Eircom 7mb - speed guaranteed?

TechnoFreek

I've been an eircom customer for a while (through lack of choice really) and have had they're 3mb package in my last rented place and my new house. I have always been able to over 300kb/s download speed and to be fair it has been a consistent service.

I'm thinking of upgrading to their 7mb service which will cost me an extra 10 quid a month on my package.

The thing is, i'be been reading lately that getting the full 7mb down an dsl line is very difficult and often speeds of 4-5mb are more likely. This info isnt directly related to eircom, think it might have been about BT in the uk.

Anyway, just wondering what are other members experience of eircoms 7mb package is, is 7mb realistic and achieveable? is it worth the extra tenner a month?

By the way, I am on the Arklow exchange.

All opinion welcome :-)

cpu-dude

TechnoFreek wrote: »

I've been an eircom customer for a while (through lack of choice really) and have had they're 3mb package in my last rented place and my new house. I have always been able to over 300kb/s download speed and to be fair it has been a consistent service.

I'm thinking of upgrading to their 7mb service which will cost me an extra 10 quid a month on my package.

The thing is, i'be been reading lately that getting the full 7mb down an dsl line is very difficult and often speeds of 4-5mb are more likely. This info isnt directly related to eircom, think it might have been about BT in the uk.

Anyway, just wondering what are other members experience of eircoms 7mb package is, is 7mb realistic and achieveable? is it worth the extra tenner a month?

By the way, I am on the Arklow exchange.

All opinion welcome :-)

It's always possible if you live close enough to your local exchange.

If you post up your current line statistics, we can estimate your maximum speeds.

TechnoFreek

cpu-dude wrote: »

It's always possible if you live close enough to your local exchange.

If you post up your current line statistics, we can estimate your maximum speeds.

cheers cpu-dude for the quick repsonse! in work at the moment so wont get to do it until tonight.

can you explain to a network n00b the best way to obtain and post line statistics?

thanks again!

cpu-dude

TechnoFreek wrote: »

cheers cpu-dude for the quick repsonse! in work at the moment so wont get to do it until tonight.

can you explain to a network n00b the best way to obtain and post line statistics?

thanks again!

Well since your with Eircom, you most likely have a Netopia router.

Go to http://192.168.1.254 > Expert Mode > Yes, Enter Expert Mode > Statistics > DSL.

TechnoFreek

cpu-dude wrote: »

Well since your with Eircom, you most likely have a Netopia router.

Go to http://192.168.1.254 > Expert Mode > Yes, Enter Expert Mode > Statistics > DSL.

yeah, have the netopia router, thanks again for the help, will post results tonight.

Prisoner6409

Fact is you will not know untill it's installed. I went from 1MB to 3MB. For the first couple of months all was good. Line was syncing at 3MB's, pings were 26 and download speeds were up around the 250-300kbps. However over the last 6 months the service has been very erratic and plenty of others have experienced the same issues. At the mo my ping is anywhere between 41 and 57 and d/l speed is less than 1MB. Between 6pm and 12pm it's at its worst. At other times it near normal. I suspect as Eircom signs up more ppl and needs the extra bandwith they overuse the existing infastructure and their customers suffer. IMO it's not just about weather your line can handle the extra bandwith.

vibe666

just to answer the subject title, they won't guarantee any speed at all other than that it will physically work, which is why they go to great pains to put the emphasis on speeds of "up to" 7.6mbps.

there have been posts here from people who've ended up with worse speeds after upgrading than before, so there are no guarantees whatsover unfortunately, but like cpu-dude says, throw up your current line stats and we can have a goo and guestimate at what you might get based on the state of your current conection stats.

TechnoFreek

here are the stats as requested, sometihng for ye to digest!

Line State Up
Modulation DMT
Data Path Interleave


Downstream Upstream
Max Allowed Speed (kbps) 3072 384
SN Margin (dB) 9.50 12.00
Line Attenuation (dB) 48.00 29.00
CRC Errors 1048 14

dub45

TechnoFreek wrote: »

here are the stats as requested, sometihng for ye to digest!

Line State Up
Modulation DMT
Data Path Interleave


Downstream Upstream
Max Allowed Speed (kbps) 3072 384
SN Margin (dB) 9.50 12.00
Line Attenuation (dB) 48.00 29.00
CRC Errors 1048 14

Unfortunately your line stats are pretty dire as they are. Upping the speed puts considerable pressure on a line and if you go to 7 you are likely to suffer frequent disconnects. Is your internal wiring old?


http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/lowSNR.htm

http://www.kitz.co.uk/adsl/linestats.htm

ElNino

According to this site
http://fremnet.net/article/216/adsl-theoretical-speed-calculator
5329 kbps is the fastest down speed that you will be able to attain and you are about 5k from your exchange.

marko91

mehh i wana downgrade back to 3mb

dub45

Prisoner6409 wrote: »

Fact is you will not know untill it's installed. I went from 1MB to 3MB. For the first couple of months all was good. Line was syncing at 3MB's, pings were 26 and download speeds were up around the 250-300kbps. However over the last 6 months the service has been very erratic and plenty of others have experienced the same issues. At the mo my ping is anywhere between 41 and 57 and d/l speed is less than 1MB. Between 6pm and 12pm it's at its worst. At other times it near normal. I suspect as Eircom signs up more ppl and needs the extra bandwith they overuse the existing infastructure and their customers suffer. IMO it's not just about weather your line can handle the extra bandwith.

There are two basic issues here. One is the speed capacity on the line and that is dependent on a number of issues which are an integral part of the dsl system - particularly distance from the exchange. So you can have an excellent line and still get poor speeds if contention is a factor in the local exchange.

Dont forget that dsl is a contended product by its very nature and therefore you are liable to be sharing your bandwidth with 48 or 24 other users. Thats the simple facts of dsl no matter who you are with or which country you are in. The effects of sharing bandwidth in this way were not so apparent before mass downloading (legitimate or otherwise) - pre youtube etc 24 or 48 people simply browsing the web had little impact on each other. Now how many people are downloading, watching you tube rte etc.at the same time?

cpu-dude

TechnoFreak wrote: »

here are the stats as requested, sometihng for ye to digest!

Line State Up
Modulation DMT
Data Path Interleave


Downstream Upstream
Max Allowed Speed (kbps) 3072 384
SN Margin (dB) 9.50 12.00
Line Attenuation (dB) 48.00 29.00
CRC Errors 1048 14

Stay where you are, your MAYBE able to get 4MB out of your line but it's not work the extra few bob for it. 3MB is fine, as your already said - you are getting the full 3MB speeds, don't ruin it.

Now, you are also getting a lot of CRC errors (which usually happen because of poor noise margin). Where have you got your BB connected in your house? Have you got every phone, fax, sky box and alarm filtered in your house? Are you using a telephone extension cable?

cpu-dude

ElNino wrote: »

According to this site
http://fremnet.net/article/216/adsl-theoretical-speed-calculator
5329 kbps is the fastest down speed that you will be able to attain and you are about 5k from your exchange.

And you have to consider overheads, poor copper, contention and internal wiring too.

TechnoFreek

cpu-dude wrote: »

Now, you are also getting a lot of CRC errors (which usually happen because of poor noise margin). Where have you got your BB connected in your house? Have you got every phone, fax, sky box and alarm filtered in your house? Are you using a telephone extension cable?

hey cpu-dude. just to expand a bit further on my setup. its a new house. and i got a phone socket wired into every room in the house. they all lead back to the hall to the main eircom socket as far as i know.
the router is actually in one of the bedrooms upstairs so it isnt connected directly to the eircom socket but it isnt on an extenstion lead as such.

I have only devices, that require a filter - the sky box and the landline phone.
i have a single port filter (supplied by eircom) on the sky box connection.
i have the eircom dual port filter in the office room which has the phone and router connected to it.

is this setup likely to explain such a noise margin?

cpu-dude

TechnoFreek wrote: »

hey cpu-dude. just to expand a bit further on my setup. its a new house. and i got a phone socket wired into every room in the house. they all lead back to the hall to the main eircom socket as far as i know.
the router is actually in one of the bedrooms upstairs so it isnt connected directly to the eircom socket but it isnt on an extenstion lead as such.

I have only devices, that require a filter - the sky box and the landline phone.
i have a single port filter (supplied by eircom) on the sky box connection.
i have the eircom dual port filter in the office room which has the phone and router connected to it.

is this setup likely to explain such a noise margin?

Yes, the Broadband should be the first in line so to speak. It should be connected through the DSL side of a double filter (dual port filter to you) on the main telephone point in the house. From there, all the other phones, sky, sockets (from the hall to around the house) etc. should be connected into the Phone side of the double filter. See below for how it should be setup:



This way, with only one filter is use - every device is filtered no matter what.

TechnoFreek

ah ok cpu-dude. gotcha

can that eircom socket be moved from the hall to another room i.e. the office

or is it more comlicated as all the other phone lines from the other rooms come back to that point (I think...)

ideally i dont want to have to put router in the hall of the house

cpu-dude

TechnoFreek wrote: »

ah ok cpu-dude. gotcha

can that eircom socket be moved from the hall to another room i.e. the office

or is it more comlicated as all the other phone lines from the other rooms come back to that point (I think...)

ideally i dont want to have to put router in the hall of the house

Why don't you want to move it? Does you use it with a LAN cable?

If so, you might want to consider using wireless or LAN via the power lines.

TechnoFreek

cpu-dude wrote: »

Why don't you want to move it? Does you use it with a LAN cable?

If so, you might want to consider using wireless or LAN via the power lines.

no real reason other than I asthetics! I have no technical reason not to put it in the hall, just dont want it sitting on the floor!!

cpu-dude

TechnoFreek wrote: »

no real reason other than I asthetics! I have no technical reason not to put it in the hall, just dont want it sitting on the floor!!

You could hide it in a drawer or mount it to a wall, even chase a DSL cable (as small as possible) to the room above?

TechnoFreek

cpu-dude wrote: »

You could hide it in a drawer or mount it to a wall, even chase a DSL cable (as small as possible) to the room above?

ah yeah, its not a big deal. i actually have a network point wired to every room in the house including the hall. i have a switch in the hall also
its just not all conncted up yet.

so there is no issue sending a signal from the router down to the switch and therefore feeding any room in the house.

cpu-dude

TechnoFreek wrote: »

ah yeah, its not a big deal. i actually have a network point wired to every room in the house including the hall. i have a switch in the hall also
its just not all conncted up yet.

so there is no issue sending a signal from the router down to the switch and therefore feeding any room in the house.

Ah that's perfect then, simple fix for your issue.

omnisynergy

TechnoFreek wrote: »

I've been an eircom customer for a while (through lack of choice really) and have had they're 3mb package in my last rented place and my new house. I have always been able to over 300kb/s download speed and to be fair it has been a consistent service.

I'm thinking of upgrading to their 7mb service which will cost me an extra 10 quid a month on my package.

The thing is, i'be been reading lately that getting the full 7mb down an dsl line is very difficult and often speeds of 4-5mb are more likely. This info isnt directly related to eircom, think it might have been about BT in the uk.

Anyway, just wondering what are other members experience of eircoms 7mb package is, is 7mb realistic and achieveable? is it worth the extra tenner a month?

By the way, I am on the Arklow exchange.

All opinion welcome :-)

We're on a 7mb package and it works just fine for us. Before when I lived with my parents we had 3mb and I really do notice the difference now...
If you use the internet a lot it's worth it. But your line has to be capable of it. We were told our line was unusual in that it was capable of up to 20mb speed. If you call eircom up they can tell you how fast your line is.