Broadband ashbourne

meath4sam

What's the best broadband in Ashbourne? just for Netflix on tv and general Internet stuff like facebook boards etc. do you have to get a landline for Internet? Why do most come with free landline calls as I have no interest in a landline.

OneEightSeven

meath4sam wrote: »

What's the best broadband in Ashbourne? just for Netflix on tv and general Internet stuff like facebook boards etc. do you have to get a landline for Internet? Why do most come with free landline calls as I have no interest in a landline.

Depends on which part you live in.

Although UPC laid cables down in my estate, I can only get Eircom and its resellers. The newer estates, like Johnswood, Brindley Park, etc... can get both UPC and Eircom. My brother, for instance, can get 30Mb with UPC.

Despite Vodafone trying to scam myself, and many others, by sneaking a fair usage policy in my contract without mentioning it, they are the only company I know of that do a broadband-only package and they're abandoning their fair usage policy on the 1st of March: http://www.vodafone.ie/home-phone-broadband/simply-broadband

You need a landline for the simply broadband package. Your telephone line must also be no longer than 2km to get the simply broadband package.

3G and 4G wouldn't be suitable for Netflix, as you may run-up enormous data usage charges. It's also technically not broadband, we call it midband.

The fixed wireless options here are rubbish and satellite broadband is universally rubbish.

Irish Steve

The fixed wireless options here are rubbish

Depends on where you are and the speeds you expect.

I've got Wimax at the moment, and had it for a number of years and get a reliable 8Mb plus speed pretty much most of the time, with no major hassles in terms of performance and reliability, and we also have phone service with that system, and it's still cheaper than many alternatives.

As mentioned, on the older estates, there's NO UPC broadband, only an ancient out of the ark rubbish cable system that should have been scrapped 15 years ago.

Some of Ashbourne has Fibre enabled, and all of the Eircom resellers are offering various packages on that platform, including Vodafone, Sky, and Imagine.

Parts of Ashbourne can get a wireless service from Ripplecom, and while not the fastest in the area, I have customers that use it without significant issues.

I've not seen any performance reports from the area on how Fibre is performing, I would be concerned that there may be some issues with congestion on Eircom, unless they've put in some extra support for the backhaul to Dublin.

In the same vein, I don't know what backhaul Sky, Vodafone or Imagine are using, so no way to gauge at present the performance of those suppliers, Fibre is still relatively recent in this area.

Get In There

Sorry to bump this old thread but I'm due to get the keys to a house in Brindley Park shortly. As I've still got 6 months left of my UPC subscription, I emailed them to inquire about transferring my subscription to the new address when the time comes, but the UPC rep replied to my email to state that they do not provide services to the estate?! Can anyone in Brindley Park confirm that they are currently with UPC or were with them recently? I don't want to be forced to cancel my contract on account of moving to an estate that UPC don't provide services to and as a consequence have to pay the 200e cancellation fee.

Irish Steve

Not sure if UPC are there or not, but what I am aware of is that there is a lot of work being done at the moment to upgrade the coverage by UPC, it's long overdue, but they are installing new cables in the older estates around Brookville, Huntsgrove and Tudor Grove, and a new supply cable from Tudor Grove going towards Cluain Ri.

As for when it will be finished, or operational, I have no details on that.

The Eircom resellers are all around the area, there's not much price advantage, but I will say that Imagine are giving me very good speeds and the ping is a lot better than some of the other suppliers, so it might be worth talking to them to see what they can offer.

rob808

meath4sam wrote: »

What's the best broadband in Ashbourne? just for Netflix on tv and general Internet stuff like facebook boards etc. do you have to get a landline for Internet? Why do most come with free landline calls as I have no interest in a landline.

Try go for UPC if you can get them they give you the best speed. I would go for either sky or Vodafone second at moment sky half price for first 6 months on one year contract.I won't go near imagine for me there a terrible company bad customer service they charge me twice when I cancel my contract early because of poor broadband I was getting of them. They told me what I need to pay them so I did they came back a week later saying I own them more shouldn't had pay them but I did.

They also keep trying to knock down the NBP speed lower same with ripplecom.I hoping imagine and ripplecom get none of the NBP.

Irish Steve

Just to clarify something there, Imagine have 2 different services, they offer a radio based service, WiMax, which is at best 8 down and .5 up, I had it here for a number of years, and at the time, it was the fastest broadband in the town, but things have moved on some, they also (not aggressively) can offer E-Fibre, and having moved over to that earlier this year, I am very happy with nearly 90 down, and 14 up, and given that I'm nearly 400 meters from the box, I'm not unhappy, the wires into this end of the estate have been there for over 25 years, but so far, it's working well.

Imagine Customer services are not brilliant, but I've had to deal with worse, (Three among other), and the E-Fibre does seem to be faster and have lower pings than some of the other resellers.

OneEightSeven

Irish Steve wrote: »

Imagine Customer services are not brilliant, but I've had to deal with worse, (Three among other), and the E-Fibre does seem to be faster and have lower pings than some of the other resellers.

I think we just get great pings here in Ashbourne. I used to get 6/7ms with Vodafone and I'm currently getting 8ms with Sky.