Eircom NGB or Imagine WiMax

Posted by: Sean | Posted on: April 28th, 2010 | 15 Comments

Currently my broadband provider is Eircom, I have tried them all from BT to Perlico and although Eircom's service is terribly slow, i found that the other Internet Service Providers (ISP) were just as bad, the main problem I have is to do with the download usage allowance, Perlico and BT both have set limits and enforce them, so as soon as I went over my limit I got an extremely high bill.

However, with Eircom even though they say they have a download limit, they do not enforce it, if I go over my limit nothing happens. This is why every time I switched to a different provider I ended up switching back to Eircom.

When I first heard about the new WiMax service that Imagine are rolling out across Ireland I decided that I would get it as soon as it becomes available in my area. My current broadband speed is 3mb (up to) and Imagine are offering 7mb (up to) at a cheaper price with unlimited usage allowance. It was the selling point here for me, I could get  a great boost in download speed for a cheaper price, why wouldn't I switch? Apparently the unlimited usage allowance of Imagine WiMax is not actually "Unlimited", I didn't expect it to be.

Imagine WiMax deem anything over 35gb a month to be excessive usage! That is a terrible cap to put on as excessive usage, that is just 5gb over my current cap with Eircom of 30gb which I do go over and do not get charged.

Since finding out about Imagine WiMax I found out that Eircom are also rolling out a new broadband service, they call it NGB (Next Generation Broadband). Eircom's NGB has a standard download speed of 8mb (up to) with unlimited usage allowance. All current 1mb, 3mb and 7mb users will be upgraded to the Eircom NGB for free! I looked up what Eircom actually deem to be fair usage and I have to agree it is a great cap, I definitely do not see myself going over it.

Eircom are setting their fair usage cap to 250gb a month :D . This download cap is only available on the highest end of the NGB packages, the high end NGB package costs about €10 more than my current broadband package. Also the maximum that Eircom will be charging for broadband is €50, so if you go really far over this cap, your bill will only run up to €50, no matter which NGB broadband package you are on :D .

I think for now, I will hold out and wait for the new Eircom service, the map on the Eircom NGB website says it should be available in my area between September and December of this year.

Eircom block PirateBay.org – Internet Censorship

Posted by: Sean | Posted on: September 3rd, 2009 | 2 Comments

The beginning of internet censorship has begun in Ireland, with Eircom getting the ball rolling by blocking the Internet’s most popular torrent downloading site, The Pirate Bay. After recently losing a court case, Eircom have now been forced to block any domain that is currently hosted on the PirateBay server's or any domain that directs to the PirateBay ip address. The image below is what appears when you try to visit The PirateBay.org: The Irish Recorded Music Association (IRMA) plans to bring the remaining ISP in Ireland to court to try and get them to follow Eircom and block access to the site too. I wonder how long this ban will actually last, surely people do not want their internet censored, so if Eircom can easily block this one site, surly they will not hesitate in the future to block more.

Eircom Hacked?

Posted by: Sean | Posted on: July 19th, 2009 | 5 Comments

My internet service provider (ISP) is Eircom. I always notice that my c0nnection is really slow, and apparently that is to be expected with Eircom.

However last Monday my broadband was actually cutting out now and again and was becoming slow at loading pages every so often. I thought nothing of it, I just put it down to the fact that Eircom's broadband was always that slow.

Then on Wednesday of this week I was reading the newspaper (The Argus) and found an article saying that Eircom had been in fact hacked on the Monday night that I had experienced the really slow page load speed!

Apparently a lot of unwanted traffic was directed to the Eircom servers, which caused a strain on the servers and by chain reaction caused a lot of users to experience either really slow speeds or to lose their internet connection completely.

I then went over to Eircom's tech support page and saw a customer notice explaining the problem that occurred, the article below is the notice they published to their site which was put up the day after the problem was fixed.

I was also reading an article about how Eircom are fully aware that there network is slow at times, and apparently they say they have no intention in the near future of upgrading their networks. You would think that since they are one of the most popular Internet Service Provider's in Ireland that they would want to have the best service available.

We currently subscribe to a package for our landline and our broadband to be in one bundle. When you sign up to Eircom you must take out a one year contract with them, it is a clause they have built in to keep their customers.

However our one year contract is up and we have begun to look at other providers to see what they have to offer. Recently Vodafone have started to offer a bundle for your landline and broadband and are giving it at a much better price.

My current broadband speed it 3mb however I could change to Vodafone and upgrade my broadband to 7.6mb and still save money!

The only thing stopping me at the moment from changing is that I have to find out more about their broadband.

First I want to see if it is actually good and second is they say they have a 30gb download limit, I want to know if they actually enforce this limit or do they let you away with going over it because I know with Eircom they have the same limit however they do not enforce any penalties if you go over it.