Digiwebs New 4G Service

Altreab

Has anyone heard whats happening to the 4G rollout we heard so much about early in the year? Based on a 088 number If IRC. It was mentioned at the time that it would be happening during the summer time.
Anyone from Digiweb here to fill us in on the new service?

govinda

Something 088 launching Monday and being discussed here:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?p=53622842

Sponge Bob

Not in the wesht its not

Altreab

Sponge Bob wrote:

Not in the wesht its not

ah FFS is it the usual "launching in Dublin Cork Waterford Limerick Galway" and "Nationwide coverage coming soon" ssssss white?

SkepticOne

From an email sent out:

Back in May, we announced details on our Mobile Broadband plans after being awarded the 088 mobile number. If you are in the Fingal County area and would like to get your hands on the hottest technology around, contact our Business team on 1800 94 1000 for pricing and plans - you won't be disappointed!

Fingal County area. Once again South Dublin left in the cold.

crawler

<- gagged (muffle muffle muffle!!)

Urban Weigl

crawler wrote:

<- gagged (muffle muffle muffle!!)

Let's face it, coverage is going to be pretty spotty.

I'm mean.

Blaster99

Now that eircom knows all the details, you may as well let us know too...

Altreab

i had a quick chat with digiweb sales today and the following sems to be the spec.

UPTO 5.3 Megs Download speeds.
1.3 Meg Upload
15 Gig a month bandwidth allowance. 5 cent a meg for excess
1 Year Contract
€99 activation fee
€29.95 a month plus excess fees (as mentioned above)
"Free" Wireless router included in the activation fee.

At the moment its on trial in Fingal and will be expanded to the usual urban areas during the year. No Dates could be given as to when exactly it would be in Galway city never mind Galway county.
I believe 400 people are doing the trial in Fingal at the moment.
Can anyone else confirm the above details?

Urban Weigl

088 phone service has been delayed until next year, due to mostly (Surprise! Surprise!) lack of feasible handsets... At least that is what someone, who shall remain nameless, told me.

I wonder how long it will take them to match O2, Vodafone and 3 in terms of mobile broadband coverage? Fingal is pretty pitiful, though obviously that is only the beginning, so it would be wrong to judge Digiweb on that.

Sponge Bob

Its the first live operation in the world on that spectrum and with that radio technology (flash ofdm) so no WONDER there is a handset problem.

Mindya Digiwebs 'other' licence for this tech is in Norway . The latter will take some rolling out Ireland has one mountain peak over 1000m while Norway has 200 or 300 peaks over 2000m .

cgarvey

Digiweb in "nothing to see here" shock... again.

damien

Currently putting something together a list of Irish Tech Vapourware. Should it make the list?

Sponge Bob

It could possibly make such a list which should also include

1. eircoms 3g network , hah ...they can't even get Fingal on test .
2. eircoms VDSL2+ in the 5 big cities ...poof .
3. eircoms 100 exchanges announced last year ( none live, not a single one )
4. eircoms 330 exchanges announced this year , completion 2011 or 2012 .
5. eircoms population 'coverage' for their 3.5ghz 'service'
6. all forms of licence enforcement by comreg, thats a very foul smelling vapour that one .
7. every announcement that Chorus EVER made about ANYTHING ( PVRs are only the most recent )
8. Cable TV in Castlebar which is live today according to the DCMNR and without even a Head End. ASTOUNDING laws of physics they have in Mayo 9 The Western Digital Corridor , actually a pothole ridden unlit boreen with a very fancy name .
10.The Armagh Monaghan Digital Corridor
11 Genesis Europe Ltd , why should Cork not have some of its very own vapour .
12.Tetra
13.Digital TV
14.Rural BPON GPON ...whoops I forgot my NDA on that one , MMMMMMMMmmmmmmmMmmmMMMM

And thats only off the top of my head.

Urban Weigl

Best. List. Of. Vapourware. Ever.

I was almost disconnected with my chair.

watty

Well the Digiweb mobile Broadband (which is not a phone based service like 3G) is running in Finglas. So it can't make it to the vapourware list.

Anyway, which do you want?
An expensive iPhoney handset or Mobile Internet for the Laptop / PDA /UMPC?

Can we add latency free Satellite services or does that not apply as the vendor has gone away?

When is Meteor launching 3G?

Urban Weigl

Digiweb have been talking about a "4G" network with nearly 100% coverage, in fact better coverage than standard 2G mobile phones currently have. They have also been talking about a 088 phone service.

Beyond a data-only trial in Fingal, neither of these exist at this point. Is that not the very definition of vapourware?

Edit: I will give you that at least there is a trial. Some of the other services on that list have not even reached that stage. I wish Digiweb put out a realistic timeline for when their service will actually be available, rather than saying "soon", etc, as they have in the past.

And never-mind the iPhone, the 088 phone service is not even available on a basic phone at this stage.

SkepticOne

I think proper vapourware would be services that have been announced for purely PR reasons but the company has no real intention of carrying out. Spongebob has mentioned some of these in this thread. Digiweb has also been guilty of these e.g. choice of ISPs over Digiweb's Metro service. Also there was supposed to be digital TV over the metro service. Do digiweb intend to deliver on these?

Sponge Bob

BT SDSL
Colt LLU
C&W LLU
Mary Harney , lots of vapour emissions .
Anything Mary Harney ever said about the e-Hub of Europe
A Single Warehouse in Dublin = Digital Hub ...surely thats vapour ???!!
Ice communications nationwide bb service by end 2007 , yeah.
Mary O Rourke and her 5mbit BB for all by end 2006 was it not ?????
Mary O Rourke on any subject more complex than dog racing.
02 and their 2g coverage map, trés vapourific that .
I also remember Digiweb promising a wholesale/oem version of Metro Sceptic One .

As far as I am concerned , any missed schedule or bs statement = vapour .

Thats why eircom , in announcing 100 exchanges where they had no money in November 2006, and in failing to deliver a single one 9 months later almost , are guilty as charged. I will withdraw that if all 100 are live by the end of October 2007 but I do not expect to be withdrawing anything .

Wcool

Altreab wrote:

UPTO 5.3 Megs Download speeds.
1.3 Meg Upload
15 Gig a month bandwidth allowance. 5 cent a meg for excess
1 Year Contract
€99 activation fee
€29.95 a month plus excess fees (as mentioned above)
"Free" Wireless router included in the activation fee.

I haven't seen anyone confirm these figures but if these are the right figures, I think it's a step back.

Right now, you get 3Mb download and 30Gb allowance for 30 euro with Digiweb.
It seems to me that for the same money you get half the allowance and because your download speed is faster, you will pass that limit faster...

Benefits, I guess, are mobility (or is it fixed wireless??) and higher upload speed (which is mostly useless as it will add towards your limit).

I just can't imagine that Digiweb is offering this? Seems not competitive at all.

cgarvey

Mobility / nomadic qualities + greater reach than traditional wireless methods. This product is not designed to replace your cable or DSL modem.

Wcool

Well, will you fork out another 30 euro on top of your regular broadband bill?

I guess businesses might or the hardcore gamer, provided ping times are low.
And maybe if they provide a killer mobile service (read very low rates).

It still seems expensive to me.

watty

cgarvey wrote:

Mobility / nomadic qualities + greater reach than traditional wireless methods. This product is not designed to replace your cable or DSL modem.

Absolutely agreed. But unlike WiFi (not really Mobile) or 3G (not true IP) it's a real mobile IP based Wireless WAN product. Handover between sectors/cells with no packet loss, just a peak in ping time (still less than regular 3G/HSDPA latency).

However if it's the only alternative to a phone line and dialup... For mix between good rural range /larger cells and good building penetration via windows and small urban cells, its a great frequency band too.

If you want higher speeds, huge cap, lower cost per MByte etc, and don't need mobile, then ADSL, Cable or Metro is obviously better. A lightly loaded cell will however be much more like basic ADSL experience. The latency makes 3G/HSDPA feel worse than ISDN and frankly a Satellite link I was testing was a nicer experience than HSDPA.

Marlow

Sponge Bob wrote:

Ice communications nationwide bb service by end 2007 , yeah.

That is definatly the type of vapourware, that can beat any of Eircoms statements or attempts. How would they get it right nationwide, if they don't get it right in their homeyard ?

Wcool wrote:

Right now, you get 3Mb download and 30Gb allowance for 30 euro with Digiweb.
It seems to me that for the same money you get half the allowance and because your download speed is faster, you will pass that limit faster...

They just make you hit the wall faster, can't you see the fun in that ? Backwards thinking accellerated

/Marlow

SkepticOne

What I'll be interested in is whether it can be used as a decent platform for VoIP. In Ireland there is a lack of alternatives to Eircom's line rental.

I'm not too bothered about download caps myself although I can see how many heavy users will hopefully be put off from getting the service.

Marlow

SkepticOne wrote:

What I'll be interested in is whether it can be used as a decent platform for VoIP. In Ireland there is a lack of alternatives to Eircom's line rental.

I'm not too bothered about download caps myself although I can see how many heavy users will hopefully be put off from getting the service.

You need good latency and a jitter-free connection for VoIP, usually less than 150-200ms to your VoIP is recommended. I don't see any mobile/nomadic wireless solution providing that for a good while. Even in fixed wireless it can be a b**ch, as you not even need clear LoS, but also a clear fresnel-zone to have solid, non-varying ping-times.

/Marlow

SkepticOne

Marlow wrote:

Even in fixed wireless it can be a b**ch, as you not even need clear LoS, but also a clear fresnel-zone to have solid, non-varying ping-times.

I have fixed wireless. VoIP works very well for me. We will need to wait and see what the story is with their mobile offering.

Marlow

SkepticOne wrote:

I have fixed wireless. VoIP works very well for me. We will need to wait and see what the story is with their mobile offering.

Don't get me wrong: Fixed wireless for VoIP is better than DSL, if you're not on a marginal link. I'm on fixed wireless, too and I would not want to swap it for DSL or cable any time, not that I've got the choice

The problem with nomadic/mobile is specificly, that it's often working of marginal signal rates and it's been optimized to do that, but the downside is that your latency goes up. VoIP will be messy, if so.

/Marlow

watty

3G/HSDPA 120ms to 350ms

Digiweb Flash-OFDM < 50ms maybe? I think you run out of sector capacity long before the latency is bad.

Jitter is a complex issue and affects fax on VOIP most of all. It depends on packet buffer size , dynamic vs static buffer and codec type as to if jitter is important for VOIP. Fax will only work on G.711 (T.38 is not really a codec, but a Tiff relay agent).

SkepticOne

watty wrote:

Fax will only work on G.711 (T.38 is not really a codec, but a Tiff relay agent).

Fax over a VoIP connection is a bad use of technology, imo. Fax, like an analogue dialup modem, itself is an attempt to get digital information over an analogue voice line.

The correct solution, imo, is a fax gateway or email with scanning if necessary. Much better use of resources.

watty

yep. I agree. Faxes are dying out anyway, modems such as Skybox, phonewatch etc still a problem, but not as fussy as fax. Older gateways quite logically used multipage tiff files (since that's what a fax is a stream version of), but people will insist in installing image viewers that only can see the 1st page in the TIFF.

So nowadays, probably PDF attachments are better from the gateway. The email TO the gateway can be more flexible.

Sometimes I have to use modem on my VOIP as I have no other way to access changing some info on a different ISP, due to IP based security instead of username & password. Update of FTP or Web content should not be locked into IP range of host ISP.

cgarvey

Try telling banks or IEDR that faxes are dying out. You wouldn't believe the fun I've had trying to get a fax down a Digiweb Metro line. When it works it works as good as any fax I've seen (albeit much slower), but it takes a lot of goes to get a page through.

Agreed on Fax over VoIP (or the kinda-telephone line Metro provides), but there are no decent email-to-fax gateways for those once a month faxes home users (and e-workers like me!) have to send.

Sponge Bob

there are decent email to fax gateways for one off or low volume outbound faxing.

thebman

I had never seen a fax machine until I started working where I am now. I get told the fax isn't working every other day now and it is working, they are just too stupid to use a fax.

Too stupid not to use a fax and use a better system too.

Its very annoying. Companies like using it for contracts.

bk

Sponge Bob wrote:

there are decent email to fax gateways for one off or low volume outbound faxing.

Links please?

All the services I've found in the past have monthly subscription fees, which is annoying for one off use.

Sponge Bob

I just sign up for a free trial here ( as required) and cancel within the month

Works fine

Blaster99

watty wrote:

3G/HSDPA 120ms to 350ms

Digiweb Flash-OFDM < 50ms maybe? I think you run out of sector capacity long before the latency is bad.

Jitter is a complex issue and affects fax on VOIP most of all. It depends on packet buffer size , dynamic vs static buffer and codec type as to if jitter is important for VOIP. Fax will only work on G.711 (T.38 is not really a codec, but a Tiff relay agent).

Have you read a book about VoIP recently or is Digiweb moving to a SIP-based telephony solution?

watty

Digiweb has been using Standards based SIP VOIP for some while and has their own PSTN Gateway(s) and SIP Server(s). I've played around with Asterisk & Trixbox (which Blueface use). I'm told that is not very scaleable so not used for Digiweb customers.

byte

bk wrote:

Links please?

All the services I've found in the past have monthly subscription fees, which is annoying for one off use.

eFax.com used to offer a free outgoing fax service (they put their logo on the outgoing fax page) but I see they no longer offer that anymore. Now, it's a free 30day trial...

cgarvey

Sponge Bob wrote:

I just sign up for a free trial here ( as required) and cancel within the month

Been there, but then they want €9/mo after that. To send a couple of faxes, that's nonsense (as are their outgoing rates on top of that as well).

The requirement is simple, a pay-per use (or a very cheap subscription fee suitable for very low volume) outbound fax service. Inbound is trickier (because of the cost of a permanent fax number), but I can live with that, or a shared number.. but anyway, I haven't found such a service.

cgarvey

watty wrote:

Digiweb has been using Standards based SIP VOIP for some while and has their own PSTN Gateway(s) and SIP Server(s). I've played around with Asterisk & Trixbox (which Blueface use). I'm told that is not very scaleable so not used for Digiweb customers.

Not very scalable compare to what? It's definitely scalable (and many huge sites using it). It mightn't be as economical to something else (which is why I'm asking).

All the SIP operators seem to be able to add standard features like voice-mail or call handling easily (and do), yet the less traditional telcos like NTL's offering, the FTH operators in the private estates, Digiweb Metro, Skype, proprietary IM networks all have issues of some sort with offering those standard features. Clearly, there are benefits to using SIP based IP telephony, and it compares well against, say, Metro from a consumer point of view anyway (long connect times, "funny" tones, no voicemail despite "in weeks" for years, basic stuff like that). The costs can't be that prohibitive if big outfits like Blueface can manage it (and manage it well by most accounts)?

.cg

Boston

watty wrote:

3G/HSDPA 120ms to 350ms

Digiweb Flash-OFDM < 50ms maybe? I think you run out of sector capacity long before the latency is bad.

Ok thats the post I was waiting for, I didn't realise flash-OFDM was considered 4g, what exactly is the criteria anyway.

watty

No-one has officially decided what 4G is. When we have the next generation of working mobile Wireless, ITU may or may not ratify it as 4G. There are 4 main systems, none of which match current ITU aspirations (for which there is not enough spectrum unless part of Analogue TV is used).

• Flash-OFDM
• LTE, the next major step of 3G/UTMS/HSDPA type systems
• Mobile Wimax
• Some sort of Urban mesh based on 802.11n WiFi

For LTE see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3GPP_Long_Term_Evolution

Only the Fixed version of WiMax is commercial.
Flash-OFDM is running in Slovakia, Ireland and Finland, also some German trials. It, like WiMax is not a development of 3G, but a new architecture, purely IP based.
LTE doesn't exist yet.
WiFi has proved so far very poor on delivery for mass delivery.

watty

cgarvey wrote:

Not very scalable compare to what? It's definitely scalable (and many huge sites using it). It mightn't be as economical to something else (which is why I'm asking).

All the SIP operators seem to be able to add standard features like voice-mail or call handling easily (and do), yet the less traditional telcos like NTL's offering, the FTH operators in the private estates, Digiweb Metro, Skype, proprietary IM networks all have issues of some sort with offering those standard features. Clearly, there are benefits to using SIP based IP telephony, and it compares well against, say, Metro from a consumer point of view anyway (long connect times, "funny" tones, no voicemail despite "in weeks" for years, basic stuff like that). The costs can't be that prohibitive if big outfits like Blueface can manage it (and manage it well by most accounts)?

.cg

SIP is perfectly scaleable. It's analogue ports on Asterisk that may not be. Skype is proprietary distributed system.
Metro and UPC cable (NTL/Chorus) both are standards based SIP VOIP with added QOS management. They run on secure private networks. I have no idea why voicemail, conferencing etc are not available yet. In theory there will be SMS on DECT handsets too. This however is separate from SIP and uses an SMS Service center and SMS gateway. Regulation of interconnect charges may be needed.

Blueface isn't that big, nor profitable last time I looked. Nor do they have a network. No network to pay for, or installs, only ATA supply (sometimes) and interconnect charges.

oscarBravo

watty wrote:

It's analogue ports on Asterisk that may not be [scalable].

What self-respecting SIP operator would use analogue ports, when a single interface card can provide 30 simultaneous ISDN channels?

watty

So how may Asterisk PCs with Primary ISDN how many cards for 100,000 calls simultaneously? Of course I meant PSTN, not Analogue. Not enough coffee.

Sponge Bob

oscarBravo wrote:

What self-respecting SIP operator would use analogue ports, when a single interface card can provide 30 simultaneous ISDN channels?

2 cards ( main + daughter) can provide at least 16 x 30 port Pri cards for an asterisk switch but it will cost ya

single pri cards such as a digium card and others are good value .

you can also encapulate an entire e1 within a symmetric ip stream using properietary boxes and break out to pri at the other end......such as in a hosting facility where e1s are very very very cheap .

the e1 or Pri 30 channel interface has not gone away you know

Sponge Bob

Watty is correct in saying that asterisk does not scale, ie asterisk would run a single pci card environment including codecs and ivr in about 500mhz of processor.

Therefore as the big computers nowadays are c.4 x 4ghz processors you get 32 pci card equivalent ( 32 x 500mhz) on one of these and as you often have a channel in and channel out you can handle 16x 30 calls ( not 32x calls) or 480 calls in setup or progress or teardown .

By using more expensive cards you offload the ivr and codec work from asterisk to these cards but the cards come with proprietary and complex apis to allow you to control the dsps and other card resources.

In this scenario 500mhz of processor could run 8 x pri cards ( or 2 x 4 port cards) which is 8 times denser than pushing all the processing onto the cpu.

Asterisk is reduced in this case to a decision making switch and is not the whole enchilada with ivr and codecs looking for cpu space .

100,000 simultaneous calls is nearly as much as eircom handles during offpeak hours

HTH someone, Digiweb maybe

Blaster99

Is this a scalability seminar for dummies I've walked into, or what's going on? It is perhaps not beyond possibility that one can have an Asterisk server farm to meet capacity requirements?

The whole 3rd party VoIP provider thing is a bit noddy but they provide an alternative and they're often very cheap.

watty

And to be really smart you put your PSTN interfaces in different towns / sites so when the JCB or whatever hits, you still have connectivity.

Well maybe someday eircom will not be the major provider. < 70% households have land line, > 110% of people have a mobile.

Liam Byrne

watty wrote:

< 70% households have land line, > 110% of people have a mobile.

How can you have "> 110% of people" ???