Posts Tagged ‘Eclipse Internet’

Almost at Journey’s End : UltraFast Broadband FTTP (FTTH) Ordered!

Monday, June 18th, 2018

The story so far, last September 2017, BT Openreach, connected fibre tails to the bottom of my telepgraph pole! It was hoped that we would have Ultrafast broadband installed by Christmas 2017, East Riding of Yorkshire Council (kind of responsible for the BDUK Project) told me it should be by the end of the Year (2017), but nothing happened, and all references to completion disappeared and changed to By the End of 2018!

btopenreachengineers1

In February 2018, Openreach Engineers, came out to the shire, I sent the drone up to spy on them....

and fitted these to the telegraph poles

This is how you know the Pole is Fibre Enabled!

This is how you know the Pole is Fibre Enabled!

and this is my “personal” pole!

8 Fibre Connectors at top of pole

8 Fibre Connectors at top of pole

and another pole

8 Fibre Connectors at top of pole

8 Fibre Connectors at top of pole

But this was February 2018!!!! At the time, I had a long conversation with the Engineers, that stated all was live back to the Exchange, and commissioning should not take too long, and I should be able to place an order in four weeks, which feedback from East Riding of Yorkshire Council also stated March 2018!

So I thought at least when I get back from Holiday in March/April, I should be able to place an order…..

BUT…

Can I get fibre - NO!

Can I get fibre - NO!

I checked daily during the months of April, May and got bored and started to pester East Riding of Yorkshire council again, at the beginning of June…

and to my surprise, after contacting East Riding of Yorkshire it changed to on 6th June 2018! I can order ULTRAFAST Broadband!!!

I’d already started the switch to Zen, for my ADSL, so I can eventually Migrate from ADSL to FTTP with Zen, and the switch was successful to Zen on the 8th June 2018.

EXCITED!!!

EXCITED!!!

So I had a few logistical details to sort out, like empty the server/network cup board of servers, network switches, Dell workstations, so the Openreach engineer when he visits can install the Openreach ONT (fibre terminator!) in the server cupboard, so my house can be connected with glass fibre to the exchange, no COPPER like you FTTC people with max speeds of approx 76Mbps.

So it’s taken a long time in coming, and I would really never have thought that we would be 1 of the 3% in the UK to have ULTRAFAST BROADBAND (FTTP/FTTH), fibre circuit from the shire out in the sticks.

At present Ultrafast maximum speed is 300Mbps download, and 30Mbps upload, but there are not a lot of statistics, because only 3% of the UK population have access to FTTP! It looks like BT (Openreach) are starting with the rural areas, which have had access to poor internet speeds for years, and once completed will revisit the more densely populated areas!

MY ULTRAFAST BROADBAND ORDER WAS SUBMITTED TODAY!

at the same time, I’ve also switched  my BT telephone line to Zen also, so I will be leaving BT after, well I’ve never been with another telephone provider other than BT.

2 July 2018, is the switch to Zen for phone.

and Openreach have scheduled an installation date of Saturday 30 June 2018 – AM, to complete the first part of the installation, which requires internal access to the house, and my server/network cupboard!

and all of the above, is currently cheaper and onto a better and faster package, than BT and Eclipse Internet!!!

Smoke me a kipper….

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GoodBye Eclipse Internet, Hello Zen Internet!

Friday, June 8th, 2018

eclipse_internet

I’ve been loyal to Eclipse Internet for 14 years, I took out my first contract for ADSL Broadband in 2004. Now known as Eclipse, originally based in Exeter, Devon – were acquired by Kingston Communications (KCOM), Hull – just down the road from where I live as it turned out in 2005.

With my Ultrafast broadband (FTTP) coming online soon, I had hoped Eclipse would be able to migrate my existing ADSL Broadband to FTTP, they did originally tell me, they could do it, but on recent communications it would appear Eclipse (KCOM) cannot supply me FTTP.

But, oddly they wanted to charge me some £35+VAT for termination of my broadband package, despite not being in a contract for over 7 years, so the easiest option was to switch to a new ISP, which could offer a path to FTTP,

1024px-zen-final-logo2-_teal

so I’ve now switched to Zen Internet. (which was one of the ISPs I considered 14 years ago).

ADSL (Superfast)  comes over your copper telephone line, Ultrafast (FTTP) comes over fibre directly linked to the BT exchange. Different technologies, so there is no requirement for ADSL (Superfast) and FTTP.  So eventually the ADSL (Superfast) will be terminated over copper, when I’m like with fibre.

I noticed a few broadband restarts at 3am, and the switch was completed at 4.45am.

So I’m now with Zen…. time to order Ultrafast (FTTP!)

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Wired or Wireless, ADSL or 3G? that’s the question?

Friday, February 10th, 2012

I’ve recently been running trails using 3G Wireless Internet with Celltime Provider Three and O2, you are probably thinking I’m as mad as a badger! (well once upon a time, I did study Electronic Communication Engineering, so I know a little about Radio Frequencies! – (thanks to Mum & Dad! for the funding!).

But check the results below, and this is with a -85 dBm signal (boffin speak for GOOD! or three bars good buddy! have you got your ears on!), using the internal antenna on a Option GlobalSurfer III (3G Router). I’ve recently noticed that Three have upgraded their transmitter to now support HSDPA (High-Speed Downlink Packet Access), well what does that load of gibberish mean, well other than the UMTS or 3G symbol changes to “H” on my phone or router. It means that rather than max speed of 3.6Mbps, the max speed could be 7.2MBps or 14.4MBps. Yes via Wireless!

At present I’m getting faster wireless speeds than wired!

Eclipse Internet Three 3G Internet
Eclipse Internet ADSL speedtest by Speedtest.net Three 3G speedtest by Speedtest.net
Eclipse Internet ADSL pingtest by Pingtest.net Three 3G pingtest by Pingtest.net
Eclipse Internet ADSL speedtest by Broadband SpeedChecker.co.uk Three 3G speedtest by Broadband SpeedChecker.co.uk
Eclipse Internet ADSL speedtest by My Broadband Speed hree 3G speedtest by My Broadband Speed
Eclipse Internet ADSL speedtest by Thinkbroadband Three 3G speedtest by Thinkbroadband

I generally use this 3G router, because when normal wired ADSL fails, it automatically fails back or fails over to 3G Wireless Internet, and after the recents drop outs and faults, I noticed my 3G wireless broadband was faster!

Option GlobalSurfer III 3G Network Router

Option GlobalSurfer III 3G Network Router

I need to complete some more calculations, and purchase a directional Yagi antenna, so I can get a stronger signal = more signal = more power = faster throughput and downloads! (does that sound like Captain Kirk to Scotty the Engineer – Give me more power! Scotty! )

Microwave Wireless Aerial or Twig!

Microwave Wireless Aerial or Twig on biscuit tin!

This aerial is not correct, the VSWR (sorry boffin alert) is too high, and not correctly matched at 3G frequencies! It reminds me of long ago with a DV27 on a biscuit tin!

I now understand, when I visited China, why they did not role out copper wires to peoples houses for telephones, they just jumped to wireless 2.5G communications (whilst the UK, was still using GSM! (2G)).

Well Good Buddy Signing Off!, 10-10.

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Broadband Woes Revisited!

Thursday, February 9th, 2012

Earlier in the month, I reported (here’s the blog) that my Broadband has an intermittent fault AGAIN. Back in 2010, I had similar if not the same issues, and it had to be escalted to BT, it looks like, it will have to be escalted to BT again! The problem is an unstable line, disconnects, occasional slow throughout, down to 0.4Mbps.

It’s been reported to Eclipse Internet, my ISP, who are not to blame, as they do not own the telegraph wire from my house to the exchange. British Telecommunications plc, “BT” own that!

Eclipse Internet, changed the Interleave on the line from ON to OFF, to try and stablise the line, but it did not make any difference, and the issues continues…….

stay tuned for the next installment of Broadband Woes Revisited Update Soon!

Draytek Vigor Connection Statistics Interleaved ON

Draytek Vigor Connection Statistics Interleaved ON

ADSL STATUS Interleaved

ADSL STATUS Interleaved ON

Draytek Vigor Connection Statistics Interleaved OFF

Draytek Vigor Connection Statistics Interleaved OFF

ADSL STATUS Interleaved

ADSL STATUS Interleaved OFF

Notice the increase in sync speed (Down Speed), but unfortunately, it did not make any difference to throughput, or fix the issue.

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Frozen @EclipseInternet Broadband!

Friday, February 3rd, 2012

Everything else freezes around here, so why not my Broadband “wires”

It sounds like food you have with chips and peas!

Again, I’m having broadband issues, for the last four days, during the twilight hours, under clear Yorkshire Wolds skies, the temperature has been falling to -7 degrees C, and I have a theory this causes a fault on the line! It just seems very coincidental, if we get a cold spell or very hot spell my Broadband has issues. Recently spoke to Eclipse Internet, that states that four other Eclipse Internet users on the Exchange also had issues this week, at the same time, so it was suggested it was BT, playing with their Exchange!

I’ll think I’ll be opening that call again Eclipse Internet!

Here are some lovely test results

SpeedTest.net Broadband Speed Test Results

SpeedTest.net Broadband Speed Test Results

Thinkbroad Broadband Speed Test Results

Thinkbroad Broadband Speed Test Results

Router Connection Statistics

Router Connection Statistics

Whilst the rest of the world, surfs the Net, at lighting speeds of 8, 20, 40 and 100MBps, I can only dream!

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Many Thanks, and thumbs up to Eclipse Internet (UK)

Friday, June 17th, 2011

Well it’s not often that I praise an Internet Service Provider, and as you may have seen by my recent “rants” and “tweets”  I had a little issue with my ISP Eclipse Internet, based in Exeter, Devon, UK in the last approx 23 hours. (alright my lover!)

So I thought I’d put my hand in the air, and put the record straight on this, one, the simple fact is we have a 40GB limit under the Fair Usage Policy between the hours of 9am – 11pm, if you exceed it, you are restricted to 256Kbps. (horrible!).

At the end of May we’ve been downloading new Microsoft, VMware software, and new Vendor virtual applicances for testing, these were only a few DVDs, but the data adds up. We do track throughput and data usage here in the office, for our own statitics, and have been doing this for the last 6 years. This is collected from the router, so ALL traffic is monitored in and out of the network. This isn’t collected from a single PC.

Data throughput from 2006 - Present day

Data throughput from 2006 - Present day

Our average daily peak usage (9am – 11pm) is approx 1.5GB, that is general email and web browsing. At the end of May (24th, 25th, 27th) see here

DVD downloads from Microsoft, VMware and other vendors

DVD downloads from Microsoft, VMware and other vendors

we boosted the limit up a bit, on June 6th 2011, we received an email from Eclipse Internet stating we had hit the Amber  zone, and if we continue to download at the current rate, we would be stuffed into the Red Zone, and limited to 256kbps. We cannot stop the mail flow during the day, or the web browsing, so we did move large downloads into off-peak, hoping not to get the Red Zone treatment, my only small complaint, was we did email Eclipse asking how much data allowance we had left in peak hours, which went unanswered.

Yesterday evening at approximately 11pm we received the dreaded Red Zone email and we were restricted to 256kbps broadband speed.

0.1MBps Download and 0.3MBps Upload

0.1MBps Download and 0.3MBps Upload

0.1MBps Download and 0.3MBps Upload

0.1MBps Download and 0.3MBps Upload

This was horrible, the internet is un-useable at the speed, you really notice all the cookie, tracking websites, waiting for websites to load, I’m glad I usually have between 1.5Mbps – 2.7MBps (to be confirmed!).

At 4.00pm today, enough was enough, and I called Eclipse Internet, Business Sales, and spoke to a very nice Sales agent called “John”, to switch our current older product (Evolution Pro 3) to Business Bronze, we’ll we get 50GB peak, and it costs less, on a 1 month contract – Fantastic, oh, and the Data Allowance gets reset! –

We’ve just been switched to Business Bronze. A Result. Thank you Eclipse!

We are very happy with Eclipse Internet, and we’ve now been with Eclipse for 7.5 years.

So far this month we downloaded 70GB!

and if I look in the new Control Panel, I’ve got some new controls and graphs to play with

Data controller to prioritize traffic

Data controller to prioritize traffic

and a new statistics utility

New data graph

New data graph

We will just have to see if 50GB is enough!

Thanks Eclipse!

Eclipse Logo

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Broadband BACK!

Monday, January 10th, 2011

and just after I posted this, I noticed that the Real-Time Energy Usage how started to work on the website, and this could only be working, if computers are sending data to the Internet via fixed ADSL!

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