Raheny Broadband

Very, very late but just in case someone can benefit ...

I've been in Avondale Park, Raheny (like the O.P.) for seven years. There is no UPC so until recently your only option* has been to use Eircom lines - repackaged as various providers over the years but Eircom lines all the same.

There is one HUGE problem with broadband in the Avondale Park area (possibly Maywood as well) and it is that the underground cable linking the area to the village is substandard and cannot reliably carry a broadband signal from the exchange in Coolock.

To their credit, Eircom have sent engineers to my home on three occasions in this last 18 months alone, checking the cables internally, to the nearby pole and back to the cabinet close to the Howth Rd. They have replaced cables, offered new modems etc but each Engineer has ultimately come to the conclusion that it is an underground issue and will not be resolved without a JCB and some new cable.

Just today, I've checked my line stats and my modem is managing to sync at 1.7Mb despite having a 6dB SN ratio and a downstream attenuation of 63dB. All this and the exchange is only a few miles away.

On the plus side, I've been testing an O2 'Hotshot' modem and that is giving me a reliable 4Mb/s bursting to 9Mb/s over a full-signal HSPA+ connection - technically not broadband but good enough for me (for the moment). I'll probably discontinue the Eircom service in a few weeks when I'm satisfied with the O2 service - looking good at the moment.

Ironically, while writing this response, I got a callback from Eircom asking if the fault on the line had now been fixed. They're a nice bunch but until someone digs up the road, I'll keep telling them (politely) that 'no it isn't fixed and can someone please help'






* Not strictly true, I used Irish BroadBand for a while but the service was so patchy as to be almost unusable.

Hi There ,I live in Maywood Lawn and have done for years the reason there is no UPC is because originally it was just TV and Maywood and Avondale had their own ariel. UPC Fibre is in Assams across the road and could be put into Maywood Avondale Bettyglen (approx 1000 homes) easily enough. We just need to get together and put pressure on them to do so. I mean 1000 homes surely 90 % would sign up to no line rental and speed 50 times greater than they get now ....Please lets campaign UPC to do this for all our sakes and maybe we could catch up with everyone else.
DC

Hi all,

Just an update on our situation in Avondale Park, we have a 2.5Mb connection from Eircom - the line just won't support more. Eircom have been out a few times and have replaced all of the cabling from the house to the telephone cabinet located close to the entrance of Maywood (from the Avondale Park end). The problem is the line going up to the village - it isn't rated for broadband and won't be replaced any time soon.

That 2.5Mb line supports general browsing and will even run Netflix at a high enough rate to get HD and Dolby Digital sound so I'm happy enough.

I work from home a fair bit and need better access to remote servers in the US and UK. To support that, I use an 02 dongle which regularly gets 5Mb and very often 8Mb - 11Mb. The only down side is that there is a traffic threshold of 15Mb and I've breached that a few times now - € 90 a go. There is a Meteor equivalent which has a 25Mb limit so I may try that.

I've even used Irish Broadband in the past but the reception wasn't great because we're located in a bit of a dip.

Basically getting real broadband at a sensible price in this area isn't possible. Personally I'd pay up to €80pm for unmetered 20Mb/s connection but there are no real options

Chris

Hi all,

Two weeks ago, I complained about the issue to Terence Flanagan the local FG TD, pointing out that Eircom were supposed to be in phase 3 of their Fibre-to-the-cabinet project etc. Just got a letter from his office which says that he has raised the issue with Herb Hribar (CEO, Eircom).

You never know, maybe, just maybe.

Chris

All cabling going to cabinets in raheny have been replaced with fibre, along with the addition of fibre cabs, was completed just after easter, there is no official release date for the coolock exchange, but people are speculating that it will be launched in June, not much longer to wait now.

You might have noticed smaller green cabs beside the existing larger cabs, these are the VDSL2 (fibre) cabs which will supply up to 70mb of broadband into each estate. Accurate locations of the cabs can be found here https://www.google.com/fusiontables/DataSource?docid=1M_lYcvMkt7xIqqSa43TdS1s25oRqtA2JgpxAkYM#rows:id=4

What part of Raheny are you in?

I've had a good look around and there is NO new cabinet in Maywood/Bettyglen that I can see. There's a planning permission notice on the two old ones but it has not been built yet, at least not anywhere near where it's marked on the map. There are ones at the entrance to Foxfield, Avondale Park and beside the Bank of Ireland exactly where they're marked.

Anyone spot a box in Maywood/Bettyglen yet? Still no luck finding it

allen175 wrote: »

Forgot to update you, had a spin around on wednesday to that cab, i could only see the old cab with planning permission on it didn't see a new cab, might be deeper into both estates. strange that there isn't one beside it considering that raheny has been fully finished for some time now.

Is it really that surprising? I would imagine that they would need to replace the cable running from the village to Avondale / Maywood before our cabinet coud be replaced with a fibre enabled one.

Chris

allen175 wrote: »

They wouldn't need to replace any existing copper cabling, they would install the cab and run fresh fibre cable to the new cab, leaving the copper cable there for use with phones.

Raheny is now live for fibre as of today, so in theory you should be able to order fibre from the different ISP's

Thanks for the speedy reply but wouldn't they need to dig up the road from the village?

I've been told that there is only low-grade copper down there from the cross-roads to Maywood / Avondale so surely someone would need to get the spades out?

Hopefully I'm just being to skeptical but I don't believe that there is fibre in the ground near Matwood / Avondale at present. I was told by their engineers that Eircom routinely ran fibre to new developments in the area but had not installed fibre from the village to the Maywood area.

Chris

allen175 wrote: »

as i said already, with fibre they don't need to touch the existing copper cables, the old cabs will remain there for voice services, no broadband will be going through the copper after everyone gets on the fibre bandwagon, the only bit of digging that needs to be done is for installing power to the new cabs.

Simon Gruber Says wrote: »

Perhaps the other cabinets in the area are enough to connect to and they didn't need the one here or something. Fingers crossed that we won't still be stuck on the current crap connection we have at least. Any improvement will be welcome.

I hadn't thought of that, perhaps they can run the cable from the fibre cabinets elsewhere into Avondale Pk. Definitely hope so because I'm tired of my 2.5Mb connection and I don't believe there is any fibre near our existing cabinet.

Hi,

I checked this morning and there are two new green cabinets embedded in new concrete near the junction of Maywood and Avondale Park. I guess that's why I go the callback from Eircom - we're probably good to go. I would guess that folks near that end of Maywood would similarly be fine.

Chris