Meteor Mobile Broadband & 3G

dmn

Anyone have any ideas when Meteor would be in a position to launch mobile broadband and 3G?
I tried searching the comreg website and couldn't find any information regarding deadlines for population coverage and commercial launch.
I recently upgraded my meteor billpay phone and while in their store the sales person had mentioned that they should have it launched by October 1st this year.
Can anyone confirm anything?
I really don't want to tie myself into a 12month contract with 3, Vodafone or O2 before I can see what Meteor have to offer, Also I'd rather just have one bill rather than two

Jonathan

Meteor didn't think they would be in a position to launch 3g services as they don't hold a licence for it??? Or did Eircom buy it for them?

dmn

As far as I know Eircom did buy it for Meteor.

Mimikyu

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dmn

i really wish their website had details of what areas thay have covered so far etc. if its correct dat they r to launch by october then surely they would have to have major cities covered by now

HiredGun

I recently did a manual network search on my phone in Dublin and saw that the Meteor 3G network was in the air.

dmn

HiredGun wrote:

I recently did a manual network search on my phone in Dublin and saw that the Meteor 3G network was in the air.

has anyone else noticed this?
i'm in cork, i can't check this myself as i dont have a 3g handset. am i'm right in understanding that it would only show up on a 3g phone?

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

jimmycrackcorm

A friend is working on a project in Meteor and confirmed that they are gearing up for an October 3G launch.

CelloPoint

Couldn't find any Meteor 3g here in Docklands, Dublin 3

dmn

just did a network search on a 3g fone and found nothing to suggest meteor 3g

billbond4

Meteor are launching 3G alright I saw that Ericsson won a contact to supply them with equipment.

dmn

I just rang meteor stating that I was considering moving to three for their fone and broadband service, but would rather wait to see what meteor was doing. and he said that the meteor 3g service would be launching sooner rather than later. still not really much of an answer tho

jimmycrackcorm

dmn wrote:

I just rang meteor stating that I was considering moving to three for their fone and broadband service, but would rather wait to see what meteor was doing. and he said that the meteor 3g service would be launching sooner rather than later. still not really much of an answer tho

Definitely not before October, their IT systems won't be ready.

DonFred

Meteor will have 3G in before October! Reason why Im waiting before I upgrade as some new phone will be in stock inc Sony Ericsson K810i

Random

How can we have 2 so conflicting reports? Will be an interesting market once Meteor get 3G I reckon!

jimmycrackcorm

DonFred wrote:

Meteor will have 3G in before October! Reason why Im waiting before I upgrade as some new phone will be in stock inc Sony Ericsson K810i

Getting phones in stock is the easy bit.

dmn

ciaranfo wrote:

How can we have 2 so conflicting reports? Will be an interesting market once Meteor get 3G I reckon!

i was thinking the same. it seems that their call centre staff and retail staff all have different ideas of when its all going to happen

Mimikyu

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godskitchen

They have to have something like 12% (Certainly no more than 20%)Population coverage by October..............its that pathetic, The next target after that is years away.

Knowing Meteor/eircom they will do the bare minimum.............

If any of the above info is wrong I am sure some fountain of knowledge (They are everywhere on the internet, right?) will correct it giving a link they found on google as proof. Where are theses people when you need them in society? I am way off topic.

Bulmers

AFAIK Meteor are starting to roll their 3G network, only minimum amount of sites this yr i think to meet licence reqs by Oct and will only be in Dublin. Will only be a soft launch i reckon, non commercial so probably realistically middle next yr would reckon but it is definitely moving, friend of mine involved in the pilot.

Slice

More importantly aren't Meteor still working on finishing their 2G network? I thought they were still piggybacking off one of the other networks or is that a permanent thing now? Their website doesn't distinguish between their own network and host network on the coverage may...

jimmycrackcorm

They do have Edge to fall back on so I'd expect a raft of phones that are 3g/2.75g. Edge is available on all their base stations.

jimmycrackcorm

jimmycrackcorm wrote:

They do have Edge to fall back on so I'd expect a raft of phones that are 3g/2.75g. Edge is available on all their base stations.

It's certainly not on all of them, I'm actually surprised by the amount that don't have it. I rarely get EDGE here in Drumcondra, the nearest 900MHz cell has it but the 1800 cell, which my phone sits on at home, doesn't have it. No sign of it down in Kerry either.

dmn

Slice wrote:

More importantly aren't Meteor still working on finishing their 2G network? I thought they were still piggybacking off one of the other networks or is that a permanent thing now? Their website doesn't distinguish between their own network and host network on the coverage may...

yes they originally had an agreement with O2 IRL, when that contract ended they started piggybacking on Vodafone IRL, and still do at the moment.

digiman

Meteor are rolling out their 3g network in Dublin at the minute and in some of the other cities as well, Galway is definitely one of them.
I know of quite a few sites in Dublin that have 3G

dmn

cork?

digiman

digiman wrote:

Meteor are rolling out their 3g network in Dublin at the minute and in some of the other cities as well, Galway is definitely one of them.
I know of quite a few sites in Dublin that have 3G

Please, do tell if you know any specific areas. Would be curious to try it out.

Solair

I'm seeing a Meteor 3G network in Dublin 2 and Dublin 4 now!

Perhaps this rollout will be quicker than we think ?

dmn

Solair wrote:

I'm seeing a Meteor 3G network in Dublin 2 and Dublin 4 now!

Perhaps this rollout will be quicker than we think ?

maybe so.
I was just looking around the comreg website and have found the 3g licensing information for the other 3 networks.
Using vodafone as an example, they were awarded their licence on 16/10/02 , and in their licence agreement they were expected to launch on 01/05/03 with 33% population coverage.
That's just 6 and a half months after they got their licence.
It seems Eircom/Meteor were awarded their 3g "B" licence on 13/03/07 so applying the same timeframe that Vodafone were given, it seems correct that 01/10/07 would be the rough deadline for commercial launch.
Please correct me if I'm wrong.
I'd be interested to know if anyone else is finding Meteor 3g coverage?

DannyBZR

There is a target for October due to the licensing requirements. But there will be no official launch until the network has sufficient coverage to actually call it a service. This is most likely to be towards the middle of next year. They have said that they don't want to launch it early because they will lose peoples interest and faith in it much like Vodafone has done. I mean in all fairness, I personally think this whole 3G thing is over hyped and its just more marketing buzz to get people to spend money..

I work in a meteor shop and this is all they have confirmed so far.

Regards,

Daniel.

dmn

Meteor 3G Update:

I recently filled out a comment card on the meteor.ie website and stated that i would be willing to pay off the remaining of my contract to move to another network with mobile broadband and 3g handsets etc etc as I felt Meteor were beginning to really fall behind other networks, and the only reason i am still a meteor customer was because of free texts to my friends. (slight exaggeration )

Some one called me back this morning to tell me that they received my comments and would like to inform me that Meteor will be rolling out 3G from October 1st in major urban areas, namely Dublin & Cork first. The first 3G call was made over 2 weeks ago from the CEO to a member of the technical team. The infrastructure is in place and all existing EDGE areas will be upgraded to 3G first

He said that almost all meteor customers now have a 32k simcard, capable of 3G, and remaining customers with 16k sim cards would simply be upgraded when they buy a 3G handset. He said the 64k simcards that vodafone currently have were not needed at all and that 32k would have ample capacity.

On the topic of handsets, he was unable to inform me of what will be available yet, but said that there would be 3G handsets in the Christmas collection so keep an ear to the ground.

Finally he said, completing a network search on a 3G compatible handset (put ur meteor sim into an unlocked 3G phone) will start showing meteor 3G in more and more areas as we approach October 1st.

This is good news all round!

Tom Dunne

dmn wrote:

He said that almost all meteor customers now have a 32bit simcard, capable of 3G, and remaining customers with 16bit sim cards would simply be upgraded when they buy a 3G handset. He said the 64bit simcards that vodafone currently have were not needed at all and that 32bit would have ample capacity.

Not to drag the thread off topic, but what's the story with 16/32/64bit SIM cards? Is somebody mixing up processors and sim cards?

L1011

32k storage I would presume he means - that is unconnected to the differences between a UICC (3G&2G capable) and a SIM (2G only) card though. 32k allows far more texts and phonebook entries to be stored on the card - the Orange "SuperSIM" I got when in the UK in 2002 supported 255 texts and 255 contacts, from memory.

dmn

oh sorry, yes i meant k not bit.

FergalBoards.ie

There might be a bit more to it than just SIM capacity for addresses and stuff.

The Vodadroid I spoke to on one occasion was horrified to discover that I still had a (working) Eircell SIM card. It never occurred to me that I should change it, why should I.

Immediately launched into all the benefits of getting a new SIM card. Useless to me as I store all my addies and txts on phone anyway.

She sounded increasingly desparate and I began to get a bit suspicious.

A person that seems knowledgeable in matters cellular told me she was desparate because the cards can store commands that affect your phones and the newer cards make it harder to clone the cards.

GSM card cloning is something I was unaware of, and I don't really understand it. It's different to the old analog cloning but Google it and you'll see it exists. The same search will also show that it's harder with the more modern cards.

L1011

Its effectively impossible with current generation UICC chips for much the same reason Sky card cloning -is- impossible.

My sister and father are on Eircell SIM cards and my brother is on a Esat Digifone one. I'd be on a 2001 era Meteor one barring a number change (due to them having no upgrades in 2002) and a move to Billpay where I was "given" a new SIM (well its a UICC) for no reason, as I was keeping my number...

Oh, and storing texts/numbers on the phone is a BAD IDEA if a washing machine happens to decide it likes your phone... my SIM was fine, the memory card was fine, but the internal memory on my 6670 would never run again.

I had an Esat SIM go bust on me in 2003, the O2 rep seemed rather shocked that I hadn't upgraded already. Didn't see the need really.

I've seen no Meteor 3G as of yet. Was trying around St. Stephen's Green last weekend and in Drumcondra and Fairview today - nothing.

chrislad

You're given a new sim card for Meteor bill because you get a new account. Your old PaYG account is terminated and you can only start a new account with a new sim. You could have arranged for the number to be transferred back to the other sim if you wanted, but why would you want a less secure sim?!

eamon234

DannyBZR wrote:

I work in a meteor shop and this is all they have confirmed so far.

Regards,

Daniel.

Hey Daniel - any decent phones coming in over the next few weeks on Meteor?

FergalBoards.ie

MYOB wrote:

Oh, and storing texts/numbers on the phone is a BAD IDEA if a washing machine happens to decide it likes your phone/QUOTE]


Well, yeah point taken, but all my phones since goodness knows how long...the Timport Moto L7089 I think it was called? Sync with PC.

I don't like SIM for addies especially because they are limited in what they can store in information fields compared to the Phone. Also I keep texts as proof I sent them, so I need to sync with PC anyway...The SIM fills up too fast, old or new...

L1011

Yeah, I -now- sync the N72 with the PC, lesson learned the hard way

BigCon

If Meteor have limited 3G coverage when they launch in October, is there a possibility that they could piggyback on another network like they did in the past for GSM coverage?

dmn

BigCon wrote:

If Meteor have limited 3G coverage when they launch in October, is there a possibility that they could piggyback on another network like they did in the past for GSM coverage?

Well Meteor actually piggyback Vodafone for GSM coverage, so i guess they could always go about extending this to their 3G network also.
I noticed someone on another thread said that they were told by Meteor staff that the Nokia E65 would be launched soon, this is a 3G compatible handset, and is also offered on 3 at the moment. So maybe this will be their first 3G handset??

Random

dmn wrote:

Well Meteor actually piggyback Vodafone for GSM coverage, so i guess they could always go about extending this to their 3G network also.
I noticed someone on another thread said that they were told by Meteor staff that the Nokia E65 would be launched soon, this is a 3G compatible handset, and is also offered on 3 at the moment. So maybe this will be their first 3G handset??

They already sell 3G capable handsets such as the Nokia 6233.

chrislad

They also had the N91 and N72.

L1011

The N72 is 2.75G (EDGE) only; not 3G. Its the only N7x thats not 3G.

foggy_lad

lol i have free msgs but hate topping up now cos "3" network soo much better and cheaper for calll and way cheaper roaming and every other network has much better phones

Meteor 3G now seems to be active in the Drumcondra area. I was walking home from work a few minutes ago and noticed my phone had no coverage. So I did a network search and it found Meteor on 3G, but attempting to register returned a "No access" error. So I needed to disable 3G for the phone to work. (I am on Meteor btw, seems they just haven't opened up the 3G network yet)

Here's what I got...

cold_filter

Karsini wrote:

Meteor 3G now seems to be active in the Drumcondra area. I was walking home from work a few minutes ago and noticed my phone had no coverage. So I did a network search and it found Meteor on 3G, but attempting to register returned a "No access" error. So I needed to disable 3G for the phone to work. (I am on Meteor btw, seems they just haven't opened the 3G network up yet)

Here's what I got...

Meteor made their first 3G call there last week the RAN is there but joe soap wont be able to access it for quite sometime

cold_filter

dmn wrote:

Well Meteor actually piggyback Vodafone for GSM coverage, so i guess they could always go about extending this to their 3G network also.
I noticed someone on another thread said that they were told by Meteor staff that the Nokia E65 would be launched soon, this is a 3G compatible handset, and is also offered on 3 at the moment. So maybe this will be their first 3G handset??

The piggyback on the o2 network