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The Daily PollIRELAND IS BEING left behind in terms of broadband roll-out and internet development, according to Google’s executive chairman Eric Schmidt.
Speaking in Dublin yesterday, the Examiner reports that Schmidt says there is huge potential for Ireland to make its businesses more global by improving its internet connectivity.
Ireland’s delays in rolling out broadband across the country have been much lamented. Ireland’s broadband take-up (58 per cent last year) is slightly below the EU average of 61 per cent and fixed broadband take-up last year reached just 23 per cent, according to EU data. However, overall household internet take-up is just above the EU average, at 72 per cent.
Under the EU’s Digital Agenda for Europe, the government has committed to providing universal broadband by 2013.
Schmidt’s message to the Irish government yesterday was simply: “more broadband”.
But how do you feel about the internet connection you use most often? Does it work well, or are you in a black spot?
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How can this poll be at all accurate? Surely only people withgood, or half decent connexions will respond? I don’t think we’ll be hearing from those on dial-up or useless lap-top dongles.
Not so. I have a useless lap-top dongle which works, sort of. Occasionally the signal drops completely, sometime for days. It’s supposed to be 1Mb but rarely gets above a third of that. When my contract comes to an end I will certainly be looking around to see if there’s anything better (faster and more reliable)
Eircom is a disgrace in rural areas, and cannot provide broadband at all.
just rural areas ?
That’s all I can speak for, but from my experience with them I’d be surprised if they could do anything well. Eircom is one of the very worst, incompetent, rude and unpleasant companies I have ever had dealings with, but no more!
I live in a very rural area and have a consistent reliable service from Eircom.
You obviously haven’t tried to deal with vodafone yet Jonathan they are a disgrace, worst company I have every had the misfortune of dealing with.
I am glad for you Evert. Are you near the exchange? And Glenn, I have heard again and again that Vodafone is dreadful as well as expensive and I will continue to avoid dealing with them. Having said that I have never been thrilled by the way any of the mobile operators have conducted themselves.
Eircom have said they would be implementing broadband in my area soon since 2007. Still no sign and my family and I have to use a slow and unreliable alternative. Not even 1MB speeds. Other countries are putting us to shame again.
Eircom have told me they will never supply me with broadband because of where I live ! If I had broadband I would seriously consider setting up a home business, but without this its impossible. I have a useless dongle which can talke all day to send 6 emails and then it does it 30 times.
We couldn’t get broadband from Eircom because we’re on a “carrier line” Had O2 mobile broadband which was crap, now have 3 mobile which is good. The reason we had a carrier line of course, was that Eircom installed it in the first plac! Go figure!
@ Sue Anthony > I really agree with you re: the home business idea. A slow connection is definitely impeding Irish business and budding entrepreneurs. I’m looking forward to my UPC fibre powered connection in a few weeks.
Lucky you Hugh :) I’m still hoping on Satellite in the next few months.
25 Meg UPC connection, not a problem. Can’t complain about the service at all.
Been with Vodafone for as long as I can remember (Esat -> EsatBT -> BT -> Vodafone) and lately it’s just complete rubbish.
Paying for 8mbit, getting less than 3mbit. Their support is useless and don’t even get me started on their technical support. My father who has limited IT skills knows more about the equipment they supply than they do.
Schmidt is 100% correct, whilst Ireland has pulled the likes of Microsoft, Google, Apple etc to Ireland, the big players can afford to route dedicated lines into their offices, we could have had more big players – and smaller ones too – if it was easier for them to get reliable broadband.
Ireland’s tardiness in the development of a decent broadband infrastructure has in my opinion stopped the growth of start up companies in Ireland. We have a good pool of talent in Ireland, but without decent broadband we might as well be putting 20′s down the toilet. It’s worked for our government but with larger denominations.
Vodafone are rubbish in every aspect… bad connectivity, slow speed, disgraceful customer service and will hound you for every cent even if you cant connect, they sign you up to contracts without giving full details, the other day they decided to switch my elderly fathers mobile from meteor without his consent (I was standing beside him when they called him and offered him a new (cheap) phone if he reconnected with them, he told them clearly he did not want to switch from meteor, however a new crap phone arrived from them the next day and he found his phone was not working. I use a 3 dongle and I am very happy with it and with 3……….Basically the lesson in all this is DONT do any business with vodafone because they couldn’t care less you.
Can you help us Google invest and give us a growing world class structure and we will be an example to the rest of the world.
I’d be very happy if UPC powered Irelands entire broadband. Its cheap(ish) and powerfull. downfall is not alot of people in ireland can get it. Most of us in the sticks are stuck with one or two providers who just cant deliver any sort of speed. Is money been invested in developing this area? eircom have people by the b*lls. beware of eircom selling you eircom broadband speeds that your line/area just cant handle. My mother had been charged for the 20MB package for a long time as she was told her line could handle it. It couldnt even make 10mb. Ask the person who installs your broadband as they’d have a better idea then someone who wants to sell it to you.
Better yet test your speed by closing all expolers and mail programes and using http://www.broadbandireland.ie/speed-test.php at different times of the day and night and work out your average. no point in paying for what your just not getting.
I’d get better Internet if i go up on roof shove the USB cable up my ass 3 mb per second try it !
I’m with 3 (woe is me!) – and why do they keep telling me lies?? ‘There is no problem in your area’ – when service goes off for weekends at a time . . .
The governments message is conflicting, they consider “Mobile” and 3G dongles as Broadband yet they are not the same as ADSL or Cable services and as such should never be compared to them.
UPC 20Mb. Very good speeds in fairness, but I know others who have the 30Mb line and see speeds of 12Mbps on “good days”. The main problem with UPC is the occasional downtime which, to be fair, is getting better. It was awful when I first signed up about a year ago. I was with UTV originally, back when 1Mb was a respectable speed. They were extremely good for uptime – one of the best – and their customer service was something else. UPC offer the best bang-for-your-buck in the country, and other ISPs should follow, at least in terms of their pricing.
On a slightly related matter – does anyone think that the mobile phone signal quality has dis-improved a lot recently ? I “drop” at least half my calls these days. Very annoying.
In the US the new definition for broadband: 4 Mb/s down, 1 Mb/s up
http://www.intomobile.com/2010/07/22/americas-new-definition-for-broadband-4-mbs-down-1-mbs-up/
So are the vast majority of us getting broadband at all??
I was paying e42 a month for wireless broadband since 2006 for 1.5mb down, 0.5mb up (packaged as 2mb broadband) and getting woeful speeds most of the time (700kbps down). Yes, e42 a month because they know they have us by the ba**s.
I rang eircom 2-3 times a year for 4 years to get my line enabled. They didn’t give one damn about me. One day I asked a rep of eircom on boards to help and true to his work he did within the week!
Eamon Ryan’s broadband on a stick….BROADBAND MY BOLLOX!
UPC throttles my torrent downloads. I am not happy.
I live in a rural area and am out of range of the nearest digital exchange so haven’t even bothered getting a landline installed to the house. Satellite is too expensive so the only option is a dongle. Vodafone was complete rubbish so I went with the company that got the gazillion euro contract from government to “roll out” rural broadband – 3. After months with only ever 2 bars connectivity, the lady who sounded like she was speaking from a call centre in Mumbai helpfully suggested I get in the car with my laptop and drive 5km to the nearest mast and work from there!!!! Rural broadband is a joke.
3′s call centre is in, em, Mumbai
Richie, Alan is right they are in Mumbai, however I have dealt with them a few times and found them very helpful, far more than the Irish staff in vodafone (ignorant shower of assholes). If you were not happy with 3 you had and may still have a cooling of period to cancel the service. Personally I am much happier with 3 than with vodashite.
Useful site to test your connection –
http://www.speedtest.net
I live in a rural part of Kerry and it’s a blackspot – no enabled phone line and mountains block the masts ! Satalite the only option at €70 p/m. It’s feckin’ beautiful here though !!!
have 35MB with UPC so pretty content with that! Their customer service is woeful though..
Rural area in Donegal – no options but wireless broadband – Vodafone were shite – O2 is better but pay for 8mbs and just about get 1mbs. Better than nothing I suppose but embarrassing when you compare to say Finland.
I live in Dungarvan, Co. Waterford where we have ultra fast broadband. It averages around 25meg download but you can get 120meg for €60 a month. It’s uncontested too all thanks to the foresight of a man named Sean Casey and his son Pat who invested in a pipe and cable laying scheme back in 1982 for cable tv. If you’re considering setting up an Internet dependent business you’d be hard pressed to find faster Internet in the country. Btw I have no connection with the company apart from being a customer.
is that only available in dungarvan? i searched the name but could not find the company’s website.. could you post a link??
Hi Joe,
There is a faster speed available than advertised on their website http://www.cablesurf.com. Give the a call if you’re interested. Ian
If this was 1996 I’d be very happy!
Am also with Three ……. just looked and I currently am running at 15kbps upload and 18kbps download !!!! Of course by the time I finish making this comment I will possibly have lost the signal altogether and have to reconnect, etc ……….
I’m into week 4 now I think of waiting for a solution from them after threatening to go to the consumer rights board if they didn’t send someone out to check my signal as it is getting worse and worse and worse by the day and I was so fed up of talking to the useless assistant on their support line (their support line call centre is not based in Ireland so anyone who finds it difficult to understand very broken english don’t bother ringing them – and no I’m not in the slightest bit racist). The engineers were here last week and they failed to get a signal they could hold on to with an external aerial & stronger repeater box …. I’m supposed to hear back from Three again today but not holding my breath for a solution.
Unfortunately I still have another 5mths on my contract so I either need them to admit they can’t sort my connection or else I have to pay the 5mths to get out of the contract and hope that someone else will be able to get me a connection that works!!
error 619 used to be my favourite, what it means is there are too many users logged onto their dongles so you will have to wait till one logs off before you can get back online.
so much for the fianna failed and green party turncoats.
I sympathise with you. I know exactly how you feel and how totally frustrating it is to deal with 3 customer care. Every time I have a problem and they check it out and tell me that there is nothing wrong at all! Genius!!! I’d love to have an alternative to them, but as it stands I’ve no option but to stick with ‘em.
UPC 20mb so no issues there, I laugh at Eircom’s ads about next gen 8mb broadband, very much behind the times, using old out of date copper wiring, where as UPC using fibre to the main exchanges at least, if not fibre into your house/apartment in some cases, superior BB service from UPC, although customer service is another story though :-/
UPC 100 Mb and I am absolutely delighted with it. Consistently get between 95 Mb and 105 Mb down and 8 Mb up speed.
Most days I feel like the cat that got the cream, thinking of downloading the entire internet when I get home this evening ;-)
I know it is far from the norm however.
Why do u need it so high? Downloading movies/music etc?
How much is that package and is it only available in certain areas? I’m on UPC 20Mb in Shannon.
I do some work from home, and also do a lot of Video Streaming. It is part of a phone tv an Internet bundle and costs €95 all in.
I had to download Windows 7the other day and I got it in about three mins.
I’m with vodafone and the speed of our broadband is pure rubbish. We’re only 4 miles from a major town and we can’t get anything more than 1mb if we’re lucky. We can’t get UPC here. Our broadband keeps going down and we’re getting no explanation. It’s like everything in this country it’s only half working.
Grainne, I was in the same boat with vodashite, however I changed to 3 and am much happier…vodafone are a disaster in every aspect of service.
With DSL the upload speeds are brutally slow. I can upload at just 5% of the speed I can download, it’s ridiculous. Eircom’s Next Generation Broadband uploads at just 512kbps. What’s “next generation” about that?
It’s nothing to do with DSL. DSL can handle fast uploads. The ISPs in this country just came to a silent agreement that upload speeds should be a small percentage of your download speed. In other parts of the world, if you pay for “10Mb broadband”, that’s for download and upload. It’s just the mentality of Irish ISPs that’s stopping this.
Yes, I meant DSL as generally provided in Ireland, not the technology.
You mean ADSL – with DSL your Upload & Download speeds are the same. but everything is contented so you will never get what you are paying for
With UPC in Cork city centre – supposed to be 25Mbit – I get around 2.3Mbit. Complained numerous times and they tell me to do the speed test which is rigged – the speed test tests the speed from the nearest server to you with no congestion or contention involved so it always says I’m getting 20Mbit or something close which is utter rubbish because I’ve tried 5 different file hosting services with premium accounts and I never ever go above 2.xMbit – ever! But UPC support is crap and I think its that way deliberately so as to put you off calling them.
BTW @ The Journal please stop opting me in for emails and sending comments to Twitter, change the default setting, thanks.
What is your actual download rate measured in kilobytes or megabytes? What http://www.speedtest.net is showing?
Speed is measured in megabits fizi and I just did the test again:
19.71Mbps down, 2.01Mbps pinging the Digiweb server in Dublin.
These online speed tests only use pings and simulated downloads which isn’t actually a reliable way to test your speed especially if your ISP has a throttling system set up (once you actually start to download a file the throttle kicks in but for pinging there is no throttling).
This speed test says that I have problems: http://www.broadbandspeedtest.net
I’ve tried downloading from HEANET and from Micorsoft and I never go above 2.xMbps.
That should be ‘Microsoft’ and p.s. fizi I used your link for the first test.
Tonacatecuhtli, what is telling that you are 2.X Mb/s?
The internet browser? If so then you are mistaken in that your browser is giving the speed in MB (Megabytes) and not Mb (Megabits)
Your Broadband provider is providing you with a speed of 25Mb/s (Megabits per second) There are 8 bits in a byte, so in Megabytes per second your speed is 3.125MB/s which is close to what your browser is saying you are getting.
I have tried most operators and have found UPC @ 30MBs the best value and most consistant service around.
Dublin doesn’t count. It’s rural broadband that is crap and needs fixing. 3G? Bollix.
Very true, in Dublin there are few good options, in the country side there is joke not Internet.
Im in Dublin and was with Eircom and wasnt happy but since moving to UPC ive no complaints at all.
see how Ireland compares worldwide and plenty of more broadband speed stats: http://www.netindex.com/
wow, that really puts things into perspective
There’s a pattern that the only people who are happy with their broadband tends to be UPC customers seeing as they’re on a different line.
Not many happy Eircom customers.
Had a lot of speed trouble for ages with Eircom landline broadband. I was advised by Eircom over a week ago to disconnnect my house phones overnight, which I did – not much better. I was told if it came to having an Engineer call it would cost me 150 Euro!! I went to their website and emailed my complaint, was informed by Google Gmail that this mailbox was apparently unknown at the address! Today I got an email from a Survey group, thanking me for my feedback and asking me to fill in a survey … which I did NOT do! It should have been an apology and and explanation – and I shouldn’t have to keep unplugging my house phone to get a speed!
I have Imagine which works fine for me though upload is non-existent. 3 lied to get NBA about their user numbers. Got 80 million contract and were fined 5000 when caught out. All done by Damon Ryan, now leader of the greens.
Statements blaming private sector companies for the lack of broadband or slow speeds is just pointless. It’s all plain economics. The costs of upgrading an exchange and related equipment vs the revenue make it un-economical to provide broadband in certain (rural) areas. It’s as simple as that. There is no USO (universal Service Obligation) for broadband hence it will not be available in areas where it is not profit generating.
What needs to be done is that broadband internet access is qualified like a utility and that the state builds a state-owned broadband backbone covering an acceptable geographical area of this country (the same way it’s done with roads, the sewer system etc.). Then this can be opened up for use by any provider who is interested to use it, on a fee-paying basis obviously).
An example would be to run fibre into every phone exchange and turn it into an open network that can provide access to broadband providers. The onus has been put on the private sector for too long without any result.
Note: I did a bit of a poll recently with interesting results – http://evertb.wordpress.com/2011/05/15/researching-the-state-of-broadband-in-ireland/
Nice poll Evert – hopefully some of the journo readers will do it:
http://evertb.wordpress.com/2011/05/15/researching-the-state-of-broadband-in-ireland/
and maybe we can see your article published here ;-)
Evert, that may well be true in certain rural areas however in cities and higher density areas where it is economically viable the service levels lag way behind where they should be.
Eircom as the incumbent and owner of much of the infrastructure (bar UPC & Magnet in some areas) has failed to invest or grow its networks capability (calling 8Mbps a next gen network is being charitable at best) and many of the carriers whom resell on the back of this network (vodafone, etc) can’t offer anything better until the Eircom network is upgraded.
for several years Eircom’s varying management teams and owners seemed to focus primarily on cost reduction and debt gearing before flipping to company to another bunch of investors. that combined with the self serving ESOT, and a weak regulator has left the infrastructure many years behind where it should be.
I’m not sure what the answer is to provide either high speed next gen broadband in both cities and rural areas but i very much doubt its Eircom.
People have to understand that you cannot provide high speed broadband to rural areas. Irish people still insist on building one-off houses in the middle of nowhere. All major cities and towns should be the focus for improved broadband.
Damn my great-grandparents for building this house here! Why didn’t they realise what a crap internet connection they’d get? ;)
On a more serious note though, my house is the last one on a rural telephone line, we ain’t ever getting wired internet here. So I’m stuck with the 3 ‘rural blackspot’ dongle. It gets me by for general internet browsing etc, but I am never going to be downloading HD movies.
Would I love 20mb internet with a wireless network around the house? Sure I would, but it’s one of the things I have to forego. It’s balanced by some of the advantages of living in a rural area.
Many positive comments about UPC which I will agree with. However there is even better service in Dublin. Magnet and their fibre optic FFTH. The main advantage is their upload speeds are crazy good, not just download – which is brilliant too. By the way I am not affiliated with them, just been using both services. Thx.
with upc on a 25mb connection sharing a house with four others running a laptop each and 3 wireless xboxs, also on the third floor, just did a speed test and getting 19Mbps… not too shaby,
before we had smart telecom with a 8Mb line and i was luck to get 1mb of a connection!
I’m big into gaming and was recently downloading some add-on content using my wireless UPC 20mb, only getting bout 5mb download speed and was taking ages so changed to a wired setup and now averaging bout 17mb download speed…no complaints!
Living less then two mile from the nearest NGB enable Exchange and I can just about get 1Mbps on average. Funny thing is that the line (to a new house, new estate, etc) is so bad that I can ring Eircom and with the broadband working and they will say that the line is not capable of broadband :-)
I wish UPC would try to get to other area then the city centres of big cities…
@Tonacatecuhtli: thanks, it seems like we found common ground then :-) In that case it looks like indeed, your Internet is not performing as it should. I’d suggest trying to download different files from different servers, different countries to check if there is any pattern. How about multi-threaded downloads sort of torrents? Any better speed on them than through HTTP or same difference? If it all fails then I’d argue with the provider. Either get them in and ask to check all the cabling and infrastructure or keep asking them for cheaper bill as you are not getting service you pay for. Good luck mate.
Thanks fizi_water for those suggestions, I’ll take a look at uTorrent and see what it gets – there is one pattern – East coast USA and some UK servers have a huge packet loss going on – I’ll investigate that further. I should have mentioned that when I had UPC televsion I had problems with that (picture quality was terrible and I got rid of it) and I’ve argued that with UPC also so I reckon, like you, it might be a cabling problem. Thanks again.
Aptus wireless broadband in Co. Carlow (and beyond) is excellent, does my broadband and telephone, rarely goes down and is always remedied very quickly if it does. No complaints.
Just as a comparison; I’m working on a few technology projects in Haiti and a 1Mb connection costs $1000 p/m there with a $500 install fee.
Puts things in perspective.
The average Zambian internet download speed is faster than my internet connection, (no lie, I checked) Zambia tops the human suffering index yet they can download a dodgy copy of Avatar faster than me! In fairness I moved over to Vodafone recently and my speeds tend to be just under 2Mbsm which is the fastest my line can handle, but Eircom should be doing more to upgrade our line, we’re not a very rural area!
Broadband infrastructure in this country is a joke but only for fixed line providers. At least you can say that the rest are trying but fixed line has copper rotting away in the ground until such time that somebody will give them a grant to replace it. I recently complained to my ISP about the atrocious quality of service experienced after they took over the reigns from another, on the same line. I was told that my distance from the exchange was the issue – apparently the tectonic plates between my house and the exchange have shifted since their takeover. Of course my neighbours, using the same exchange and a different ISP do not have the same issues. I’d rather be bluntly told they couldn’t be bothered than lied to and lied to by technologically ignorant folk who can’t back-up their reasoning. UPC is my next stop…
I’ve never had any problems and I use the net a lot. I’m with UPC, and have been for since they started up here. This morning I voted “Very satisfied”… Nothing happened. Refresh… Nothing happened. Turns out the service was down for about 5 hours. Just voted again… “Adequate” :)
With smart telecom for years no complaints. Due to recession switched to eircom slightly cheaper, lots of complaints. Same wires same exchange crap service especially the the phone, it sounds like an old analogue tv that has not been tuned. I’m no techie but the ISPs must each have there own equipment at the exchanges. The nightmare with eircom is over in October UPC all the way.
@Tonacatecuhtli: lol mate I know network speed is in Megabits, I am I.T. The reason I asked you to tell me that in Bytes is because that is what more relevant to people – all downloads ratio speeds are showed in most systems in Bytes. Values you just tested and posted are just about correct for 25 Mbit/s connection, where is your problem then? You stated you are only getting 2.x out of 25. Do you mean by that upload speed or download speed? If you mean upload then this is OK, providers when advertise 25 Mbit/s connection they don’t mean it’s symmetrical connection, it’s typical to get about advertised download speed, but upload is always much lesser. It is even included in technology name – ADSL (Internet over phone line basically) – assymetrical digital subscribers line – suggest not equal down/up speeds. I think then your connection speed is perfectly all right…:)
It’s cable broadband fizi_water – it’s advertised as 25Mbps down and the most I get is around 2.3Mbps down not up (I don’t bother uploading much, photos to Facebook etc. that’s all so I’ve never bothered testing the up speed).
All the online Flash-based speed tests tell me I’m getting an average of 20Mbps but they only test ping rates and the more ‘sophisticated’ ones use a small sample file but these aren’t reliable tests.
I just downloaded this 50meg file from the Heanet network which is one of the fastest in Ireland and the max speed I got was 2.7Mbps whereas if I was to go up to UCC I would get anywhere from 20-30Mbps – the same applies to the filehosting sites I’ve used so I know the speed issue is not on the server side but on my side. Plus, I’m using a 1gig wired ethernet NIC on an i7 based Windows 7 x64 laptop with 4gig of RAM so I know it’s not my laptop either.
http://ftp.heanet.ie/mirrors/damnsmalllinux.org/current/current.iso
BTW bytes are used for storage measure (1MB = 1024KB) whereas bits (1Mb = 1000Kb) are used to measure speed (I was a computer engineer).
;-)
“BTW bytes are used for storage measure (1MB = 1024KB) whereas bits (1Mb = 1000Kb) are used to measure speed (I was a computer engineer).”
Some computer engineer there!
Bytes and bits are both a measure of data in the same way litres and pints are both a measure of volume.
Both can be used interchangeably as they are both a magnitude of a single bit. A byte is simply 8 bits. It is not a completely different unit. And either byte or bit can be used to measure either “storage” or “speed”.
I’m sorry but that is wrong.
Bytes (B) and bits (b) are both measurements of data size where 8 bits = 1 byte.
Byte per second and bits per second are both acceptable for measurement speed of data transfer.
In fact your web browser and other download tools will quite often estimate your download speed in bytes rather than bits.
For the purposes of broadband (which is what this discussion is about) speed is measured in bits whereas storage is measured in bytes – this is practiced by all ISPs who advertise their speeds in bits per second and your download quota in bytes and yes a byte is normally made up of eight bits – but for the purpose of speed this is not so – so 1 megabyte is 1024 kilobytes in storage but 1 megabit is 1000 kilobits in speed plus when you buy a hard drive most manufacturers cheat and use the 1000 measure instead of the 1024.
Actually Tonacatecuhtli
A Megabyte is 1000 bytes. A Mebibyte is 1024 bytes.
Once again.
A bit is a measurement of data size. Bits per second is a measurement of the speed of a data transfer.
A byte is a measurement of data size. Bytes per second is a measurement of the speed of a data transfer.
How are you confused by this?
Actually Christopher, mebibyte (2 to the power of 20 in binary and value) was only formalised and put into use in 2000 but up until then we used megabyte (2 to the power of 20 in binary but 10 to the power of 6 in value) and even though the IEC standard is mebibyte most ISPs (and most OEMs) still use the SI standrad of megabyte and megabit.
Mebibyte is used interchangeably with megabyte and because of that both confusion and deception have thrived because technically speaking kilo/mega refers to 1000 whereas kibi/mebi refers to 1024.
p.s. I’m not a bit confused Keith.
“(2 to the power of 20 in binary but 10 to the power of 6 in value)”
What?
So it’s 1048576 in Binary but it’s 1000000 in Value? How does that even make sense. Please don’t copy and paste drivel you don’t understand off of Wikipedia in an attempt to back an argument.
And I can assure you, ISP’s use the proper definition of Megabyte (1000KB just in case you still weren’t sure)
The majority of included command line tools, as well as a number of visual tools in Linux actually now use the SI unit of measurement for Megabytes.
The notable exception is Nautilus.
Actually Christopher I used:
http://physics.nist.gov/cuu/Units/binary.html
and even if I used Wikipedia it refers to the IEC website so what’s your point?
I am still correct – while a megabyte should refer to 1024 kilobytes (and in most computer science cases it does) the actual prefix of kilo and mega is the SI standard which is what we use for weights and measurements such as kilogram and kilometre – both of which mean 1000 grams and 1000 metres respectively (decimal measures) – in computer science we used mega and kilo and meant 1024 bytes and bits respectively but because we were using the SI standard some manufacturers and service providers decided to use 1000 bytes and 1000 bits (thereby robbing us blind) – but the IEC stepped in with kibi and mebi to reassert that the measurement should be 1024 and not 1000.
If your hard drive is advertised as 500 megabytes it is probably 500,000 kilobytes but it should be 512,000 kilobytes – you’re being robbed of the extra 12,000 kilobytes – same goes with broadband speed. I did my computer science degree pre-2000 and we were made aware of these discrepancies back then.
@ Keith – I think you mean IEC, no?
No I do not mean IEC. The Linux kernel as well as the majority of GNU tools use the SI units not the IEC. Gnome is however inconsistent, with the majority of reporting tools using SI and Nautilus using IEC.
Mac OS X uses SI.
IEC defines the binary value and the metric value, but the binary values were predominantly used for memory and CDs.
Metric was used for the majority, including HDD sizes, DVDs, USB sticks, Flash storage, and network traffic.
I’d argue that HDD manufacturers were incorrectly accused of advertising their sizes to their benefit due to Windows reporting their sizes in the now IEC binary standard, rather than the SI standard as many other OS’s do.
Then the people that were using Mega/Kilo to refer to 1024 of a unit were wrong. Just because the manufacturers were using the correct unit does not mean anyone was being robbed. Just that you were wrong to be using the unit incorrectly in the first place.
The only area that Mebibytes are still referred to as Megabytes is when referring to RAM. Everything else is measured using the SI standard of 1000.
You know what? Argue with the IEC, IEEE and NIST:
“Historical context
Once upon a time, computer professionals noticed that 2^10 was very nearly equal to 1000 and started using the SI prefix “kilo” to mean 1024. That worked well enough for a decade or two because everybody who talked kilobytes knew that the term implied 1024 bytes. But, almost overnight a much more numerous “everybody” bought computers, and the trade computer professionals needed to talk to physicists and engineers and even to ordinary people, most of whom know that a kilometer is 1000 meters and a kilogram is 1000 grams.
Then data storage for gigabytes, and even terabytes, became practical, and the storage devices were not constructed on binary trees, which meant that, for many practical purposes, binary arithmetic was less convenient than decimal arithmetic. The result is that today “everybody” does not “know” what a megabyte is. When discussing computer memory, most manufacturers use megabyte to mean 2^20 = 1 048 576 bytes, but the manufacturers of computer storage devices usually use the term to mean 1 000 000 bytes. Some designers of local area networks have used megabit per second to mean 1 048 576 bit/s, but all telecommunications engineers use it to mean 10^6 bit/s. And if two definitions of the megabyte are not enough, a third megabyte of 1 024 000 bytes is the megabyte used to format the familiar 90 mm (3 1/2 inch), “1.44 MB” diskette. The confusion is real, as is the potential for incompatibility in standards and in implemented systems.
Faced with this reality, the IEEE Standards Board decided that IEEE standards will use the conventional, internationally adopted, definitions of the SI prefixes. Mega will mean 1 000 000, except that the base-two definition may be used (if such usage is explicitly pointed out on a case-by-case basis) until such time that prefixes for binary multiples are adopted by an appropriate standards body.”
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ… Wake me when yer finished… ZZZ
There’s been a notice up in my post office from eircom saying that they’d be putting down the required cables for broadband etc. for the past 5 years……yay! I can feel it coming….
@Tonacatecuhtli: OK mate, this makes bit more of sense now and sorry for my ADSL mixup, if that’s cable connection. Anyways, when you downloaded this 50 MB iso file, how do you know you were getting 2,7 Mbps? You see, where I am coming from I had suspision you are misreading your speed values. Fair enough, if you are comp. engineer you are probably not, but where did you take that speed from? Any Windows based system will show you download speed in Bytes not bits – therefore discrepency between speed advertised by providers and actual download speed. Let me make it more clear. Say you got broadband advertised as 25 Meg, so technically it is 25 Mbit/s. Let’s just forget about overheads, etc. and just calculate it simply, 25 divided by 8 (8 bits = 1 Byte), should get you about 3,125 MB /s of real (Windows) transfer speed. 700 MB big movie should download in less than 4 minutes providing you achieve maximum speed all the time. So therefore can you clarify exactly please what is your 2,7 MB/s or 2,7 Mb/s? Quite difference :)
Hey fizi_water, I’m using DownThemAll Firefox extension and it measures (like IE) in megabytes per second and the max I get is around 1 megabyte per second but the average according to DTA is lower.
25 megabits per second translates as around 3 megabytes per second (approx) – I definitely don’t reach 3 megabytes per second – I’m lucky to get a third of that and once I start downloading large files the speed suddenly drops and if I download a lot then even when I’m finished downloading the speed takes time to recover and even viewing a YouTube video is difficult. (In case anyone is wondering I download Linux distros, test virtual machines etc.).
when living in clonsilla was with magnet waste of money dial up was faster and more reliable couldn’t get UPC as cables were not high enought quality, so went with error.com, slight problems with routers resetting and high costs, moved house stayed with errorcom as they connect your house for free to phone system, was only getting 3meg yet was on a 8meg line, vodafone called around show me the price list and if I have mobile get another 10per cent off land line, pay about 45 euro a month get land line plus call deals and 8meg broadband and 300gig limit. I’m. happy with what I have as I have seen other connections, would love a higher bandwidth for streaming media buy 8meg is grand for downloading, and coop etc.
I have imagine Wimax in North Kildare where I was sold a min. 7mbps but it is rarely more than 2 if I am lucky. I was told that if I wanted a better signal then I would have to pay 100e extra for a dish on the wall. I am not sure whether to risk it and still have a below par service or change to UPC. Any expert opinion greatly appreciated.
Not an expert but move to UPC! I wasn’t happy with their service initially and within a week they had replaced the router, rejigged the system with some fancy gadgetry, replaced all the wiring and splitters inside and outside the house and knocked a few quid off the bill. All free, all without me asking for it. No call out charge even. And it’s nearly always above 10MB which is loads for my use
I was with Irish Broadband (now Imagine) for three and a half years and they improved a lot since the first days when it was desperately slow. Anyway, they discontinued the service “broadband in a box” with no notice and they charged me for the whole month even if the service was only available for 10 days. They still owe me a refund (overdue 6 months)
Then last December I switched to Three and it’s a complete RUBBISH (in capital letters). Since mid May it was acceptable but now sometimes it does not work at all, particularly in the evening. At the begining I thought that it might be because of the “visits” but no, it’s still the same.
I think that there should be a control on this because it is unacceptable to call that service Broadband.
The best comments that I have heard are from UPC and o2, but I suppose that it depends on the area and the luck of each one.
I have vodafone and my download spedd is rarly 100kb/s and usually its aroubd 60kb/s and upload 6kb/s.I live right next to mullagh and my friend who lives even further away almost in the middle of nowhere has 5000kb/s. I cant even play online and occasionally I can watch youtube at 360p very late at night.
400k down, 200k up, paying for the “up to 8 megs” con.
They should be obliged to advertise average rates, not what it its capable of, but what it actually does.
I said it before but when it comes to speed and reliability UPC and Magnet would be my top choices as they are cabled, but not DSL (phone line) based. They offer DSL service too, by the way to confuse you more :) DSL would be my second choice, do Eircom, BT, UTV, and so on. DSL technology is great, but in Ireland many phone lines are poor quality where good DSL service is relying on. For that reason that would be my second choice. My 3rd choice would be all wwan solutions, so mobile providers like Vodafone, o2, wimax, etc. The reason for that is they offer poor download allowances as for heavy users and their service is often erratic even in the city, nevermind country. Big plus is portability and contract free plans though.
have your say