Only four homes remaining without broadband in Ireland.....ComReg

clohamon

Sole remaining ComReg Commissioner, Kevin O'Brien did his first solo in front of the Dáil Committee today, and the department couldn't have hoped for a more reliable communicator of its message.

He managed to convey the impression that only four out of 5,000 applicants to the Rural Broadband Scheme still had issues and that interventions for those four were underway.


No broadband problems in Donegal

The Commissioner was unaware of any problems in Donegal as was his head of wholesale Donal Leavy. Deputy Joe McHugh TD who was quite impressive has already been on the airwaves about this.

http://www.highlandradio.com/2013/03/14/comreg-unaware-of-broadband-problems-for-businesses-in-north-donegal/

The Commissioner also hinted that future mobile monitoring might be venturing off the smooth asphalt of the National Primary roads to check mobile service in more rural areas, but he is happy that coverage obligations are being met at present.

watty

Because they peddle the lie that Mobile and Satellite are Broadband. They provide Internet.

Internet access is NOT Broadband just because it's not on a phone line charged per minute.

eirator

I got nothing out of the Rural Broadband Scheme, I didn't pursue it that far because I didn't waste anyones time trying to get a Satellite connection because you can't where I live, just in the wrong location to "see" the Satellite. So I'd be counted as now having broadband through the scheme - typical govenment scam.

clohamon

eirator wrote: »

I got nothing out of the Rural Broadband Scheme

Don't feel too bad, nobody got anything out of it.

eirator

clohamon wrote: »

Don't feel too bad, nobody got anything out of it.

I didn't really want anything out of it but I don't like the way as a statistic the outcome in my case would have been counted as a positive when the RBS didn't help me in any way.

Interestingly no one else used it that signed up in our area, of 4 others who signed up and followed it through 2 went off and got satellite that wasn't connected with the RBS and 2 others just gave up when none of the wireless operators on their list couldn't help.

clohamon

eirator wrote: »

I didn't really want anything out of it but I don't like the way as a statistic the outcome in my case would have been counted as a positive when the RBS didn't help me in any way.

Interestingly no one else used it that signed up in our area, of 4 others who signed up and followed it through 2 went off and got satellite that wasn't connected with the RBS and 2 others just gave up when none of the wireless operators on their list couldn't help.

Satellite was not a permissible option under the conditions of the EU decision that allowed the scheme (RBS) to go ahead, as it could not meet the performance or affordability criteria.

Footnote 5 page 2

"As explained by Ireland, based on current market prices, satellite broadband is not considered as an affordable option."

Paragraph 10(b)

"The minimum required service will have the following characteristics:…... latency requirements such that common Internet Protocol (IP) applications such as Virtual Private Network (VPN), Voice over IP (VoIP) and gaming may be supported by the broadband service."

eirator

But that didn't stop the department giving everyone that signed up for the RBS an option for satellite so they couldn't fail to have an option to say everyone could get broadband through the scheme, even I can get satellite if I put the dish out in the garden but I've nowhere to mount a dish in a location that will get a signal otherwise.

iirc the reason I didn't go ahead was because I got a pushy sales call from QSat, well that and the fact a Satellite internet connection wouldn't have been any better than my current flaky 3G option and I only get that by having my 3G router 400m away on a hill in a pump house.

clohamon

eirator wrote: »

But that didn't stop the department giving everyone that signed up for the RBS an option for satellite so they couldn't fail to have an option to say everyone could get broadband through the scheme, even I can get satellite if I put the dish out in the garden but I've nowhere to mount a dish in a location that will get a signal otherwise.

iirc the reason I didn't go ahead was because I got a pushy sales call from QSat, well that and the fact a Satellite internet connection wouldn't have been any better than my current flaky 3G option and I only get that by having my 3G router 400m away on a hill in a pump house.

The department's position is that sometime between December 2009 and June 2011 satellite became affordable, and that the height of geo-stationary orbits was reduced, thus eliminating the latency in satellite communications (so as to enable VOIP and gaming).

Around these parts we've also been wondering what happened to the €14.5 million of EU citizens money that was acquired by DCENR for the RBS. Apparently it's unpatriotic to accuse your own government of trousering EU taxpayers money under false pretences. So for the moment we'll just assume its resting in an account awaiting return to its rightful owners.

clohamon

clohamon wrote: »

Sole remaining ComReg Commissioner, Kevin O'Brien did his first solo in front of the Dáil Committee today, and the department couldn't have hoped for a more reliable communicator of its message.

He managed to convey the impression that only four out of 5,000 applicants to the Rural Broadband Scheme still had issues and that interventions for those four were underway.

So what happened to the last survivors? Robert Troy TD asked the question, but its still not clear whether they got any useful help or whether they just gave up.

Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
475. To ask the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources further to Parliamentary Question No 146 of 29 November 2012, in relation to the rural broadband scheme, the actions taken to secure broadband services for the then remaining six applicants to the scheme; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [4257/14]

Pat Rabbitte (Minister, Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources; Dublin South West, Labour)
.
.
My Department was advised by the participating service providers that they had been unable to provide service to a total of 6 applicants. In one of these cases, the applicant obtained a service from another provider, leaving 5 applicants un-served subsequent to the RBS process.
Engineering officials from my Department visited those 5 households in May 2013 and provided advice, having assessed the local topography, on possible terrestrial and satellite providers who could provide a solution. Further information was provided to 2 of those households in September last and my Department has had no further requests for information or advice.
http://www.kildarestreet.com/wrans/?id=2014-01-28a.1002&s=speaker%3A341#g1003.q

BeerWolf

I'm on Mobile Broadband with a 20GB monthly allowance for €30/m, while fix broadband users can enjoy unlimited for less - well done I say...!

/sarcasm

watty

Your so called "Mobile Broadband" can vary in speed by 200:1, only connects on demand and may not connect or it may drop connection due to congestion as that is the only contention control. To avoid congestion the cap (allowance) ought to be about 1Gbyte on cheapest Mobile Internet and only 20Gbyte on €150+ Mobile.

Also voice is subsiding that package as only 0.3Gbyte of voice data would cost about €30 (about 2 hours). ALL data in and out has to be paid for per Mbyte to a 3rd party. Almost no servers on the Mobile operators network. Outgoing call charges to 3rd parties are about equalled by incoming call termination charges. Many calls are entirely on the Operators network. Thus Voice and SMS are obscenely overcharging and Data is undercharged.

Electricity costs for Mobile operator are 100s of times higher than for real fixed Broadband operators.

The Government needs some reality in this. The Ka-Sat (newest Internet Satellite) has 20x capacity of previous satellites for Europe but only 1/80th of that is for Ireland compared with about 1/15th of previous satellites. So in reality about x4 added by KaSat to Ireland, maybe x6 in best case. But the ENTIRE Ka-Sat is only about the same capacity as ONE small exchange or FTTC or UPC cable street cabinet for perhaps 64 homes.

Mobile and/or Satellite and the NBS are not Broadband solutions. LTE/4G just adds some capacity and resilience with easier management. It would be many more times costly in electricity and capital expenditure to even do average ordinary DSL speeds compared to national fibre to every home and business.

A Secondary school via "real" Broadband scheme (Not on FWA or Satellite) only gets about 1/10th of fibre performance but is still 100x better than Mobile and nearly twice entire Irish Satellite capacity during drizzle.

A fibre to the Home can deliver 20x the entire Irish satellite capacity or 300x the average DSL speed. or 4000x the minimum LTE/4G speed. Or the equivalent of 16 off entire capacity of typical 3G masts at peak speed (Mobile is as poor as 1/200th of peak speed).