utterly screwed from every angle...

sibergoth

Rural Co. Clare.
Close to the sea, fresh air, bad roads, utter crap broadband..

Stuck on 2.55Mbps ADSL
Exchange capable of 24Mbps but artificially limited to 3 because the backhaul link is a pathetic microwave link at 16Mbps for a village of 650 people.

Eircom have NO plans to upgrade, despite smaller villages close by being upgraded.

the ADSL is more or less unusable at peak times now. I have a 'samknows' monitor box which reports an hourly speed average at 9pm of a horrific 0.6Mbps down. Only at 3-4am is when i actually see the 2.55Mpbs 'max'

4G will likely never come here.. this is a Three NBS area, I do see good 3G speeds during the day when everyone is at school. but weekends and evenings is very bad again.

Out of range of Ripplecom and other fixed wireless

I pay the same €35 a month to Vodafone for my extremely slow, 10 year old speed, as people with 100Mbps fibre.. (I'll be upgraded for free once fibre is available! but fibre will definitely not be available until the government intervene... if that ever happens)


Satellite is not an option. pathetic speed, upload, download limits and overpriced.


I'm absolutely sick of this. I've been ranting about this for YEARS now... why are rural areas treated like absolute sh1te ?

ED E

This may seem harsh but you have exactly two options:

1. Start a community broadband scheme like B4RN and connect yourselves
2. Move to an area with real broadband, aka a large town or city.


I wont cover it all here, we've had a million threads on it over the last few months on this forum, but rural areas are hard to service. You said it yourself, the roads are sh1te. Your house would cost 2-3x as much if it were in Dublin, but would get great services. This is the tradeoff.

sibergoth

i'm afraid that argument just doesn't wash.. it's been proven in many other countries that rural areas CAN be serviced with broadband as well as cities. The problem is the government have never understood what connectivity actually means.

not everyone can live in a city. not everyone WANTS to live in a city.. that should never mean that those people must suffer sh1te internet...

what if the electricity was only 80 volts because you were rural ?? what if the water flow was a drip because you were rural ??

Hotale.com

Wasn't there some government plan announced a few weeks ago to invest in fibre broadband infrastructure in rural areas? Maybe check that out?


Our broadband is a bit of a joke too, the people at the front our estate got fibre broadband and we're stuck on 8mbps even though we're literally 50m away from them. I'm sure we're the only part of the town that doesn't have it as well.

listermint

So you want Sun Sea Sand, Cheap home, idealic location and super fast broadband too.

Erm, There are trade offs. Thats life.

SteelyDanJalapeno

Would not make any economical sense to supply a village of a few hundred with the infrastructure you'd need.

3Mbps aint bad to be honest.

ED E

sibergoth wrote: »

not everyone can live in a city. not everyone WANTS to live in a city.. that should never mean that those people must suffer sh1te internet...

what if the electricity was only 80 volts because you were rural ?? what if the water flow was a drip because you were rural ??

Most could. Only farmers need to live rurally, and they make up the minority of rural dwellers(BK has the stats somewhere). Most are there by CHOICE. They also pay for septic tanks, have bad roads, pay more for their ESB(which is further subsidised by urban customers), may not have a garda station etc. This is the reality of where you chose to live. If it was all win everyone would live on the coast with great sea views. Its not.

long_b

sibergoth wrote: »

utter crap broadband..

Stuck on 2.55Mbps ADSL

That's about 4 times faster than mine, and I don't have any sea views.

Hotale.com

long_b wrote: »

That's about 4 times faster than mine, and I don't have any sea views.

He's not lying that it's utter crap though, yours is just super ultra crap.

cuculainn

The government plan to bring fibre to rural locations will still be limited to small towns/ villages.....once you go 3-4 km outside the towns you will be back to your copper wire speeds of 0.5 - 1 mps

you really cant expect them to bring fibre speeds to every house randomly scattered around back roads

4g is the only hope for us

syklops

Can we maybe move on from the "You're living in the countryside and there are trade offs" bollox. Its natural to want speedy internet connectivity, and it really isnt that hard or that expensive to provide it.

Incidentally, I live in an apartment complex next to a Luas stop in South Dublin and I can only get 4Mbps.

OP, have you looked at 3g/4g dongle/hotspot options? Im getting a 4g hotspot next month.

Meteors coverage map is here

ElNino

It is totally unfair that eircom haven't run a fibre backbone to Kilmihil but instead of moaning about something that isn't going to change (according to what eircom reps have repeatedly said to you on the Talk To Eircom forum) you have 2 options as I see it:

1. Setup a community broadband scheme like Big Lar did in County Waterford and which is well documented in this thread
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056423539

2. Talk to the ESB and try and convince them to include you in their fibre rollout.

jamo2oo9

It is a bit of pain in the arse when it comes to broadband in rural areas. I have friends who live in the town and I get much better broadband speed than they do and I live at the shore, with the nearest Eircom exchange two miles away. My friends get broadband speeds of 3-5mbs and they would be well connected to the nearest phoneline exchange. We can't get broadband through the telephone line as it's too weak so we got it through the aerial dish (not satellite) and we pay €45 for 10MBs and we get 6-7 all day on average, everyday. Previously, we were getting 0.5-1mbs for the same price.

Don't know where everyone is getting at, if you live by the sea or have a great view, expect to give up broadband?

That isn't the case, we have lots of houses around here that are well isolated with fantastic views and average broadband speeds that the households would be satisfied with.

murphaph

sibergoth wrote: »

what if the electricity was only 80 volts because you were rural ?? what if the water flow was a drip because you were rural ??

In the case of water at least I'm sure you're aware that in many cases there is no water at all and you have to bore a well to build.

What village do you live in?

gctest50

It'll probably get there in the end or you could DIY like these folk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpeM5oAmJIQ

OneEightSeven

sibergoth wrote: »

i'm afraid that argument just doesn't wash.. it's been proven in many other countries that rural areas CAN be serviced with broadband as well as cities. The problem is the government have never understood what connectivity actually means.

I would like to see the evidence for this. Rural areas in other countries have houses in clusters instead of ribbon developments. Ribbon developments are a nightmare of ADSL or cable broadband; however, I understand you live in a village, so the reason why you haven't been upgraded yet is because Eircom were slow to upgrade their technology and bigger towns and villages come first.

not everyone can live in a city. not everyone WANTS to live in a city.. that should never mean that those people must suffer sh1te internet...

I know not everyone can live in a city but the "not everyone WANTS to live in a city" statement made me laugh.

High-speed broadband isn't compatible with rural areas because it costs a lot of money to rollout and theere is no return on investment. Furthermore, housing is cheaper in rural areas because the services are poorer than in cities.

You can't have everything for cheap and if that doesn't suit you; well then, though shíte, a broadband company shouldn't have to pay out of pocket just to give a handful of house high speed broadband. Furthermore, the tax payer shouldn't have to subsidize it because your lifestyle is subsidized enough as it is.

what if the electricity was only 80 volts because you were rural

They have been subsidized already. ESB is state-owned. The tax payer footed to bill for all rural houses getting electricity.

what if the water flow was a drip because you were rural ??

I live in Ashbourne and we have an underground spring with a pump over it. I don't think it's used anymore but settlements are generally built near springs or rivers. If you're stupid enough to build a house miles away from a water source, then that's your problem.

If you're fed up with slow broadband (2.55Mb isn't too bad, certainly not bad enough to warrant huge investment just so you can get faster broadband), then move house.

funnyname

Was this not good news for you?

http://clareherald.com/2014/04/25/broadband-boost-for-56-rural-locations-in-clare-1089/

the.red.baron

ED E wrote: »

Most could. Only farmers need to live rurally, and they make up the minority of rural dwellers(BK has the stats somewhere). Most are there by CHOICE. They also pay for septic tanks, have bad roads, pay more for their ESB(which is further subsidised by urban customers), may not have a garda station etc. This is the reality of where you chose to live. If it was all win everyone would live on the coast with great sea views. Its not.

Alright everyone, lets all move to the city tomorrow, I'm sure Ed E can put us up on his couch, whats the password for your wifi mate?

OneEightSeven

the.red.baron wrote: »

Alright everyone, lets all move to the city tomorrow, I'm sure Ed E can put us up on his couch, whats the password for your wifi mate?

No, you'll have to buy your own house. The city folk subsidize your lifestyle enough as it is: http://www.irishtimes.com/news/consumer/dubliners-get-up-to-50-times-less-funding-than-rural-dwellers-1.1730130

ED E

The funny thing is my 120mb cable connection could support your entire extended family ^_^

the.red.baron

OneEightSeven wrote: »

No, you'll have to buy your own house. The city folk subsidize your lifestyle enough as it is: http://www.irishtimes.com/news/consumer/dubliners-get-up-to-50-times-less-funding-than-rural-dwellers-1.1730130

there are about 400k houses vacant in the city so, no probs so

don't forget all you dole payments

the.red.baron

ED E wrote: »

The funny thing is my 120mb cable connection could support your entire extended family ^_^

Ha ha ha, you only have 120mb internet, what a loser

drumswan

We can run broadband over the new overhead powerlines which are to be installed across the country. Oh but thats right, the country folk object to us paying for their new infrastructure unless its exactly under the terms they decree.

MBSnr

^^^
Meanwhile on the moon they can stream youtube seamlessly....
I'm just about to check the 2014 Census data for the population

http://www.siliconrepublic.com/comms/item/37044-the-moon-officially-has/

murphaph

OP: what village is this you're talking about?

OneEightSeven

the.red.baron wrote: »

there are about 400k houses vacant in the city so, no probs so

It''s doesn't have to be a city, you can move to a town. I live in a town and hoping to get 90Mb in a few weeks.

don't forget all you dole payments

No idea what you're trying to say here. Have you been drinking?

syklops

Well I think we can say the thread is fully off topic now.

bk

sibergoth wrote: »

i'm afraid that argument just doesn't wash.. it's been proven in many other countries that rural areas CAN be serviced with broadband as well as cities. The problem is the government have never understood what connectivity actually means.

It isn't that simple, there are very significant differences between Ireland and other European countries.

First of all, the urban/rural split is 60/40, by far the highest percent of any European country. For instance in France only 10% is rural and that is common of most of Europe. It is much harder to get broadband to everyone in rural areas when 40% of your population is rural versus 10%

Second most houses in rural Ireland are one off houses strung along roads in ribbon developments. Such ribbon developments are a nightmare to supply with broadband as ADSL, cable and even wireless are all distance based technologies and not really suited to supplying broadband to these types of development.

In mainland Europe, typically you have little in the way of such ribbon development, instead most people who do live in rural areas tend to live in small villages or clusters of homes. Much easier to get broadband to these sort of developments then ribbon developments here in Ireland.

Also the reality is that broadband in rural areas isn't that great on mainland europe either. When you go to rural France or Germany, you mostly find just ADSL or ADSL2. Though they do tend to get better performance out of these then we do as they tend to be living in the villages, thus much closer to the exchange. But don't kid yourself, there is little in the way of superfast broadband in rural Europe.

The problem for Ireland is that there is really only one good way to bring decent broadband to rural homes and that is Fibre To The Home, as Fibre isn't really limited by distance. However fibre is frighteningly expensive. The average cost of doing Fibre is €10,000 per rural home (and that is a figure based on the whole of Europe, it is probably higher for Irelands ribbon developments)

Now multiply that by Irelands 40% of rural homes (800,000 homes) and you are looking at a bill of 8 Billion euros, probably closer to 10 billion to FTTH just rural Irish homes!!

We just don't have the money to do this and folks need to be realistic about this.

A more realistic plan, is to get fibre to every town and village in Ireland. This then can be used to get rid of bottleknecks in the exchange like the OP writes about here, power potential VDSL roll outs and help power 4G and fixed wireless access from antennas in the village to feed the surrounding countryside.

But even all this will just bring decent broadband to rural Ireland, you can forget about the superfast broadband of urban Ireland.

In the VERY long term, fibre to every village can be the basis on which we build FTTH to everyone. But again people need to be realistic, it will be on time lines similar to the electrification of Ireland, 80 years, it won't be here tomorrow.

bk

As an aside, many people highlight the electrification of rural Ireland as being a fantastic success story.

Personally I think it is one of the worst policy decisions ever made!

We decided to heavily subsidise those living in rural Ireland for political (vote buying) reasons. Which allowed people to continue to live in rural Ireland.

On mainland Europe, this didn't happen, people had to pay for their own electricity to be installed, which was frighteningly expensive and many couldn't afford it. As a result you had a massive urbanisation of mainland Europe with most people moving to cities and even those who stayed in the countryside (e.g. farmers) moved from one off homes into local villages.

This is actually very beneficial to these countries as it is much cheaper to deliver high quality of services to urban areas and even villages.

We then compounded this very damaging policy with an even worse policy of a very weak planning process which allowed massive amounts of one off homes to be built in ribbon developments along roads.

We are now left with a massive percentage of our citizens living in rural Ireland, who will always be doomed to bad infrastructure, poor roads, poor broadband, no public transport, no hospitals, etc.

_Brian

We also live in rural Ireland and currently get a consistent 1.6mb down via eircom.

Surely further investment in fibre to every rural house is a pipe dream.

Surely 4G or similar technology is the practical answer to rural broadband. I'd have thought that this is where the government should be looking rather than promising fibre in 80years.

bk

_Brian wrote: »

Surely 4G or similar technology is the practical answer to rural broadband. I'd have thought that this is where the government should be looking rather than promising fibre in 80years.

Yes, 4G and fixed wireless is the answer and while we don't have details yet, that seems to be what the new government plan is.

No one is promising FTTH in 80 years or ever! I'm just putting that out there as a realistic long term time line for FTTH.

The government plan seems to be fibre to every village in Ireland and then 4G and Fixed wireless from the village to the surrounding countryside.

And that is a good and reasonable plan IMO. But people need to be realistic, this will bring decent broadband to rural Ireland (i.e. 10 to 20mb/s) but not superfast broadband.