Smart Broadband - too good to be true?

Ferox13

For various reasons but mostly due to their Cap limit and Bit torrent Shaping, I wanna dump NTL. I'm sure i'll miss their great customer service but I was thinking of going to SMART..

Is there a catch to them? I get the same 3megs down but no cap for pretty much 50% of what i pay NTL?

Does anyone use them?

What are they like for Bit Torrent and online gaming?

dub45

Ferox13 wrote:

For various reasons but mostly due to their Cap limit and Bit torrent Shaping, I wanna dump NTL. I'm sure i'll miss their great customer service but I was thinking of going to SMART..

Is there a catch to them? I get the same 3megs down but no cap for pretty much 50% of what i pay NTL?

Does anyone use them?

What are they like for Bit Torrent and online gaming?

Did you do even a rudimentary search here before you posted?:rolleyes:

If you did you would have your questions answered no problem and the answer is if you can get Smart dont hesitate.

SuperSean11

I have smart and its always trouble DONT GET IT:mad:

steveland?

Good point, well made...

Care to back that up with any reasoning? I've heard very little negative about Smart other than "I can't get it" (not counting the Eircom thingy)

the corpo

Smart's broadband offering is fantastic, go for it if you can get it.

muckwarrior

I'm an ex Smart customer. If they become available where I'm living now I'd switch back in a heartbeat! Always had excellent speeds and no download limit is great!

AlmightyCushion

I hate smart because they haven't enabled my exchange. The moment they do eircom can kiss my ass goodbye and I'll be getting 7meg broadband with smart.

Stokolan

Ive always thought of smart as the best BB supplier In Ireland. well wher eya can get it anyway.. which i cant but there still the best

AlmightyCushion

Stokolan wrote:

Ive always thought of smart as the best BB supplier In Ireland. well wher eya can get it anyway.. which i cant but there still the best

They've enabled a couple of exchanges in my town. Fingers crossed they enable mine.

the corpo

AlmightyCushion wrote:

They've enabled a couple of exchanges in my town. Fingers crossed they enable mine.

it's eircom who aren't enabling the exchanges, they are who you should be hating!

AlmightyCushion

the corpo wrote:

it's eircom who aren't enabling the exchanges, they are who you should be hating!

No my exchange already is broadband enabled but Smart exchanges are adsl2 (that's why the speeds are higher and why they only sell broadband through exchanges they are in). Smart hasn't out their adsl2 equipment in my exchange but hopefully they will soon.

Ferox13

Did you do even a rudimentary search here before you posted?

I looked but could find no mention of Smart and how good it is for Bit Torrent or gaming.

If it's ok for these I'll prolly sign up since I can get in at my exchange..

pizzahead77

Smart is excellent for torrents and for gaming.

They have their own games servers too - http://support.smarttelecom.ie/forums/showthread.php?t=1663

Some of their network admins supply support on their support forums too.

AlmightyCushion

pizzahead77 wrote:

Smart is excellent for torrents and for gaming.

They have their own games servers too - http://support.smarttelecom.ie/forums/showthread.php?t=1663

Some of their network admins supply support on their support forums too.

Ha ha. That's pretty cool.

Ferox13

Excellent - gonna ring em tomorrow..

Liam Byrne

I was a VERY happy puppy last month; having been a VERY satisfied (and slightly richer) BB customer by being with Smart for nearly 3 years, I'll be moving house soon and I was panicking coz the last time I'd checked the new house wasn't on a Smart-enabled exchange.

But thankfully that exchange has since been enabled, so it's all systems go.

Smart are the best, but only based on price, speed, contention (lack of), limits (lack of), availability longer distances from an enabled exchange, and service/support......

AlmightyCushion

Liam Byrne wrote:

Smart are the best, but only based on price, speed, contention (lack of), limits (lack of), availability longer distances from an enabled exchange, and service/support......

:eek: Is that all? I don't know why I got so excited about them.

SuperSean11

steveland? wrote:

Good point, well made...

Care to back that up with any reasoning? I've heard very little negative about Smart other than "I can't get it" (not counting the Eircom thingy)

Well i wud have commented earlier but i was cut off. After 10 o clock it seems to keep losing connection and some times doesnt recover until morning

Is this because its a peak time?

AlmightyCushion

SuperSean11 wrote:

Well i wud have commented earlier but i was cut off. After 10 o clock it seems to keep losing connection and some times doesnt recover until morning

Is this because its a peak time?

What have you done to rectify the issue? Have you rang customer support?

smellslikeshoes

SuperSean11 wrote:

Well i wud have commented earlier but i was cut off. After 10 o clock it seems to keep losing connection and some times doesnt recover until morning

Is this because its a peak time?

Ring customer services and see what they say, It sounds more like a problem with your line than anything else.

dub45

SuperSean11 wrote:

Well i wud have commented earlier but i was cut off. After 10 o clock it seems to keep losing connection and some times doesnt recover until morning

Is this because its a peak time?

Post your problem here and dont forget to put your telephone number in your profile when setting it up.

http://support.smarttelecom.ie/forums/index.php?

pocketac3s

I've been with Smart now for 2 years and their great. Torrents + Gaming are fantastic and having no cap is brilliant.

(whats the point in having a cap with broadband internet?its like having a Ferrari and restricting it to 60 miles an hour!)

Have only rang tech support twice, it was a premium number but as soon as I was connected the guy on the other end took my number and rang me straight back or set a time to call me if he couldn't fix the problem. Pretty much any technical issue you can encounter has been dealt with on their support forums, what can I say?

I want your babies Smart!

MickH503

Going very slightly off topic ... is there any way to find out what exchanges Smart plans to enable in the coming months? I sent them a mail asking about my local exchange and got a fast response saying it was not in their plans, but to try again in a couple of months ... any way of seeing what exchanges they are enabling either in advance or as they do it?

AlmightyCushion

MickH503 wrote:

Going very slightly off topic ... is there any way to find out what exchanges Smart plans to enable in the coming months? I sent them a mail asking about my local exchange and got a fast response saying it was not in their plans, but to try again in a couple of months ... any way of seeing what exchanges they are enabling either in advance or as they do it?

On there forum (linked above) they have a thread called 'Smart Exchange Update' where you can ask. I don't know how quick they are to reply but it's worth a shot.

lucernarian

That thread was created before the problems in Smart arose. I wouldn't pay it any credence. It would be good for the country if it was available in more places. There's a lot of large towns which are still dependent on Eircom.

Mikebyrne

I'd take that offer in a heartbeat but there's no SMART exchange in my area, getting really tired of Ice and there crap "3MB" line

PixelTrawler

We have smart in the house and although it took ages to get connected, once it was connected support has been fantastic.

Unfortunately our line was shoddy and although we ordered 7meg it could only deliver 1.4:eek: (and we're not out in the sticks, we're in the middle of a major housing estate on the east side of Galway City) - actually the NTL connections to that estate seem hopeless too but thats another issue

This was not smarts issue though and they were very good in doing some technical witchcraft by downgrading us and make some other changes (what these were I've no idea), we are now getting closer to 3 Meg.

Based on this experience I say go for it. I had NTL for a good while and support is hopeless and customer communications zero.

Smart actively rang us until we got the best of our line.

00sully

I just got an eircom line in (rather re-activated from previous house occupier) since Smart enabled their blanchardstown Exchange.

Smart said I could get full 7meg but when they checked the line they said it could only deliver 1meg due to the poor quality of the line. Eircom were in no hurry to even offer a solution or time frame for looking at the line - the mandatory "3 months" was quoted with no quarantee of improving the quality.

so even tho Smart enabled my closest exchange im still stuck with UPC

(i refuse to criticise NTL's name since they were great when it actually was NTL!)

azezil

I thought they went out of business a couple of years ago because they couldn't pay their bills and a lot of customers were cut off without warning by Eircom?

SuperSean11

I have rang custumer services a few times They say theyll "fix the problem" They normaly do But after a few days the problems starts again So iv began to keep a record of the times it goes off But i dont no what to do with this information I think ill try and post this info on the website Dub45 posted

SuperSean11

azezil wrote:

I thought they went out of business a couple of years ago because they couldn't pay their bills and a lot of customers were cut off without warning by Eircom?

I think eircom just did that so people wud go back to them But the ombudsman fixed the problem

Sad Professor

I switched from ntl to Smart over 4 months ago and so far have been very happy with the service. My line is a big long so I don't quite get the full 4Mb I signed up for (more like 3.5) but the connection is very solid otherwise. And unlike ntl they don't interfere with torrent speeds. I even got a call from one of their agents last week asking if I was having any problems and was happy with the service. Their online support forum is great too.

thefinalstage

SuperSean11 wrote:

I think eircom just did that so people wud go back to them But the ombudsman fixed the problem

No, eircom flicked the switch back on after nearly killing Smart for no good reason.

SuperSean11

thelastangryman wrote:

No, eircom flicked the switch back on after nearly killing Smart for no good reason.

I thought that was what i pretty much said

thefinalstage

SuperSean11 wrote:

I thought that was what i pretty much said

You didn't state how it wasn't Smarts fault.

dub45

SuperSean11 wrote:

I have rang custumer services a few times They say theyll "fix the problem" They normaly do But after a few days the problems starts again So iv began to keep a record of the times it goes off But i dont no what to do with this information I think ill try and post this info on the website Dub45 posted

Unfortunately there seems to be a strange phenomenon out there whereby the bb signal is affected at a particular time - this is not restricted to Smart in fact this is the first time I have read of a Smart user experiencing it. But there have been a couple of threads on the problem.

MickH503

AlmightyCushion wrote:

On there forum (linked above) they have a thread called 'Smart Exchange Update' where you can ask. I don't know how quick they are to reply but it's worth a shot.

Thanks ... I posted the question there, but it seems hit and miss wther I'll get an answer as you said:D

DecTenToo

Is it still the case that in order to get smart you have to

1. cancel with your current bitstream supplier
2. go back to eircom to get an eircom account number
3. then apply to join smart?

SuperSean11

thelastangryman wrote:

You didn't state how it wasn't Smarts fault.

I said "I think eircom just did that" (Cut them off) "so people wud go back to them "

GarfieldConnoll

DecTenToo wrote:

Is it still the case that in order to get smart you have to

1. cancel with your current bitstream supplier
2. go back to eircom to get an eircom account number
3. then apply to join smart?

No. You can now go direct from eircom bb/ bitstream to Smart.

Garfield.

dub45

GarfieldConnoll wrote:

No. You can now go direct from eircom bb/ bitstream to Smart.

Garfield.

Garfield welcome back to boards! People will be very happy to hear that - is there a procedure in place for the transfer now and is changing the number still an issue?

GarfieldConnoll

dub45 wrote:

is there a procedure in place for the transfer now and is changing the number still an issue?

'Yes', procedure in place
and
'No', changing the number is no longer an issue, as in you can keep your existing number.

Garfield.

dub45

GarfieldConnoll wrote:

'Yes', procedure in place
and
'No', changing the number is no longer an issue, as in you can keep your existing number.

Garfield.

God is in the details ok!:) So just to labour things a little bit could you advise someone who wants to make the change (and as someone who made the change ages ago I would or course encourage anyone to do so) is it enough to approach Smart and tell them you want to change? what about the months notice to terminate etc etc.

GarfieldConnoll

dub45 wrote:

God is in the details ok!:) So just to labour things a little bit could you advise someone who wants to make the change (and as someone who made the change ages ago I would or course encourage anyone to do so) is it enough to approach Smart and tell them you want to change? what about the months notice to terminate etc etc.

Call Sales. Tell them you want to keep your number and that you've broadband/ bitstream on the line at the moment.

As part of the move to Smart, your current ISP will be advised of the cancellation of the broadband/ bitstream service.
As for the month's notice that's to do with your current ISP, as opposed to Smart.

Garfield.

DecTenToo

GarfieldConnoll wrote:

No. You can now go direct from eircom bb/ bitstream to Smart.

That's excellent news. If I switch (from UTV) is there any downtime?

GarfieldConnoll

DecTenToo wrote:

That's excellent news. If I switch (from UTV) is there any downtime?

Should be just for the physical jumpering (let's say an hour).

Garfield.

shayser

GarfieldConnoll wrote:

No. You can now go direct from eircom bb/ bitstream to Smart.

Garfield.

Already a long time subscriber, but glad to hear this had been sorted.

If you are on a Smart enabled exchange, it's a no brainer.

dingding

GarfieldConnoll wrote:

'Yes', procedure in place
and
'No', changing the number is no longer an issue, as in you can keep your existing number.

Garfield.

Moved to smart a year ago, can I get my old eircom number back, perhaps keep the 2 numbers.

muckwarrior

Any idea why my (phibsboro) exchange isn't enabled? It seems a bit ridiculous that a city centre exchange wouldn't be set up at this stage.

watty

It's obviously lack of demand.

Vunderground

Great news!!!

I didn't know you could keep your existing number and that was a big issue. Will think about a move from BT now.