SBP Confirms UPC to introduce 100Mbps

irishguy

Chorus NTL to launch premium broadband
08 November 2009 By Adrian Weckler

The country’s largest cable operator is to launch Europe’s fastest broadband service to 600,000 homes.

UPC, which trades as Chorus NTL, will invest €90 million next year to launch a home broadband service of 100 mega bits per second (Mbs) by August 2010, according to Mark Coan, director of sales and marketing.

The service, which will be 50 times faster than broadband speeds in Ireland today, will place Ireland in the top tier of EU countries for broadband speeds.

‘‘We believe that there is a definite market need for this," said Coan.

‘‘There is a myth that Irish consumers are not interested in fast broadband speeds, but almost two-thirds of all our new broadband connections are at the highest level possible, ten to 20 megabits."

The service will put new pressure on operators such as Eircom and mobile operators to invest in new infrastructure for so-called ‘next-generation’ broadband networks.

A recent Oxford University survey placed Ireland last among EU countries for the speed and quality of its broadband.

However, the survey said that availability of basic broadband services had improved, with Ireland now mid-table among EU countries for broadband availability.

UPC is currently upgrading its network, replacing older cabling with fibre, which is required to deliver next-generation broadband speeds.

http://www.thepost.ie/news/ireland/chorus-ntl-to-launch-premium-broadband-45531.html

CutzEr

cmpunk

Pity a am 10km away from geting UPC ****y 7mb eircom

thebman

This will really force some of the other operators to up their game.

Some are probably limited by technologies used and others will always be cowboys but UPC will become pretty dominant if they do this.

coldfire1x

May be for €100 per month :eek:

Sponge Bob

It was April 2010 not so long ago, any explanation for the delay other than lack of pressure from eircom ????

thebman

Maybe they are just behind schedule. Who knows.

jor el

The service, which will be 50 times faster than broadband speeds in Ireland today

Why must they always use bullsh*t numbers like this when talking about broadband. eircom offer 7Mbps across most of the country, and UPC offer 20Mbps to about a quarter of the country, so since when does 100 divided by 50 equal 20 or 7?

One of Ireland's biggest problems in getting proper services put in place is idiot tech journalists like this. Same crap was spouted after the Imagine Wimax "launch", which still hasn't actually launched. Don't just regurgitate a press release you lazy sods.

thebman

jor el wrote: »

Why must they always use bullsh*t numbers like this when talking about broadband. eircom offer 7Mbps across most of the country, and UPC offer 20Mbps to about a quarter of the country, so since when does 100 divided by 50 equal 20 or 7?

One of Ireland's biggest problems in getting proper services put in place is idiot tech journalists like this. Same crap was spouted after the Imagine Wimax "launch", which still hasn't actually launched. Don't just regurgitate a press release you lazy sods.

I'm guessing its the average speed Irish broadband subscribers have.

BaconZombie

Is it just me or is the maths in the press release flawed?

By their logic 50 x 20 megabits = 100 megabits?????

UPC, <SNIP> home broadband service of 100 mega bits per second (Mbs) <SNIP>

The service, which will be 50 times faster than broadband speeds in Ireland today,<SNIP>

<SNIP> two-thirds of all our new broadband connections are at the highest level possible, ten to 20 megabits."

Sponge Bob

Bull**** Detector.

1. UPC only share about 45 Megabits per cable segment . Therefore a road is maxed out when 3 people get 20 megabits or 5 people get 10 megabots in a neighbourhood . After that it slows right down.

2. As Jor El said only about 1/4 of households can get a 20 megabit service from UPC today and they are not exactly expanding like mad .

About 50% of households can get 3 megabits or higher from eircom . The 'average' of 2mbits is quite plausible seeing as over half of eircoms DSL customers had 1mbit packages as late as 2008. Only about 20-25% of households can get 'up to' 24megabit packages from eircom ..ie over 10 megabits .

About ( fuzzily as it is difficult to be precise) 80% of households can get 1megabit from EITHER eircom OR UPC

lucernarian

Considering only the very smallest exchanges are not enabled, and the pass rate often (not sure how often) includes pairgains now, the number would have to be over 80%. The latest time I heard anything about coverage which was 2 years ago, something like 88% of lines were on an enabled exchange with a pass rate of 89%. As 94% of lines (varies from exchange to exchange I know) can get 28.8k or above, the pass rate then ruled out very long/poor lines and pairgains.

With the figures 2 years ago, availability was 78% or so. Though even with the change in pairgain evaluation and more exchanges enabled since then, I can't see the rate for eircom-only being much more than 85%.

bk

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Bull**** Detector.

1. UPC only share about 45 Megabits per cable segment . Therefore a road is maxed out when 3 people get 20 megabits or 5 people get 10 megabots in a neighbourhood . After that it slows right down.

First of all, They use EuroDOCSIS, rather then DOCSIS so it is 55.62 Mb/s per channel.

The point is that they are moving to EuroDOCSIS 3 which uses 4 channels so 222.48 Mb/s shared.

Yes, it is shared, welcome to the internet, where contention is a fact of life.
Do you want to tell people what their Eircom 1Mb/s DSL connection really is with it's 48:1 contention?

I'd much prefer to have 120Mb/s at 24:1 contention then 1Mb/s at 48:1.

Why the snarkyness SB, UPC seem to be the only people in Ireland who are actually investing in their network and pushing competition here, surely a good thing.

bk

I'm surprised the article mentions 100Mb/s again, I would have assumed they will roll out 120Mb/s like UPC have in all their other countries.

Also while 100/120 Mb/s will be their headline product, the really scary thing for the other ISP's wil be if they increase the speed of their entry level products.

20 to 25 Mb/s BB for €20 to €25 per month

In the Netherlands they do 25Mb/s for €20 per month!!

This would be the product that would really set the market on fire. Decent speed for low prices.

Much better value for money then the crappy 3G products for €20 and there is no way Eircom can charge less then €45 including line rental and at best can do "up to" 24mb/s.

It will be interesting to see how the market responds to this, I'm guessing that Smart, Magnet and Eircom in urban areas with ADSL2+ will be forced into having just one product, an "up to" 24Mb/s product and at entry level price.

jor el

thebman wrote: »

I'm guessing its the average speed Irish broadband subscribers have.

Probably, but they should have qualified the statement by saying average then. Saying it's 50 times faster than broadband speeds available, when 24Mbps is available (even if it's not to many), is a con.

It should have stated that the new speed would be 5 times faster than UPC's current top speed, and 7 times faster than eircom's. That would have at least been accurate.

weisses

The service, which will be 50 times faster than broadband speeds in Ireland today, will place Ireland in the top tier of EU countries for broadband speeds.



So when you get 100 mbit for 1000 people your in the top tier in europe


Riggghhhhttt

GigaByte

weisses wrote: »

So when you get 100 mbit for 1000 people your in the top tier in europe Riggghhhhttt

Do you live under a large stone? UPC have a lot of broadband subcribers, I for one will be looking forward to my 100mb connection

MagicMarker

Jaysus Sponge Bob you're some skeptic!

Sponge Bob

I was not being snarky at all ( save about marketing muppetry) and the 45mbit segment speed is what the UPC Cisco Modems report if you telnet into them .

I also said "80% of households" TBC and deliberately not 80% of lines and I will stand over that .

It is also well known that most households that can get ADSL2+ can ALSO get UPC .

CutzEr

GigaByte wrote: »

Do you live under a large stone? UPC have a lot of broadband subcribers, I for one will be looking forward to my 100mb connection

100mb eh?

Your a bit a way from 1gb anyways..

Steffano2002

Sponge Bob wrote: »

It is also well known that most households that can get ADSL2+ can ALSO get UPC .

I wish that were true...

No NTL in Ashbourne yet we all have ADSL2+. NTL could make a killing in Ashbourne if they offered broadband! A KILLING!

weisses

GigaByte wrote: »

Do you live under a large stone? UPC have a lot of broadband subcribers, I for one will be looking forward to my 100mb connection

how many people in Ireland would have access to this service ???

IMO claiming you are in the top of European broadband you need to be covering at least 90%of the population

I'm happy you can avail of this service but it isn't representing the Irish situation in broadband ... is it?

time to descent from the cloud ur living on :P

dogpile

They should concentrate on giving everyone the option of getting it first before they introduce super dooper BB....someone in 1 street can get it while the next person around the corner can't with the promise of it being available on the never never....how many years have they been "upgrading" ??

Sponge Bob

dogpile wrote: »

...how many years have they been "upgrading" ??

They started 11 years ago and took a break for 3 years so they have been "upgrading" for 8 years .

UPC , at any rate, only pass a bit over 1/3 of Irish homes with their cable , certainly not as many as 40% and that is whether it has been upgraded or not .

dogpile

Sponge Bob wrote: »

They started 11 years ago and took a break for 3 years so they have been "upgrading" for 8 years .

UPC , at any rate, only pass a bit over 1/3 of Irish homes with their cable , certainly not as many as 40% and that is whether it has been upgraded or not .

Yeah well 7 years ago I had their digital tv which was rubbish and no end of problems, was soon ditched....and here I am 7 years on, Digital service I can still get(would hope it's improved by now) but BB still not available

bk

Come on lads, what is with all the whining.

UPC offering new products will benefit everyone, even those who can't get UPC as it will force Eircom, Vodafone, Smart, Magnet, etc. to improve their products and drop their prices, etc.

UPC doing this is a really good thing, they are the only ISP actually investing in their network. Yes I know it is frustrating if your not in an enabled area, but at least we might see some movement in the Irish BB market and it will likely force Eircoms hand to kick off their Next Generation Network.

BTW SB sorry for saying you were being snarky. I'm just surprised at all the negativity from posters here. This is a good thing.

Sponge Bob

I am trying to put this in some perspective .

Q for you BK. Can 50% of all UPC Cable customers get their broadband .....any UPC broadband yet ??

I reckon they just might and that is after 8 years of upgrading . Now I want you to look at two links

1. http://www.lgi.com/europe_ireland.html

UPC Ireland’s customers are located in five regional clusters, including the capital city of Dublin and Cork. Its cable network is 59% upgraded to two-way capacity, with 57% of its cable homes served by a network with a bandwidth of at least 550 Mhz. UPC Ireland makes its digital video, broadband internet, and wire line voice services available to 94%, 59%, and 46%, respectively, of its homes passed.

In addition, UPC Ireland offers to business customers a complete range of telecommunications solutions from standard voice and internet services to more advanced services such as Ethernet LAN extensions, corporate voice services, and high-speed internet. These services are offered to large corporations, public organizations, and small to medium size businesses in Ireland, primarily in Cork, Dublin, Galway, Limerick, and Waterford.

and most importantly

2. http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r20428169-Re-Lets-keep-all-DOCSIS-30-Discussion-in-this-thread-please

particularly the comments on the grade of cable

AlmightyCushion

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Bull**** Detector.

1. UPC only share about 45 Megabits per cable segment . Therefore a road is maxed out when 3 people get 20 megabits or 5 people get 10 megabots in a neighbourhood . After that it slows right down.

Which beats my eircom connection. I have 3Mb and while I used to get that most of the time now it's rare. Right now my connection is at about 1-1.5Mbps. It goes as low as 512kB at times. After about midnight I'll start getting about 3Mbs. At least upc are investing and trying to give people better speeds.

bk

Sponge Bob wrote: »

I am trying to put this in some perspective .

Yes, fair enough.

Sponge Bob wrote: »

Q for you BK. Can 50% of all UPC Cable customers get their broadband .....any UPC broadband yet ??

First of all let me point out I don't work for UPC, never have and I don't have any insider information on UPC.

From what I've heard I believe their BB enabled network is now well over 50%, also I believe a UPC employee has previously commented here on boards that the majority of their upgraded network is 750MHz.

Even the areas with only 550Mhz quality cable, I don't think it is the cable quality that would be the issue, after all 550Mhz should still have space for 3 extra channels for DOCSIS 3, no I think the issue is that older areas haven't been upgraded with Fibre optic nodes feeding the coax.

BTW that is some thread you've pointed me at, lots of reading there

Ah, found the post I think you are looking for:
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=62326581&postcount=16

The upgraded network to this point has been built to 862Mhz with next years build looking to be spec'd to 1GHz.Most of the networks built since 94 have been a 750Mhz design, albeit with 450Mhz amps in some cases, but its just a case of changing the insert to get them up to the higher frequencies.

the_syco

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

At least upc are investing and trying to give people better speeds.

At least UPC are not held back by the government or getting raped by it's owners.

Eircom have to sell it's products to it's competitors at a cheaper rate, and at an earlier date than they can sell to it's own customers... in the name of "competition". They have also not gotten much upgrading done as the Oz owners have done f**k all upgrading :mad:

AlmightyCushion

the_syco wrote: »

At least UPC are not held back by the government or getting raped by it's owners.

Eircom have to sell it's products to it's competitors at a cheaper rate, and at an earlier date than they can sell to it's own customers... in the name of "competition". They have also not gotten much upgrading done as the Oz owners have done f**k all upgrading :mad:

Believe me, I know some of the bull**** eircom have to put up with. I just wish they'd give me a 3Mb connection that doesn't drop to 512kb to 1Mb for more than half the day.

dub45

bk wrote: »

First of all, They use EuroDOCSIS, rather then DOCSIS so it is 55.62 Mb/s per channel.

The point is that they are moving to EuroDOCSIS 3 which uses 4 channels so 222.48 Mb/s shared.

Yes, it is shared, welcome to the internet, where contention is a fact of life.
Do you want to tell people what their Eircom 1Mb/s DSL connection really is with it's 48:1 contention?

I'd much prefer to have 120Mb/s at 24:1 contention then 1Mb/s at 48:1.

Why the snarkyness SB, UPC seem to be the only people in Ireland who are actually investing in their network and pushing competition here, surely a good thing.

Where do you get the contention ratio
for UPC? As far as I can see they studiously avoid ever mentioning it. I cannot find it anywhere on their site.

From their customer support page in respone to a search for 'contention ratio'

FAQ search results

Your search "contention ratio" did not match any documents.
Suggestions:

* Make sure all words are spelled correctly.
* Try different keywords.
* Try more general keywords.

I wrote to them over a year ago asking them what it was and needless to say I am still waiting. Surely if it was as low as 24:1 they would be trumpeting it from on high?

Sponge Bob

It is constantly variable Dub45 . Everybody on a cable segment shares 45mbits .

Therefore 2 x 20mbit hogs will severely degrade a segment where 2 x 3mbit hogs will not . It cannot be descirbed as a ratio because UPC cannot predict where hogs live and sign up .

vandriver

I just tested on speedtest.net @ 98.75 Mbps ! (In Walkinstown)

bk

vandriver wrote: »

I just tested on speedtest.net @ 98.75 Mbps ! (In Walkinstown)

Nice, but are you on some sort of trial? Do you ave a DOCSIS 3 modem?

Most modems UPC have been sending out till now are DOCSIS 2 and couldn't get this speed. Perhaps can you confirm it by trying to download an ISO from heanet?

The uload speed doesn't look so great.

AlmightyCushion

Yeah try downloading something from heanet/rapidshare and post up what speed you are getting.

GigaByte

weisses wrote: »

how many people in Ireland would have access to this service ???

Currently they have 114,001 broadband subsribers so there's 114,000 people who have it now that could get it. Not sure how many can get it but chose not to?

weisses wrote: »

IMO claiming you are in the top of European broadband you need to be covering at least 90%of the population

I'm happy you can avail of this service but it isn't representing the Irish situation in broadband ... is it?

Yes that is only your opinion, for 114,000 other user's your opinion doesn't matter one bit. So to me and the rest UPC will be one of the best but to you that doesn't matter one bit

weisses wrote: »

time to descent from the cloud ur living on :P

Nah, its lovely and sunny up here now!

GigaByte

CutzEr wrote: »

100mb eh?

Your a bit a way from 1gb anyways..

What does mb mean where you are? Up here on my cloud it actually means millibar.

GigaByte

dub45 wrote: »

Surely if it was as low as 24:1 they would be trumpeting it from on high?

They used to have it on there website at 17:1, I don't know where 24:1 comes from??

EDIT: A quick google found this
http://broadbandireland.blogs.ie/category/contention-ratio/

The quick google also found this!
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=53379298&postcount=11

_Sidhe_

Be carefull BK.
No matter how you deny it, anyone who doesn't contest their undying hatred for UPC on boards is considered a super secret company spy.

bk

_Sidhe_ wrote: »

Be carefull BK.
No matter how you deny it, anyone who doesn't contest their undying hatred for UPC on boards is considered a super secret company spy.

LOL, yup, however I think most regulars here know exactly who I am, I got involved here on boards through IOFFL.

BTW Yes I'm wrong about 24:1, I remember NTL previously saying it was 17:1 on their website, 24:1 is for some of Eircoms DSL products.

Either way the point I was trying to make is that I would rather even 48:1 of 120mb/s then 48:1 of 1mb/s.

Sponge Bob

NTL pass around 300,000 homes with Broadband out of 575,000 homes passed with cable which is in turn out of 1.6m homes in the state . They could serve 20% of all homes now and 40% when they are fuly upgraded . They will never provide broadband to the other 60% of us who live off their cable networks and will stick on 40% of homes at most .

Of the 300,000 homes they pass with BB out of their 575000 homes passed by cable they have 114000 signed up . eircom serve more business premises than NTL do and therefore it is difficult to work out how they have done as they do not break out residential DSL from their totals .

I think eircom have around 650,000 DSL connections of which c four fifths or 520,000 are residential but eircom pass around 1.3m homes within a reasonable distance of an enabled exchange @ say 3 miles .

480,000 out of 1.3m is a netch OVER 40% penetration by those passed
114,000 out of 300,000 is also a netch UNDER 40% by those passed but UPC were much further ahead 4 or 5 years ago and eircom caught up !!!!!! However these are 4 month old figures and that is now almost level .

They are almost neck and neck. However eircom is losing customers right now as its high line rental pains people and UPC is gaining many of them off eircom , as they are the fastest growing technology right now ( fater than 3g yes!) apart from wimax as it starts at 0 and UPC want to keep the squeeze on eircom who cannot serve as many of their passed homes with 10 or 20 megabits .

That is why their salesman was blabbing on about 10 and 20 megabit packages in the SBP .

GigaByte

Nice interesting post Sponge Bob

Sponge Bob

One other stat, I amended the DSL ratios above as they were a bit out !!!

At the end of June 2009 the following were the Takeups

Analogue Cable 180k
Digital Cable 240k
BB Cable 125k

These include Dungarvan where the ENTRY level is 20 mbits ...and Longford where the entry level is 9mbits but which are not UPC owned

Now look at the quarterly growth stats

Analogue Cable 180k -8.1%
Digital Cable 240k +4.9%
(but a net loss between them to Freesat and Sky )

BB Cable 125k +10%

That means that BB will be the second most important product for Cable companies early in 2010 and THE most important some time in 2011 .

thebman

Sponge Bob wrote: »

That means that BB will be the second most important product for Cable companies early in 2010 and THE most important some time in 2011 .

I'd consider this to be good news for Irish BB myself. Bad news for other companies in the BB market of course since they will be focusing and investing in it more if it is their most important product.

bk

In some ways BB is already UPC's most important product.

UPC cheap TV + BB bundles are reducing churn of TV customers to Sky, otherwise I believe the churn would be much higher.

Nehaxak

vandriver wrote: »

I just tested on speedtest.net @ 98.75 Mbps ! (In Walkinstown)

I wouldn't really put much faith in testing UPC on Speedtest.net - for some reason, it has always given me huge download speeds reported there, like this one just now (or in my sig)...



I do though always get the full 20Mb in fairness on downloads or whatever.

Can't see myself getting much benefit from 100mb as 20Mb is more than sufficient for me at least but it's great to see UPC looking to invest like this.

thebman

Nehaxak wrote: »

I wouldn't really put much faith in testing UPC on Speedtest.net - for some reason, it has always given me huge download speeds reported there, like this one just now (or in my sig)...



I do though always get the full 20Mb in fairness on downloads or whatever.

Can't see myself getting much benefit from 100mb as 20Mb is more than sufficient for me at least but it's great to see UPC looking to invest like this.

I imagine almost nobody has need for 100Mbps unless your sharing a house with 5 people who each have multiple devices.

Other than that it is just something that is nice to have, I guess especially if it is affordable which will really decide if anyone takes up this 100Mbps offer they plan to implement at some stage.

Sponge Bob

I 'imagine' UPCs filtering system proxys the speedtest request which means that UPC are cheating , large !!!!

Ranicand

Nehaxak wrote: »

I wouldn't really put much faith in testing UPC on Speedtest.net - for some reason, it has always given me huge download speeds reported there, like this one just now (or in my sig)...



I do though always get the full 20Mb in fairness on downloads or whatever.

Can't see myself getting much benefit from 100mb as 20Mb is more than sufficient for me at least but it's great to see UPC looking to invest like this.

Hammer of Thor

Jaysus, ya'd think they'd bring their service to the rest of the country before spending all that money on hooking up 100mb. I hate living here sometimes....