godskitchen wrote: » Is it just me or is the current ESB fibre network not all that impressive?...... From the published map it looks like they have a lot of fibre to run.
murphaph wrote: » No it doesn't. Have you read anything about the JV? They have named the towns they wish to target in Phase I. They are largely provincial towns with more than 4,000 buildings, so yes, it is going to involve lots of digging in estates which aren't ducted for electricity (lots and lots of them!!). But they aren't doing any of this in Phase I. It's also definitely not cheaper to connect 50 one off houses over 10km² than 50 houses in a single estate, with ducting or not. What are you on about? They don't have "one" fibre serving 100k subscribers. I think you're just trying to knock this project for some weird reason. Google "ESB FTTH" and check out the praise for this project in the industry. It is a huge step Ireland is taking going down this road now. The other providers will be forced to upgrade their last miles to FTTH as well. Ireland will have the best broadband in Europe and most of the world in 10 years if this all goes to plan.
PeadarB wrote: » I currently receive 100/20 e-fibre from eircom so what implications does this new scenario present for me. It will jump me and initially a potential 500,000 premises into a new age of connectivity. I remember back in 1985 when I built my first home being annoyed that I had to pay the ESB so many hundred of pounds to connect my house to the network. Several new poles were required to string the cable to "my poll" from the nearest transformer. A large (1 or 1 1/2 inch) diameter heavy duty black pipe was taken down that pole and routed 30 meters underground, at my expense I might add, to my white box at the side of the house. I was living 5 km from the centre of Letterkenny at the time. Electric Ireland Networks connect to every home and business in the country, using the various power providers, on their own infrastructure. They already have the backhaul in place on their 1,300km figure of eight fibre optic network to main population centres. In Letterkenny it terminates at Lurgybrack, 3 or 4km from the town and has remained dark for years. It will not be too onerous a task to run their fibre cabling to every premises in the town and to outlying areas using the existing distribution system. The fibre can for the most part be strung on existing poles to terminate where the power line runs down that fat pipe into each premises. Compared to building a new fibre network the costs should be moderate as the infrastructure is practically in place. A project of this magnitude requires capital investment. A return on this investment can only take place over time. €450 million is small change to both these companies, who with a little bit of foresight(mostly the ESB's) have now the potential to flood the country with a world beating new age comms system. This still requires EU approval and if eircom whinge as much as their opposition did to ComReg in the run-up to the e-fibre roll-out we could be in for a good wait. Though Electric Ireland Networks, as a semi-state company are in a strong position to ride out any opposition. No contention, no concerns about SNR or crosstalk or latency, no concerns about distance to the cabinet. Let the fun begin...
MajesticDonkey wrote: » I admire your enthusiasm but I strongly believe that what you're hoping for is completely and utterly not going to happen by 2020. I would however love to be proven wrong.
fergus1001 wrote: » I can see eircoms network becoming redundant over the next 10 years and the company itself get into serious trouble because of the lack of line rental and income from other operators using there network
football_lover wrote: » By about 2018 which is four years away it will start to become apparent in agriculture and rural businesses that they do not have a proper communications system to be able to deal with the technology requirement of intense agriculture.
dalta5billion wrote: » How does Agriculture especially need fibre? I can't think of any farming activity that requires high bandwidth. LTE should more than suffice.
football_lover wrote: » You are living in a fantasy world if you believe that Ireland will have the best broadband in Europe in ten years time.
football_lover wrote: » There are large numbers of people in this country that are not getting broadband with an acceptable level of service.
football_lover wrote: » They have no intention of building rural networks in Ireland that can allow people living in the countryside to have fast broadband.
football_lover wrote: » There are even people on this forum that will respond with move to urban areas.
football_lover wrote: » It would be easier at this point to do FTTX than in rural settings than in urban settings and probably cheaper.
murphaph wrote: » Time will tell. The Eircom VDSL rollout however bodes well for my prediction. Hence the 3 large scale projects designed to address that: Eircom's VDSL, ESB's FTTB and the national broadband plan to bring fibre to 1000 towns and villages. I'm not aware of any other country with such ambitious plans in play right now. Do you mean one off houses or people in rural Ireland? Or not build isolated one off properties. Farmers are a special case. Most people living in isolation don't need to. They choose to. Still, eventually even these lines will be upgraded to FTTB. Nonsense on both counts.
murphaph wrote: » we are actually now moving towards FTTB. The ESB/Vodafone JV will get 25% of all premises in the state on FTTB in Phase I alone (by 2018). Phase II (AFAICT) aims to add another 25% and assuming it takes a little longer but not much longer than Phase I then within 10 years Ireland will have 50% of all premises in the state equipped with FTTB. I promise you now that no other sizable (the likes of Andorra & Lichtenstein excepted) country in Europe (depending on how the Latvians continue with their extensive FTTB programme) will match this level of penetration and that's before we even consider the effects of the ESB's plan on Eircom and UPC. These 2 companies (especially UPC) will be forced to replace their last miles with fibre and as the ESB intends avoiding UPC areas initially, we can expect that this will push the number of premises with FTTB to over 60% in 10 years. That would be simply phenominal and would leave most of Europe in our dust. The critical mass would have been achieved and there would be high quality fibre backhaul densely spread around the country to provide REAL wireless broadband options to our farmers and those who choose to live in isolated one off properties. Make no mistake the ESB's plan here is revolutionary stuff. Will there still be one off properties in Ireland in 20 years who can't access "decent" broadband? Yes, probably, but very few I suspect.
same ol sh1te wrote: » You're counting chickens......
murphaph wrote: » Ireland does a lot of stuff really badly but it's getting its broadband sh!t together. Anybody but the most pessimistic person can see that.
same ol sh1te wrote: » Nonsense, the digital divide is getting worse, the communications regulator doesn't regulate broadband and only exists to make money. The government lets the market fend for itself and then gifts a mobile phone company money for a band aid fix to build a network they were going to build anyway, to go along with the 3 mobile networks we already have, with no stipulations for future infrastructure sharing. We are far from clapping ourselves on the back.
murphaph wrote: » Come to Germany and see that there's a "digital divide" here as well! Of course there is. Infrastructure is simply easier to implement in urban areas. Dial up or 64kbps ISDN is still used here too! If you can't see that Eircom bringing (vectored!) VDSL to 1.4 million premises in a country the size of Ireland is positive then I don't really know what to say. Eircom have plans (you can see them on their site) to locate cabinets in hundreds of really small places, many with a handful of houses. Coupled with the ESB project to bring FTTB to 500k premises and the government's subsidised 1000 small town/village rollout how can you say that broadband is not improving?
hallo dare wrote: » It's not improving in my area or for thousands of houses in this and neighbouring parishes!
same ol sh1te wrote: » Ninja edited my post above while you were posting. Yes I do see this and Eircoms plans as good moves, but without joined up thinking (and using wireless technologies) we will never tackle this digital divide. The problem is the lack of a long term plan, every new minister only cares about the next four years
murphaph wrote: » So it's not worth doing anything if it doesn't immediately benefit your parish? Or what was your point?
murphaph wrote: » To be honest so long as the fibre keeps getting blown then we should be broadly happy that things are progressing. Quality wireless solutions need that fibre back haul so if it's put in to service VDSL it will also be there for wireless base stations. We could also see small pole mounted VDSL units but again, the fibre has to be brought to them first.
same ol sh1te wrote: » The problem with wireless is that Comreg are making a pigs ear of it, getting in the way, they see it as a cash cow. Licensed links are a ridiculous annual fee (last I heard it was over €1000 pa where it was ~£50 in the UK) and Fwa licences are limited to 20km circles.
murphaph wrote: » No argument from me there but the fibre is permanent. Comreg can be removed from the equation at the stroke of a minister's pen. It is strange for sure that the country built those MANs which are pure fibre open access low cost and then the same country has barriers to wireless like you mention above.
murphaph wrote: » ...ESB intends avoiding UPC areas initially...
Liamario wrote: » Can you clarify what you mean by this. Mullingar for example has UPC (it's patchy, but it's there), but it's on the list of 50 for this venture.
