Chorus & Kilkenny

MDR

FYI

Chorus have gone live with Broadband Services in Kilkenny town @ €50 per month. See CableNet for more details, my source says Cork is next on the list for rollout and it should happend very soon.

MDR

Oh yeah I suspect the same services are available in Limerick also, amn't sure on that though ...

sirlinux

That cablenet domain was owned by CMI for there cable internet service in malahide and swords, chorus shut it down when they bought them, incredible that they havent launched yet again in swords and malahide even though all the technology has been there for years!!

MDR

You may find they have relaunched, I don't want to badger my source for information, could you give em a call querying availablity in those areas ?

dahamsta

Since Chorus don't have the brains or the technical competence to list the areas that service is available in on their website, I'll do it: Kilkenny, Clonmel & Thurles. Bunch of muppets.

adam

irishguy

€50 a month thats very good does anyone know what the pings are like?? and the speeds??.so if its uncapped that means that powernet will stay uncapped aswell

spongebob

....says it is not enforced, merely optional as it is probably in the T&C's already.

Its still 3.33 times more than €ircon at half the price.

Dahamsta is right about the vapour, the service may possibly exist but the Cablenet site won't say Where .

Enjoy their customer service when you ring them on the 1890 number, it is unique.

M

MDR

"Good point. I'll add the available network areas to the website."

I have expressed your concerns to my "friend" at Chorus, he has said he will update the website ...

dahamsta

Enjoy their customer service when you ring them on the 1890 number, it is unique.

Aside from my recent complaint, where a customer support rep literally lied to me on the phone, I've found support has improved in some areas. What concerns me about Chorus is their networking skills, which are absolutely atrocious. I've said it many times before: Chorus can't keep their existing TV network running, and now we're expected to believe that they can manage an IP network sitting on top of it? Not a hope. They're a bunch of clowns, always have been, always will be.

adam

sirlinux

So i called to see if they had turned back on the network in swords and malahide, guess what, no, any idea when it will be turned back on? no.

aidan_dunne

Originally posted by dahamsta
They're a bunch of clowns, always have been, always will be.

I agree adam, but, at €50 per month and a more reasonable looking cap than eircom's, it's not to be sniffed at. I could nearly bring myself to dealing with the Chorus Clowns at that price, if only this service was available in Portlaoise. Oh well, guess I'll have to continue on living in hope.

Raskolnikov

Wasn't there trials for this already? Didn't a few people who were on the trials speak favourably of the service? I might possibly be getting confused with NTL here.

You should all still go and sign up your interest anyway, i mean you guys did it for the virtually unknown Beam didn't you?

It seems as if things are finally starting to happen, slowly admittedly but we are in a far better position than last year. ADSL is on the rollout, the price is high at the moment but it will most definetly start to fall as more users sign up. Esat are about to release a product that will come close to flat-rate. With any luck Eircom will be forced into providing a flat rate solution soon after.

aidan_dunne

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
Wasn't there trials for this already? Didn't a few people who were on the trials speak favourably of the service?

Yes, it's been on trial in Kilkenny for a while and it seems to have had good reviews. Looks from this like the trials are now finished and Chorus are going to start rolling it out in Killkenny with other areas to follow hopefully (fingers crossed for Portlaoise! ).

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
You should all still go and sign up your interest anyway, i mean you guys did it for the virtually unknown Beam didn't you?

Sounds like a good idea to me. Maybe we should all e-mail/phone/write to Chorus asking about this service and, that way at least, they'll know that there is a big demand for this and it might make them consider speeding up and expanding the rollout of this service ot other areas.

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
ADSL is on the rollout, the price is high at the moment but it will most definetly start to fall as more users sign up.

Well, recently published figures have shown that less than 1,000 users have signed up for Eircom's ADSL service and, of that number, most were former trialists who got bitten by the bug and couldn't face going back to 56K dial-up and signed up the ADSL as a result. And that number is not going to increase significantly unlessEircom drops their prices. As has been discussed elsewhere, the high price will not attract users and, therefore, bring down the price. The opposite needs to happen. Eircom needs to lower the price first and then the customers will flock in their droves.

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
Esat are about to release a product that will come close to flat-rate.

As I said before, we've got nothing to go on here but rumours so far so I'll believe it when I see it. And, even then, it's not proper flat-rate and should not even be mentioned in the same sentence as the words "flat-rate", in my opinion.

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
With any luck Eircom will be forced into providing a flat rate solution soon after.

I can't see that happening for some time to come. Eircom loves the huge profits per-minute pricing currently brings them and they will not give that up without a fight (even though we are not asking them to give it up completely. We're asking them to let it co-exist alongside flat-rate but they just won't listen!). Eircom will introduce FRIACO when either they see fit themselves or they are legally obliged to do so. Neither looks like happening in the foreseeable future, unfortunately.

pertinax

im still on the trial
its quite kickarse really downloads are fast ive not seen anything less then 300kb/s usually i get about 500 and sometimes over 800 but it is a trial. pings are good but i dont play much fps. i think i remember getting mabye an average of 100 to 200 to english servers out there.

as for chorus being clowns well thats yet to be decided in regards their broadband offering. I had win me and i kept losing connection every so often anything between 20 mins and 2 hrs.
everything looked ok frm my shed
they email saying do i like it i say yes but i keeps knocking me off.
They say theyll look at thier shed (probably is a converted cow shed) and get back.

Knowing better too wait for thought maybe xp would help got the opinion of another trialist (thank you for that) and he said xp worked for him so i did and it works peachy for me now.

thing is if most peoplke came up agianst the dead connection thing they cant be expected to upgrade to xp so i wouldnt class it as a saleable product untill it is sorted out.

the irony is i have free broadband and i get tendonitis last week so i shouldnt be typing this. or even have the computer on.

By christmas we should know wheter theyve redeemed themselves if thats possible.

Raskolnikov

I recieved a reply from Chorus saying blah blah blah not out in your area yet but we'll let you know when it is.

Aidan : I just think that you and the rest here shouldn't knock them yet

Dustaz

Originally posted by pertinax

its quite kickarse really downloads are fast ive not seen anything less then 300kb/s usually i get about 500 and sometimes over 800 but it is a trial.

Eh? It says its a 512 service on the website?

sceptre

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
I recieved a reply from Chorus saying blah blah blah not out in your area yet but we'll let you know when it is.

Aidan : I just think that you and the rest here shouldn't knock them yet

Possibly not - at least with regard to this service.

Chorus come into the Internet access market with a really poor reputation hanging over them from their cable TV service though. A reputation that, with regard to this service is well deserved. I've had great problems with them where my paid for channels (movies, cartoons) keep dropping. It's happened on a regular basis - someone has to call out to fix it when it does. No sign of them actually fixing the problem permanently. Meanwhile for the past three months they've been billing me twice for everything. Funnily enough, my Chorus box was dropped on their doorstep last week with a note telling them to go to hell.

They may redeem themselves with this service yet (and I really hope they do) - they still have the major problems in their core business though (and unfortunately customer service for both services will be the same people)

pertinax

there was another trialist who said he got 2000
they either probably didnt implement the download limit or probvably dont know how to. i could believe that. Like i said its a trial and im not complaining about the speed so...

one of the blokes who installed it says it was 128 which madew me wonder but its not. installers werent chorus theough and other wise were good.

aidan_dunne

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
Aidan : I just think that you and the rest here shouldn't knock them yet

Actually, if you re-read my previous posts, you'll find I'm not knocking this new service. In fact, as I said, if it's going to be available at €50 per month with no cap/more reasonable cap than Eircom, it's certainly something good and something to look forward to.

What I was knocking was their cable TV service and the dreadful customer service they have, as Sceptre pointed out. This cable internet service looks good so far and I'm not knocking that. I am knocking their other main service, their customer support and the shoddy way the company seems to be run as a whole. I think you'll find if you re-read my posts and everybody elses that we all feel the same abuot this.

Raskolnikov

Originally posted by aidan_dunne


Actually, if you re-read my previous posts, you'll find I'm not knocking this new service. In fact, as I said, if it's going to be available at €50 per month with no cap/more reasonable cap than Eircom, it's certainly something good and something to look forward to.

What I was knocking was their cable TV service and the dreadful customer service they have, as Sceptre pointed out. This cable internet service looks good so far and I'm not knocking that. I am knocking their other main service, their customer support and the shoddy way the company seems to be run as a whole. I think you'll find if you re-read my posts and everybody elses that we all feel the same abuot this.

Dreadful customer service? This from my experience, this is unfounded. I was using Chorus up until awhile ago and the only time i had a problem with the service i made a quick phone call and it was sorted out in a few days. I have never had any billing problems and to cancel my subscription all i did was return the box, no hassle. I think a lot of people are just jumping on the bandwagon since Chorus make such an easy target.

I wasn't specifically referring to you when i posted my message, *cough* *cough* Dahmasta.

dahamsta

Well, like I said, up until the last time I had to call, I've found their customer service a vast improvement. However, the last time knocked the few before it on the head, for the simple reason that the rep lied to me, knowingly and willingly. That annoys me.

There's a post about it in the ICDG Cable forum if you want to read about it. (I wouldn't be bothered if I was you, it's quite dull.) But when you get right down to it, and you average everything out, Chorus are muppets, period. IMHO, of course.

adam

aidan_dunne

Originally posted by RASKOLNIKOV
Dreadful customer service? This from my experience, this is unfounded. I was using Chorus up until awhile ago and the only time i had a problem with the service i made a quick phone call and it was sorted out in a few days. I have never had any billing problems and to cancel my subscription all i did was return the box, no hassle. I think a lot of people are just jumping on the bandwagon since Chorus make such an easy target.

Well, good for you then. However, here in Portlaoise, we've had the service since the time it was known as CMI. Things were bad then and have never improved.

You say, "to cancel my subscription all i did was return the box", which I guess means that you're on their digital package. We're still on their analogue system here, unfortunately, and while we could upgrade we have enough in 15 channels and we're not going to pay extra for a service that is still crap, only in digital quality.

More often than not, our channels are gone. The reception is terrible. This has always been the case and we often see Chorus vans in our estate but, from the looks of things, they're never actually doing anything because the quality has never improved. And this is going all the way back to the CMI days.

Their customer support, as I said earlier, is dreadful. Maybe you're lucky and you're getting through to some competent people but anyone we've ever dealt with has been terrible. They haven't a clue what they're talking about, don't seem to understand the simplest questions and, to be frank, just seem totally uninterested and don't give a damn. In fact, a neighbour of mine who always rings them to give them hell whenever the channels go on the blink heard a customer rep mutter, "Oh f**k, not him again," under his breath once and on another occasion when he started asking them when the channels would be back on again, the rep turned on him and shouted, "Look, we'll get it sorted whenever we f**king can (yes, he did curse). We're very busy and we can't just stop everything to come out and sort ye're channels out for you whenever you demand", and then hung up on my neighbour. And no, this wasn't years ago, this was only about two or three months ago.

Maybe some people are jumping on the "slagging off Chorus" bandwagon, as you suggested, but I'm certainly not. I know how crap they are from my own experience of dealing with them and having to put up with their $hite TV service. If you feel they've improved and you've had a good experience with them then, as I said, good for you. But for me, and everybody I know in Portlaoise who's with them, it's been terrible.

Fionn

Hi

I got a Cablenet Broadband brochure in the door today (I’m in Clonmel, one of the SNL castaways ) it says download speeds of up to 512k with uploads of up to 128k. This is assuming all technologies are working at optimum speed etc. which I suppose they rarely do!
However I’m thinking this is an attractive offer compared to what’s available around my area at present.

There’s an introductory offer of €75 connection fee (expires 31 Oct 2002 ) and a monthly charge of €50 inclusive of VAT, this sure does beat the socks off a dial-up connection even if it only worked half the time!
The small print in the “Terms & Conditions” mentions that the service is for one PC only and Chorus reserve the right to charge for excessive downloads, download limit set to 10gb per month, there is a 3¢ per Mb thereafter.

Three questions come to mind!
1. Will their service be in any way reliable at all, considering their reputation in the cable tv area!
2. Their definition of the word excessive, “not in the spirit of the service” springs to mind!
3. Would 10Gb be sufficient for say perhaps 45 hours a week surfing web building etc. and if not how much extra might I be looking at in charges?

Anybody hazard a guess??

I’m going to contact them for more details anyway, and I’ll report back when I get any news.

spongebob

Nice definition of normal Chorus service by Fionn there.

this sure does beat the socks off a dial-up connection even if it only worked half the time!

looks like you sold it to yourself head. You can spend the other half of the time in the pub with your friends.....bEEtchin about Chorus no doubt.,

M

Dustaz

Nice to see Chorus are actually coming good on thier promises for a change.

Originally posted by Fionn
Three questions come to mind!
1. Will their service be in any way reliable at all, considering their reputation in the cable tv area!

Hmm, sorry cant help you with that. But if Eircom can keep thier broadband in working order, then anyone can:)

2. Their definition of the word excessive, “not in the spirit of the service” springs to mind!

Thats probably just to cover themselves if you go mental downloading the entire internet every month:)

3. Would 10Gb be sufficient for say perhaps 45 hours a week surfing web building etc. and if not how much extra might I be looking at in charges?

Again , you should be grand with that. From talking to people and monitoring my own behavour, You wont exceed much more than 5 megs as long as you stay away from P2P networks or FTP sitez (i use the Z to indicate what type of sites i mean:) ).

Fallschirmjager

HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!


please stop...we have reached a new low


Please is everyone telling me here that they think muppet central in chorus can manage a network...FFS you can get a channel...

I had them in wicklow and they are so astoundingly C R A P, it defies description...and then when i was leaving they asked me for comments on why i was....i mean they could not believe that i actually wanted to RECEIVE the channels i was paying for...


Now please , right now goto www.chorus.ie

and tell me could they seriously manage a network with a web design like that...


now unles ye are all talking about a DIFFERENT CHORUS...but judging from the 'help' line (LOL what a ****ing joke) it is the same one...

Fionn

ok! I've read all the replys so far and looked again at my phone bill and have decided to take a leap of faith (in Cablenet).

I signed up today and will report back next week when/if they install it.
The sales rep that called said that it was on trial here and the other areas for months prior to rollout and that reports were very favourable. I know a guy that was on the trial so this has been verified.

I'm just hoping that any bugs that were in the system have been ironed out.
we'll see!........

jonski

I've been in touch with chorus for a few weeks now getting E-mails from them , and basically this is what they said.

"Hi John,
Thanks for your reply.Unfortunately I haven't got an expected release date
for the Cablenet in the Limerick area as it really is just released in
Clonmel,Kilkenny and Thurles since yesterday and we will have to see how
this goes.The price at the moment is on offer at EUR75 (this will more than
likely change by the time it is released in Limerick) and then EUR50 per
month subscription.This is an always on connection and therefore no dial
up.I can keep your details on file and contact you as soon as I hear
anything in the area.
Kindest Regards,
Chorus."
...and the last one said
"Hi John,
Thanks for your reply.I can keep your details on file and contact you as
soon as I hear anything for the Limerick area.
Cablenet is ideal for Gaming as it is so much quicker than a normal dial up
connection."

Don't know if this is much help to anyone.

abbeyvet

I got this in yesterday morning. The installation was smooth, the installers knew their job. So far (admittedly after just over 24 hours, but a very goodly proportion of them spent online) so good.

I have had bandwidth consistently over 300kbs, downloaded a 13MB+ file in less than 5 minutes and I am very very happy

Whatever its deawbacks it is like sheer heaven after using a cruddly dial up for so long.

Stephen

Bugger. I'm in Kilkenny and am too far from the centre of town to be connected to this service

Fionn

I've been hooked up, very good job by the installer IDC no snags so far!

Must say this really beats dial up!!! average speeds I've noted so far are about 275 kb. I did a test recently on dial up got 32kb.

So everything seems to be going ok.

I hope it rolls out in all the areas people are looking for it!

I think that Ireland Offline has raised awareness for reasonably priced broadband and in my opinion this is well placed price wise.

Well done everyone involved with Ireland Offline !