty. it will actually be a part of a much larger company then Eircom and will actually have far more muscle then Eircom.

I'm not disputing the fact that NTL could become a major competitor to eircom in the BB space. What I'm saying is that right now eircom don't have to worry so they don't really care about NTL, they are still limited and don't advertise at all.

bk wrote:

As for footprint, NTL BB now supposedly covers all of Galway and Waterford and by the end of this year 50% of Dublin (probably aiming for 100% by end of next year). That is a very large footprint and consists of most of the most important parts of Eircoms target market.

I was already told about that. In 2000. I'm still waiting for NTL to get around to upgrading my area, I'm not holding my breath.

bk wrote:

What Eircom are really scared of is when NTL starts advertising their services nationally on radio, TV and newspapers. This is likely to happen when Chorus and NTL merge and they rebrand. Then the cat will really be out of the bag.

Of course eircom is worried about possibilities. That doesn't change the fact that they are possibilities and not actualities. I'll only get excited when possibilities become actualities, until then I don't care and neither does eircom.

bk wrote:

Don't forget that NTL:UK is the single largest BB company in the UK, it has even more customers then BT. There is no reason why the same can't happen here, in fact due to much higher cable penetration here in Dublin, it could even be worse for Eircom.

I would LOVE if that were to happen but I'm still waiting..............

Freddie59

OfflerCrocGod wrote:

eircom don't have to worry so they don't really care about NTL, they are still limited and don't advertise at all.I was already told about that.

They don't have to. Accoring to reports they're installing quite an amount of them.........and the difference between them and Eircom is that when they enable a district for broadband, everyone in that district has access.......not only some, due to lines failing, etc. So it would appear to be a far more reliable form of enablement. I presume they also have their problems, but they're getting widespread coverage far quicker than Eircom, and actually appear to be putting in a concerted effort to do so.:)

paulm17781

OfflerCrocGod wrote:

I'm not disputing the fact that NTL could become a major competitor to eircom in the BB space. What I'm saying is that right now eircom don't have to worry so they don't really care about NTL,

They should be. I know I am not the only person with NTL BB & VOIP. Eircom are now beginning to lose customers to the likes of NTL. If they are not worried they need a new management team.

Freddie59

paulm17781 wrote:

They should be. I know I am not the only person with NTL BB & VOIP. Eircom are now beginning to lose customers to the likes of NTL. If they are not worried they need a new management team.

What's the VOIP quality like? Is it dodgy mobile to VOIP, and lastly who do you have it with?

seamus

I tried skype over NTL the other day. Quality is perfect.

paulm17781

Freddie59 wrote:

What's the VOIP quality like? Is it dodgy mobile to VOIP, and lastly who do you have it with?

I use Blueface.ie near perfect call quality and FAR cheaper than Eircom. If you have cable BB worth checking out. With Blueface you can port your Eircom number too!

bk

NTL is a very real danger to Eircom, when NTL enable an area, everyone can get BB in the area, no line checking and their local advertising is very effect, multiple letters informing you that you can get BB and even a phone call. This has allowed them to get a 10% take-up which is even better then Eircom with their big fancy ad campaigns!!

Lots and lots of people are signing up to NTL, just look around these boards and they all are very, very happy with the service (excpet for a few D15 people who had problems), just take a look at this poll:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=312194

NTL works extremely well, it offers some of the best speeds, low consistent pings, generous cap policy, very stable (never goes down) and all for some of the lowest prices.

When NTL made it's promise to roll out BB back in 2000, it was just before it went bankrupt (mostly the UK's fault, Ireland was the only profitable part of the company), now that NTL:Ireland has been separated and it is being bought by Liberty, it started the rollout of BB again about 9 months ago and it is going very quickly now.

Just a quick history lesson, back when NTL first announced it was rolling out the triple play 5 years ago, Eircom got very scared and invested in very expensive DSL equipment and head end encoders that they thought would allow them to do video over DSL.

Now this was premature, the technology wasn't there yet (it is even questionable if it is there now) and it cost too much, but it showed how scared Eircom were of NTL. However the ODTR wouldn't allow Eircom to transmit video over DSL, lucky for Eircom NTL went bankrupt and Eircom scrapped all it's equipment and went with much cheaper DSL system.

However Eircom then stupidly wasted the last 5 years, instead of consolidating the BB market on DSL and creating a mature market where most people already had BB and would be hard to persuade to move, they instead did everything they could to delay the rollout of BB. Now NTL are ready to go again and Eircom only has a very small and weak hold on the BB market which will make it much easier for NTL to steal lots of Eircom market share. Eircom management was so short sighted.

paulm17781

What amazes me is that Chorus aren't getting BB out there like NTL. With UGC owning Chorus in full you would think they would start building up a market share.

PixelTrawler

NTL are a major threat. They are growing at what must be a frightening rate for Eircom

Just under a year ago i was told by customer service at NTL there was no plans for broadband in Galway. Next in may suddenly they were rolling to Knocknacarra only, 4 months later is almost the whole ciy... thats rapid growth. Our area was enabled iin august and i was led to believe by NTL themselves that wouldnt happen. Needless to say i'll be switching soon. 3meg makes me happy, never mind 8!

bk

Joebloggs4817 wrote:

Just under a year ago i was told by customer service at NTL there was no plans for broadband in Galway. Next in may suddenly they were rolling to Knocknacarra only, 4 months later is almost the whole ciy... thats rapid growth. Our area was enabled iin august and i was led to believe by NTL themselves that wouldnt happen. Needless to say i'll be switching soon. 3meg makes me happy, never mind 8!

Yes, the CS staff, despite being very good are not told about roll out plans, only management and engineers know that.

paulm17781

bk wrote:

Yes, the CS stuff, despite being very good are not told about roll out plans, only management and engineers now that.

I think that is one place NTL (and alot of other companies) fall down. CS staff really should know what is going on. It is very frustrating to ring a company and have the people you deal with have no idea what is happening.

pablo321

Yeah but then if the CS know then the Eircom knows and they do promotions in the area to sign everyone up for 6 months.

Apparently that was why they stoped telling their CS anything

Pablo
Stiring it!!

Roen

Drifting a bit from the OP, so are NTL increasing speeds or not? Will there be a corresponding increase in fees?

paulm17781

Roen wrote:

Drifting a bit from the OP, so are NTL increasing speeds or not? Will there be a corresponding increase in fees?

Last time they increased speeds the price of their top package came down by 5 Euro.

bk

Roen wrote:

Drifting a bit from the OP, so are NTL increasing speeds or not? Will there be a corresponding increase in fees?

No info yet, however it does seem likely. NTL:UK (a different company now) is upgrading to 10mbit/s, so it would seem likely that NTL:Ireland can do the same.

The last time NTL upped the speeds there was no increase in price, in fact the top package NTL Broadband Max decreased by €10 from €55 to €45, while the speed increased from 1.5m to 3m. So I'd expect the price to stay the same, unless they introduce newer higher packages and keep the same packages.

OfflerCrocGod

The fact is that the area I am living in (D15) has very limited penetration of NTL BB (yes there are a few lucky ones). If you compare D15 to Galway you'll see that D15 is only half the population of Galway and it's only ONE division of Dublin and yet it's still not fully upgraded - 5 years after I was told "In 3 months time". It's great that NTL are helping out the more backward parts of the country but if they really want to beat eircom they need to take Dublin away from them, not Galway! Given current growth rates Galway will be a suburb of Dublin in 20 years (finally Civilization!), so why bother with those [strike]savag[/strike] differentially placed people?

So far NTL have left Dublin (a beacon of hope unto all) alone, next year that will change but for now eircom aren't being forced to move by NTL. Just look at their lack of action with Chorus (or at least their respective owner). I was hoping that NTL would be kicking eircom's ass RIGHT NOW as opposed to sometime next year. Eircom are reactive not pro-active and so far NTL have done nothing to make them react, that's my problem. *In the future* is great but I'd prefer the here and now.

Don't worry Galway, Dublin's coming to save you! It will bring enlightenment and prosperity for all!