8ta Speed, Disconnections & Coverage Problems – click here first!

[Telkom Mobile]

same happened in my area - Wish 8ta could publish their planned expansion somewhere...

Hi Bundu!

We may have planned expansion, but it is rather difficult to to publish due to quite a number of factors which can and do restrain our rollout. Factors like tower acquisition, property owner approval, local government agencies, quality checks, power availability and transmission, these plans can change everyday due to this.

Regards,
Social Media Team

[Telkom Mobile]

Hi 8ta team
Had a visit from James, one of your technicians, today. Very nice guy with a great personality. He found that my interrupted service was due to traffic handling conflicts between three towers in my area, one of which is the very big Telkom tower which dominates Pretoria' skyline - only 600m away. If I understand correctly, from time to time these towers hand over the call to each other - a process which results in the internet connection being dropped. This description, if correct, seems to accord with my experience. Since it was not in his power to solve this issue, his next step was to file a report, requesting the 'higher-ups' to seek a solution, which would take about 2 weeks.
Could you confirm this?
Grahame

Hi grahame!

Pending no complications, a site should be going live by the end of May 2012 which should resolve your problem. This update was added to your query today.

Regards,
Social Media Team

[Telkom Mobile]

Just to follow up, I would try and put Speedtest.net results up, but I can't get to the final page as upload does not get past "connecting".

Speeds we see are 52ms ping and 0.84Mbps down.

Hi NightWulfe!

Please can you provide us with the information requested on the first post of this sticky so we can investigate?

Regards,
Social Media Team

[Telkom Mobile]

Hey hey,

We've been working fine for months on 8ta, but the last couple of weeks the connection is mostly unbearable. We are in Samrand / Kosmosdal / The Reeds area. Are there any towers down or something that you are aware of?

Line keeps dropping, signal also used to be a stable 60% odd, is now down to 30% on average. We do not see the same issues on other networks using the same modem and router (ZTE MF668 and TP-Link MR3420).

Any help would be appreciated!

We currently have no reported towers down in this area.

[kabous1]

Got myself the 8ta 10GB + 10GB and I'm running it on an old school E220 modified to use an external Yagi antenna mounted on my roof. I'm in Noordwyk Midrand, 9th Road.

So after pointing the antenna in all possible directions, the speedtests remained very erratic and hence I mailed social@8ta.com to find out from the 8ta guys where the closest 8ta tower was in Midrand so that I could hopefully point my antenna in that direction to get better coverage and a more stable connection.

Got a quick reply from the 8ta team, however it would seem that the closest tower is in Wynberg (The nearest site based on customer' location is GC_SWAN_house_building(-26.119540 28.090600) 2012/04/25 10:58:07).

So is everyone that's using 8ta in Midrand roaming on other network towers?

[Bundu]

Hi Bundu!

We may have planned expansion, but it is rather difficult to to publish due to quite a number of factors which can and do restrain our rollout. Factors like tower acquisition, property owner approval, local government agencies, quality checks, power availability and transmission, these plans can change everyday due to this.

Regards,
Social Media Team

wow 8ta, you are on a roll with all your feedback on this otherwise lazy day!!

I wonder if you could perhaps check if you have ANY plans on having better coverage in this area in the near future? http://g.co/maps/hykve

a friend of mine stays there and he would love to also move over to 8ta, but he's not on the present coverage map and I've tested his signal there and it's VERY weak....

[Bundu]

Got myself the 8ta 10GB + 10GB and I'm running it on an old school E220 modified to use an external Yagi antenna mounted on my roof. I'm in Noordwyk Midrand, 9th Road.

So after pointing the antenna in all possible directions, the speedtests remained very erratic and hence I mailed social@8ta.com to find out from the 8ta guys where the closest 8ta tower was in Midrand so that I could hopefully point my antenna in that direction to get better coverage and a more stable connection.

Got a quick reply from the 8ta team, however it would seem that the closest tower is in Wynberg (The nearest site based on customer' location is GC_SWAN_house_building(-26.119540 28.090600) 2012/04/25 10:58:07).

So is everyone that's using 8ta in Midrand roaming on other network towers?

you are aware that the 10GB package excludes roaming?

[kabous1]

hi Bundu, I was not aware of this.

So then clearly there are 8ta towers somewhere in Midrand... Currently my antenna is not pointing at the location as per my previous post as I get little to no signal in that direction.

I've mailed 8ta again, will see what tower location they come back with this time.

[Bundu]

hi Bundu, I was not aware of this.

So then clearly there are 8ta towers somewhere in Midrand... Currently my antenna is not pointing at the location as per my previous post as I get little to no signal in that direction.

I've mailed 8ta again, will see what tower location they come back with this time.

yes, on these very cheap deals, you can only use 8ta towers - Just had a look at -26.119540 28.090600 on http://www.8ta.com/coverage/8tanetwork/ and if it's somewhere near 76 11th Rd, Johannesburg 2090, you should actually be fully covered on the 8ta network

edit: sorry, just saw GPS coordinates were not your address, but the tower - check your address here http://www.8ta.com/coverage/8tanetwork/

[grahame]

Hi 8ta Team
Received a follow-up call from Veronica today. Thanks for the feedback. Apparently technical support will be addressing my tower problem within the next 3 weeks. I look forward to better service and no dropped connections on 21 May!
Grahame

[kabous1]

yes, on these very cheap deals, you can only use 8ta towers - Just had a look at -26.119540 28.090600 on http://www.8ta.com/coverage/8tanetwork/ and if it's somewhere near 76 11th Rd, Johannesburg 2090, you should actually be fully covered on the 8ta network

edit: sorry, just saw GPS coordinates were not your address, but the tower - check your address here http://www.8ta.com/coverage/8tanetwork/

According to the map our complex is in a dead spot surrounded by coverage...

[Bundu]

According to the map our complex is in a dead spot surrounded by coverage...

that's a bit of a bummer....
You could get an external antenna and perhaps be OK or you could hope that 8ta expand their network in your area - my house was not covered at all about three months ago and suddenly a month ago I'm now fully covered

[SaiyanZ]

Anyone else having trouble in Cape Town? My connection is terrible from last night. I've been online from last night and the whole of today and it's been terrible throughout. Pages time out and I have to keep refreshing pages otherwise they don't load completely.

[Telkom Mobile]

Got myself the 8ta 10GB + 10GB and I'm running it on an old school E220 modified to use an external Yagi antenna mounted on my roof. I'm in Noordwyk Midrand, 9th Road.

So after pointing the antenna in all possible directions, the speedtests remained very erratic and hence I mailed social@8ta.com to find out from the 8ta guys where the closest 8ta tower was in Midrand so that I could hopefully point my antenna in that direction to get better coverage and a more stable connection.

Got a quick reply from the 8ta team, however it would seem that the closest tower is in Wynberg (The nearest site based on customer' location is GC_SWAN_house_building(-26.119540 28.090600) 2012/04/25 10:58:07).

So is everyone that's using 8ta in Midrand roaming on other network towers?

Hi kabous1!

We have sent your query to the relevant team at 7am this morning and we are awating feedback.

Regards,
Social Media Team

[Telkom Mobile]

wow 8ta, you are on a roll with all your feedback on this otherwise lazy day!!

I wonder if you could perhaps check if you have ANY plans on having better coverage in this area in the near future? http://g.co/maps/hykve

a friend of mine stays there and he would love to also move over to 8ta, but he's not on the present coverage map and I've tested his signal there and it's VERY weak....

Hi Bundu!

There are plans for improving this location's coverage. There is a planned site and negotiations are currently underway (last update on 18/04/2012) with another operator to share a tower. Your friend should complete the form on the right hand side of our website and he will be contacted once coverage is available.

Regards,
Social Media Team