Irish Networks

rogue-entity

Since Sarge has started a thread on Irish networks providing information an the four networks and there tariffs, I though I would start this thread for others to comment on Sarge's work, as his thread is closed (read only).

First, I will add my 2c's.
Sarge, you are incorrect about Vodafone, Vodafone does not have the largest/best/highest coverage in ireland, actualy Vodafone and O2 have equal coverage with "blackspots" in different areas (O2 works in some places that Vodafone does not and v/v).

Vodafones network does not have the best call quality, in fact in practise the quality on O2's network is far higher then that of vodafone, especialy when makeing cross net calls. Every time I foned friends on voda, all the calls were hissy and of poor quality, they were equaly bad when I foned O2 Cust Care from my friends voda phone. The only time I had good quality calls was when I called landlines and O2 numbers.

I use 3, so far they have the best 3G coverage. Over 60% (although they really need to update there maps).

A-Trak

rogue-entity wrote:

First, I will add my 2c's.
Sarge, you are incorrect about Vodafone, Vodafone does not have the largest/best/highest coverage in ireland, actualy Vodafone and O2 have equal coverage with "blackspots" in different areas (O2 works in some places that Vodafone does not and v/v).

Vodafones network does not have the best call quality, in fact in practise the quality on O2's network is far higher then that of vodafone, especialy when makeing cross net calls. Every time I foned friends on voda, all the calls were hissy and of poor quality, they were equaly bad when I foned O2 Cust Care from my friends voda phone. The only time I had good quality calls was when I called landlines and O2 numbers.
.

I think you'll find Sarge is correct, the percentage of coverage relates to population (i.e. 97% of the population,) not the % of the country covered.

As for voice quality, don't you think that your "data" (calls made by yourself) is a pretty small base to generalise the voice quality of an entire network throughout the country?

Solair

My own personal experience of O2 Speakeasy has been that their voice call quality was kinda "tinny" and I suspect that they're not offering Enhanced Full Rate to speakeasy customers or at least they're bumping them down a service level when the network gets busy.


I've found Meteor's voice quality excellent (in recent months) in comparison.
Likewise, vodafone's is great. Although, I will say that Vodafone gets busier and you do get the good old "conjestion tone" and Netowork Busy far more frequently than on Meteor (I've yet to see it happen hehe)

jesus_thats_gre

Have you tried calling the same Vodafone numbers from a Vodafone/Meteor mobile or a landline and did you experience the same issues with call quality?


Your point regarding coverage is now correct. It was the case that for a long time that Vodafone offered 99% coverage while 02 offered 98%. I think it has only been increased to 99% in the past year or so.

rogue-entity

A-Trak wrote:

I think you'll find Sarge is correct, the percentage of coverage relates to population (i.e. 97% of the population,) not the % of the country covered.

As for voice quality, don't you think that your "data" (calls made by yourself) is a pretty small base to generalise the voice quality of an entire network throughout the country?

No I am correct, O2 and Vodafone both claim to cover 99% of the population and 99% of the country, so I can safely say that sarge was incorrect by stating that vodafone was a better network then O2.

And as for voice calls, when calling any vodafone number from my O2 mobile or a land line the experience was the same, the quality was poor. This is of course my personal experience with vodafone. Anytime I called someone using there network the quality was about the same. Again this is just my personal experience.

AFAIK O2 fully supports EFR and I am sure that voda does as well. It is most likly that my personal experience with the network is to do with the quality of the handsets that my friends are using.

flywheel

rogue-entity wrote:

as his thread is closed (read only)

closed to avoid conversation tangents on a sticky... as this thread has shown

if there are additions / deletions or factual updates PM Sarge and he can contact me to get them updated

soiaf

rogue-entity wrote:

No I am correct, O2 and Vodafone both claim to cover 99% of the population and 99% of the country

Not quite, O2 claims to have 99% population coverage and 95% country coverage.
O2 Site

1huge1

soiaf wrote:

Not quite, O2 claims to have 99% population coverage and 95% country coverage.
O2 Site

lol i was waiting for this rogue-entity to be proven wrong just a matter of time
well done

rogue-entity

1huge1 wrote:

lol i was waiting for this rogue-entity to be proven wrong just a matter of time
well done

Okay, I will admit that I was wrong about the coverage, but my point was that vodafone are not better then O2 and likewise O2 are not better then vodafone. They are generaly considered to be equal (at least according to the staff in CPW).

Anyway, the only reason that I started this thread was for people to have there 2c about the irish phone networks, this also includes land-line networks like eircom and BT.

Sponge Bob

rogue-entity wrote:

No I am correct, O2 and Vodafone both claim to cover 99% of the population and 99% of the country, so I can safely say that sarge was incorrect by stating that vodafone was a better network then O2.

Neither supports 99% geographic , voda support about 96% and 02 about 93%

Im sick of explaining to their call centre muppets that the black spots are outdoors too ' oh our coverage map is not indoor coverage' the gob****es

meteors map is a pure joke, they claim to cover areas that o2 in fairness do not , its amazing how they do it with no cells or nuthin .

rogue-entity

TBH none of the networks coverage maps seem to be very accurate.
On the three website, it claims that there is no 3G coverage where I live, or where my gran lives but I have a full 3G signal in both those places.

Sponge Bob

Sponge Bob wrote:

meteors map is a pure joke, they claim to cover areas that o2 in fairness do not , its amazing how they do it with no cells or nuthin .

About a mile down The road from the back of tesco to the Gorey Wexford Road has no O2 coverage at all , nada,zilch nothing.
Meteor has full coverage there as they have a cell on a hill overlooking that road.
So theres one area that I can categorically say Meteor cover that O2 don't.

Cutie18Ireland

o2 and vodafone are the most expensive out there... especially for us poor ready to go customers!! if everyone moved to meteor we'd all have 5c calls!! well anyways lets be relistic.. vodafone and o2 have been around the longest but this certainly does not mean that they are any good!! they just have lots of advertising!! ive been with all irish networks apart from 3 and i love meteor! vodafone cripple phones with all their mad logos and stuff whereas meteor dont and o2 dont really either apart from a start up screen!! meteor are usually the cheapest for handsets and are the cheapest for calls and texts also!! oh and vodafone 3g was the worst thing they ever done!! DO NOT BUY A VODAFONE 3G HANDSET!! it'll cost you a fortune, eat credit, go dead continuosly and drop most of your calls and even after the 3g phone my sim still wasnt back to what it used to be so that went in the bin too!!

Cutie18Ireland

Cutie18Ireland wrote:

if everyone moved to meteor we'd all have 5c calls!!

No
I'd say what would happen is meteor in that case would put up their price.The market dictates the price, thats why competition is good.

I got my first 3 bill the other day-€25-thats all it was for more minutes than my last meteor one which was around €60.

Lets hope that the mobile co's are forced to open their airwaves to virtual operators and this will come down further.