Castlebar Internet

Notch000

Im looking at upgrading the parnents interent in castlebar. Im used of 25mb UPC in galway and am shocked at how bad their eircom service is. Its generally slow drops connection and very often doesnt work at all. its pretty hopeless for xbox live & netflix

so what are other options available ??? are all connections run on eircoms network ????

the house is 2 miles out side of town.

finisklin

I'm in the process of leaving Eircom and signing up to Vodafone. It's a efibre line which they say will improve the download speed. Their packages have unlimited downloads which is great. Eircom has a limit. Only thing is it is a eircom line. Vodafone says you can get up to 70mb download speed, will have to withhold judgement on that though.

Really fed up with Eircom though, slow and can be intermittent.

I'm in Ballina, btw. Interested to hear other perspectives county wide.

I have no connection to Vodafone.....was recommended by a mate. Link here to package.

yop

Just outside Cbar and can't even get wired broadband. Have heard the wired in town is poor.

Notch000

im only getting, 1.5mb download and 0.2 upoad on the current set up, he vodafone test said i should be able to get 24mbs on our curenet line, might call them up

yop

Notch000 wrote: »

im only getting, 1.5mb download and 0.2 upoad on the current set up, he vodafone test said i should be able to get 24mbs on our curenet line, might call them up

Bet if you read the T&C's then you will see its best possible rate.

Notch000

5 or 10mb would be fast enough for anyone if it worked consistently

Mickeroo

I used to have 8mb in Castlebar, around Aglish/Gladesville. Found it very good, Netflix used to stream in HD and never had any problems for gaming either. That was with eircom too.

Seriously doubt you'll get 25mb vodafone outside the town, they'll only be able to provide similar speeds to eircom afaik since they just piggyback off their lines.

Dudda

It depends what part of Castlebar you are in. In the town you get this on Vodafone:

Download: 35.96 Mbps
Upload: 11.75 Mbps
Ping: 31 ms

But I know eircom are still rolling out their efibre around the town which affects Vodafone as its eircom infrastructure they use. For example it's the Breaffy Road and the businesses along it that are getting updated this week so they should all get a big speed boost this week if of course they get the technician out for free and update their router and connection.

Your best to check their maps to see what areas are currently covered and if not yet covered which areas are due for upgrade and when. Just contact them if you're not sure.

irishgeo

be handy to know a general area your in notch

out the westport rd and i have efibre with vodafone.

old broadband is based on the distance from the exchange.

fibre is based from the nearest green cabinet with a fibre one beside it. the one on the right. http://oi47.tinypic.com/r1zy1d.jpg

Notch000

I need to ring them but there seems to be An exchange 500mtrs away so should be ok

finisklin

How do you identify where the exchange is?

Notch000

n5 power station

witnessrenegade

I live out the Breaffy Rd, have Vodafone broadband, it is terrible, I would love if UPC came to Castlebar, great to have when I lived in Galway!

irishgeo

the exchange in castlebar is up behind the court house.

this map shows the location of all the fibre mini exchanges in castlebar. breaffy has a mini exchange as well.
https://www.google.com/fusiontables/DataSource?docid=1M_lYcvMkt7xIqqSa43TdS1s25oRqtA2JgpxAkYM#map:id=4

Dudda

witnessrenegade wrote: »

I live out the Breaffy Rd, have Vodafone broadband, it is terrible, I would love if UPC came to Castlebar, great to have when I lived in Galway!

How far out the Breaffy road? If your not in the eircom fibre area it's unlikely UPC would go out further if they came to Caatlebar. Their arrival would only suit those in the town.

finisklin

Check out this site http://www.broadbandspeedtest.ie/ which handily shows how good/poor your broadband is.

The interesting thing about it is the option on the right hand side which compares broadband plans. You include your phone number and it shows up the different providers and costs.

Interesting that it shows Vodafone as having the fastest broadband in Ballina at 70mb per second.

TheBully

im Getting the max 24mbps download and 8mbps upload. In Ballina and with eircom BTW

witnessrenegade

Dudda wrote: »

How far out the Breaffy road? If your not in the eircom fibre area it's unlikely UPC would go out further if they came to Caatlebar. Their arrival would only suit those in the town.

Living at Kilkenny Cross near the roundabout

irishgeo

witnessrenegade wrote: »

Living at Kilkenny Cross near the roundabout

should have no problem getting fibre there.

captain_boycott

irishgeo wrote: »

should have no problem getting fibre there.

unfortunately not.

Kilkenny cross is over 1km from the Moneen cab. However when eircom deploy the next phase of efibre which will extend service to up to 2Km, then there is a slim chance, depending on the copper quality to your house. I hear it might be avaliable soon.

But you should get up to 5Mb with plain old Dsl from there.

captain_boycott

irishgeo wrote: »

should have no problem getting fibre there.

unfortunately not.

Kilkenny cross is over 1km from the Moneen cab. However when eircom deploy the next phase of efibre which will extend service to up to 2Km, then there is a slim chance, depending on the copper quality to your house. I hear it might be avaliable soon.

But you should get up to 5Mb with plain old Dsl from there.

seligehgit

Seems to be mixed reviews re Vodafone?Thinking of swapping over to their Simply Broadband package.

seligehgit

irishgeo wrote: »

the exchange in castlebar is up behind the court house.

this map shows the location of all the fibre mini exchanges in castlebar. breaffy has a mini exchange as well.
https://www.google.com/fusiontables/DataSource?docid=1M_lYcvMkt7xIqqSa43TdS1s25oRqtA2JgpxAkYM#map:id=4

Thanks for that,very informative.

DuckSlice

I'm in achill and can get 7mb if needed. It's not next generation as eircom call it but it would be fast. Just opted for the 3mb tho as it's good enough. Runs at 2.6mb. Surely you could get that in cbar,

Alpha Dog 1

Anyone any idea whats the best broadband out the westport Road in Castlebar?

yop

Alpha Dog 1 wrote: »

Anyone any idea whats the best broadband out the westport Road in Castlebar?

From what I understand you can fixed line BB out as far as Cloonkeen, but after that there is no fixed line. Most of us have Westnet.

Alpha Dog 1

yop wrote: »

From what I understand you can fixed line BB out as far as Cloonkeen, but after that there is no fixed line. Most of us have Westnet.

Didn't even consider westnet, thought only sky, eircom and Vodafone were available. I presume they will all have similar speeds since they all work off eircom infrastructure. Don't want to get tied into a contract though.

White Heart Loon

Westnet now do 4 mbit down, 1 up for €45
http://westnet.ie/packages/

yop

Alpha Dog 1 wrote: »

Didn't even consider westnet, thought only sky, eircom and Vodafone were available. I presume they will all have similar speeds since they all work off eircom infrastructure. Don't want to get tied into a contract though.

Ya, I honestly can't complain about them, use it a lot as work from home but speeds have always been good.

runawaybishop

White Heart Loon wrote: »

Westnet now do 4 mbit down, 1 up for €45
http://westnet.ie/packages/

When did they start that? I've been waiting for them to up their speeds so i can go back to them, always found they had good service.

Alpha Dog 1

I take it that UPC are not available in Castlebar?

Kristopherus

Alpha Dog 1 wrote: »

I take it that UPC are not available in Castlebar?

Chorus, now part of UPC, ripped up the town in the late 80's/ early 90's and then f***ed off and left the Town Council to pick up the repair tag. That cost is now a first charge on any permission UPC might get to cable the town in the event they decide to do so (unlikely imho).

Alpha Dog 1

Anyone any experience with Sky broadband?

irishgeo

Kristopherus wrote: »

Chorus, now part of UPC, ripped up the town in the late 80's/ early 90's and then f***ed off and left the Town Council to pick up the repair tag. That cost is now a first charge on any permission UPC might get to cable the town in the event they decide to do so (unlikely imho).

apparently nobody is allowded touch the cable in the ground despite it being all cabled up and ready to roll.

White Heart Loon

irishgeo wrote: »

apparently nobody is allowded touch the cable in the ground despite it being all cabled up and ready to roll.

What cable, I thought the ducts were empty?

irishgeo

White Heart Loon wrote: »

What cable, I thought the ducts were empty?

apparently not.

A previous meeting of the Council had heard a frank admission from the executive that there was never a written agreement with Chorus in relation to the work, that the piping and wiring that was laid will never be used and that the Council do not have maps of where the work was carried out.

source: http://www.mayonews.ie/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=5146&Itemid=26

oscarBravo

Just because someone says there's cable in the ducts doesn't mean there's cable in the ducts.

White Heart Loon

oscarBravo wrote: »

Just because someone says there's cable in the ducts doesn't mean there's cable in the ducts.

Exactly, this is old but I'd the only info I could find online. The ducts are empty. http://www.castlebar.ie/board/2004/aug/98031.htm

Kristopherus

Alpha Dog 1 wrote: »

Anyone any experience with Sky broadband?

I have Sky since last Feb. Had Voda before that & was getting up to 8mbps and actually 5.5 to 6.5 mbps. Was happy with that as it allowed streaming without glitching. With Sky, though, I'm getting 14-18mbps, which is miles ahead of Voda. Very happy with it so far. Now they're proposing to raise the tarriff from €17.50 to €40.00 from mid-Feb. I'll have to eke some concession out of them. Fibre is available from several providers for that amount.

Alpha Dog 1

I can get Efibre and evision for 50 euro per month. Seems very good deal. Only problem is the 18 month contract.

Kristopherus

Not that I'm a lover of all things Sky, far from it, but if they want to stay in the race, they will have to pitch their skyfibre tarriffs lower than either Eircom or Voda.

Alpha Dog 1

They're basic TV package is quite expensive as well. I don't watch much TV and most of what I watch is sourced online so a better Internet connection is more important than TV.

naughto

Alpha Dog 1 wrote: »

I can get Efibre and evision for 50 euro per month. Seems very good deal. Only problem is the 18 month contract.

I have fiber with eircom have to say its very good,was with sky b 4 this line could only hold 4mb.

They have blocked kickass torrents as of a few days ago.put you can get around this with a proxy.
I have stand alone fiber,did not take a calls package for 40euro a month

Alpha Dog 1

naughto wrote: »

I have fiber with eircom have to say its very good,was with sky b 4 this line could only hold 4mb.

They have blocked kickass torrents as of a few days ago.put you can get around this with a proxy.
I have stand alone fiber,did not take a calls package for 40euro a month

I've been quoted 35 per month for phone, fibre (70 meg) and evision for the first 6 months then 50 per month after that. Seems a good deal. Won't have it for another 2 weeks so will report back with a review once I get it up and running.