Choosing a broadband supplier shouldn’t be a tricky business. Yet for many of us the procedure is shrouded with mystery and more than a whiff of brimstone.
In the past couple of years we’ve seen the emergence of many broadband providers to challenge the ‘big two’. So, despite what some people say there is a reasonable choice out there and prices have also come down.
Despite the improving landscape, broadband take up in Ireland is still under 10% of the population. Comparing that to our nearest neighbours in the UK, that boast an impressive 35%, not to mention our more progressive European counterparts in France and Holland, we seem to be trailing quite badly.
There are many reasons why we’re in this position, some blame the telco companies while others point to the government. Also the public has become more aware of the machinations of the telco sector, the spats, feuds and court cases get regular mainstream news coverage.
Yet the companies are out there, hungry to do business with you and eager to prove that broadband will improve your life without over burdening your pocket. Furthermore, there’s plenty of new services such as triple play that brings broadband, TV and voice down one pipe. For residential users, there are some good packages available. The following, in no particular order, attempts to guide the home user around the various options.
Magnet operates in what’s known as the triple play space. Its entry level product entitled Magnet Intro is a broadband and telephony service. It has a 4 Mb download with 4 Mb upload if you’re in one of the new housing developments equipped with fibre to the home technology. If you’re not, it has an upload speed of 512Kbps. There’s a 100Gb monthly usage allowance. If the allowance is not used in one month it is not carried forward. It has an introductory offer of €18 per month for the first two months and €28 per month thereafter.
Magnet Lite’s package is the same for broadband as its Intro package. The difference is the voice phone tariffs are more favourable. It has an introductory offer of €28 per month for the first two months and €38 per month thereafter.
Magnet’s Entertainment package has up to 8Mb down and 8Mb up depending on, again, if you’re in a housing development with fibre to the home. If not, you can expect upload speeds of up to 512Kbps.
There’s a monthly 150Gb usage allowance, if unused within the month it is not carried forward.
In addition, this package brings you 30 digital channels with free local and national calls. The cost is a very reasonable €59 per month. And there’s a special introductory offer of €34 per month for the first two months.
For a further premium you can also avail of Magnet’s Sky by wire service. This will allow you to view Sky’s premium rate channels such as movies and sport via your broadband connection as opposed to a satellite dish. Prices range from €31.50 to €49.50 per month
The rub here, though, is Magnet’s services is limited to the cities and suburbs of Dublin, Cork, Galway, Limerick and Waterford.
Irish Broadband
No phoneline required would be one of Irish Broadband’s marketing angles. And it is on to something of a winner with this philosophy if a recent study by Comreg is anything to go by. According to the regulator, the vast majority of people under 40 don’t have or want a landline.
Irish Broadband has three residential products – Ripwave is a plug and play box that can be purchased at several retail stores. Buy it, bring it home, plug it into a power outlet and into your PC and you’re online with speeds of 512Kbps both ways.
Breeze 1Mb provides speeds of 1 Mb down and 1Mb up for €35.99 a month. This involves getting a small aerial put onto the roof of your house and a cable run inside and into a modem/router
Breeze 2Mb delivers speeds up to 2Mb down and 2Mb up for €48.40 per month. Again, it comes in via an aerial on your roof.
Contention rates on the three products are 48:1, 48:1 and 24:1, respectively.
Digiweb
Digiweb offers wireless, DSL and satellite broadband. Its standard residential package comes in at €29.95 incl VAT with a connection fee of €29.95 incl VAT. That gets you speeds of up to 2Mb down with a 20Gb cap.
Its home wireless package is called Homewave – it provides 512 kbps down and 128 up at a cost of €35 per month with a 10Gb cap and 36:1 contention ratio. You also pay an €€89.66 (incl vat) installation fee.
Metro has been gaining some attention of late. It’s Digiweb’s latest product and delivers free phone line rental with reduced call charges and 3Mb to 6Mb broadband. Its sights are also set on including high definition TV and video on demand into that package.
The basic offering costs €42.35 including VAT and gets you 3Mb down and 512kbps up with a 30Gb cap and contention ratio of 40:1. Installation fee is €112.36 incl VAT.
At the moment Metro is available in Dublin, Cork, Waterford, Limerick, Galway and Dundalk.
NTL & Chorus Bundled together because they are going through a merger, both companies have separate offerings; though expect this to change when the organisations become one.
NTL Broadband Starter is a 1Mb product with 100Kbps upload and a 17:1 contention ratio for €24.99 incl VAT (free for the first three months).
Broadband has a 2Mb connection speed with 200Kbps up and a contention ratio of 17:1 for €29.99incl VAT (free for first three months).
Broadband Max has a 3Mb connection speed with 300Kbps upload and a contention ratio of 17:1 for €39.99 incl VAT (free for the first three months)
While there is no connection fee on any of these products, consumers who aren’t NTL customers should expect to pay a fee to get connected.
Chorus
Cablenet Broadband Easy gets you 512Kbps down and 128Kbps up. This has a 10Gb limit and is normally €25 per month. Currently, there’s a special offer that secures the service for 10 months for €19.95 per month.
Cablenet Broadband increases the speeds to 1.5 Mb down and 385Kbps up the cap is higher at 20Gb. Pricing is €35 per month with an offer of €29.95 per month for the first 10 months. You can also avail of a further discount if taken with another Chorus service (TV/phone).
Cablenet Broadband Plus ramps it up a further notch with 3Mb down and 512Kbps up with a sizeable 40Gb limit. This comes in at €45 per month with a special offer of €39.95 per month for 10 months. If you take on Chorus’s TV or phone products you can avail of further discounts.
Available in Cork, Kilkenny, Naas, Clonmel and Thurles, consumers who aren’t customers of Chorus will pay a connection fee.
Imagine
Imagine’s entry level product, On Demand, is €9.99 per month with a 20 hour time limit. For that you get 1Mb connection and 128Kbps upload with a 48:1 contention rate
Its higher end product, Always On Premium, costs €39.99 for 3Mb down and 384Kbps up with a 24:1 contention ratio with a 20Gb limit on downloading.
In between the two are Always On and Always On Plus. Always On costs €19.99 per month for a 1 Mb line with upload speeds of 128Kbps and a 12 Gb download limit.
Always On Plus costs €29.99 for 2Mb download and 256Kbps upload speeds with a 16Gb limit for downloading.
With the exception of On Demand all of Imagine’s other products have a €44.99 connection fee.
BT Ireland
BT has three options for home users priced at €20, €30 and €40 per month respectively.
Option 1 has speeds up to 1Mb download/128Kb upload and a download limit of 10Gb per month.
Option 3 speeds up to 3Mb download/384Kb upload and a download limit of 30Gb per month.
All options have a €40 connection fee, but if you are transferring from another provider and have a modem/router connection is free. If you bundle in BT’s voice service you can avail of further discounts.
BT is also in negotiations to bundle Yahoo Communicator with its broadband service. Discussions are ongoing as to what the exact nature of that will be.
Eircom
Eircom has recently reduced its rates across a number of its residential offerings. Its entry level product, Time, gives you 20 hours of broadband for €19.99 per month. Speeds are 1Mb/128Kbps.
Starter has the same speeds and is €29.99 per month, it is not capped on time and has a download limit of 10Gb.
Home Plus is a 2Mb/256Kbps product, coming in at €39.99 with a 20 Gb cap.
Home professional is a 3Mb/384Kbps product coming in at €54.45 with a 30Gb cap.
Smart Telecom
Thanks to an aggressive media campaign and a very strong hook – free line rental – Smart is probably one of the more well know providers outside of Eircom and BT. For €35 a month you get a 3Mb/356Kbps broadband connection with free line rental and discounted calls on its voice service. People interested in Smart broadband will need to switch to its voice product which means, at this stage, changing your phone number.
The company has recently released some new products – 4, 5 and 6 Mb for €45, €55 and €65 respectively.
It is also developing a triple play service for green-field sites.
Irish Broadband is using this new technology in Killaloo as part of the government broadband scheme. Previously, Killaloo had no broadband service.
As a part of the Wimax forum companies such as Intel, have been helping to develop this new standard. Essentially, it’s Wi-Fi on steroids or as Colin McHale, Intel’s country manager for marketing and sales said, “it’s often called the big brother to Wi-Fi”.
McHale said that with the right condition you can get distances of up to 30 kilometres whereas with Wi-Fi the distances are usually around 150 feet from the base station.
Intel is helping to drive this standard forward and by 2007 McHale reckons most notebooks will have a Wi-Fi and Wimax capability built into the Centrino chip.
Satellite broadband company Aramiska closed its operation in late January. Both Digiweb and Pure Telecom gained at its expense as it mopped up some of the business left behind.
According to John Quinn of Digiweb, his company was able to offer many of Aramiska’s customers DSL and wireless broadband, which is significantly cheaper and more efficient than a satellite connection.
In the middle of February Ouranos Networks, a company that took over Aramiska’s activities said that the service was up and running again.
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