Afrihost Uncapped ADSL Feedback

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Looking at what's going on (with other ISP's as well), I reckon south africa isn't ready for anything above 4MB/s lines yet.
 
Looking at what's going on (with other ISP's as well), I reckon south africa isn't ready for anything above 4MB/s lines yet.

Considering the extortionate prices Telkom charge ISPs (~90% of the internet connection costs go to Telkom), I am really very puzzled why none of the larger ISPs have invested in creating their own network yet, at least in the big cities. Labour is cheap in South Africa, so that's not the issue. The massive extra profits (>R400 per customer per month) they could make would pay off the investment rather quick. The only thing I can guess is that it might be difficult to get all the required permits.
 
I get a massage from Afrihost support about my Speed on a 10 MB account
Hi There
Thanks for the email:)

Kindly note that we have managed to resolve and fine tune the network and everything seems to be running 100%. Uncapped accounts will be shaped if their usage is high and will be monitored over a 10 day rolling window. Once the usage drops ,your the shaping will be removed. While being shaped you will have full speed on realtime and http ,although your p2p and downloads will be shaped causing slower speeds. if you want full speeds please look at our capped packages.

Thank you and take care:)

Please do not hesitate to contact us if we may be of further assistance.

Warm Regards
Renaldo
Afrihost.com
Pure Internet Joy!

and on ther Web Sit it says 10 MB Account

Media, Downloads,
Heavy Use
Semi-Shaped Bandwidth

I love how there's no details. When your useage is "high" and when your useage "drops." So who determines what is defined by "high" and "drops"? Afrihost, at their convenience.

Why can't it be how it was with IS, with individual limits, if you > 300GB on a 10mbps line your speed is throttled blah blah blah.
If it's really true that MTN has more capacity (which seems it actually doesn't currently), then why can this not be applied to their new network?

I'll be honest and say I have downloaded 120GB this month so far in 16 days on a 10mbps line, which is a neat 7.5GB per day. 3-4 HDTV episodes. And now I am shaped to all hell, 25% of line speed. 225GB in a month (and not every month mind you) is not excessive on a 10mbps uncapped package.

If Afrihost cannot offer the bandwidth to go with a 10mbps line then they shouldn't offer 10mbps uncapped at all, end of story, because they cannot realistically deliver on these promises.

As the old adage goes, "Buy cheap, buy twice." That certainly applies to us who have paid Afrihost, and it also applies to Afrihost who have paid MTN. "Buy cheap, buy twice."
 
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My advice: When the Telkom guy arrives, supervise him non-stop. Before he leaves, make sure that not only your phone line, but also the phone lines of those around you work.

Afrihost told me 3-5 working days, in the end it took nearly a whole month to get my ADSL line working, partly due to Telkom connecting my neighbours to my phone line and disconnecting the neighbours, partly due to the fact that Afrihost and Telkom do not really communicate (I was told by Afrihost support that if Afrihost has logged a fault with Telkom, they're not allowed to contact Telkom again for another 48 hours... Amazingly frustrating when you know that Telkom has looked at the issue and failed, and you need to wait 48 hours before Afrihost can tell Telkom that it still doesn't work) and partly due to the fact that it took Telkom 3 weeks from when my ADSL was hooked up until they had fixed the line enough that I could actually synchronise the line.

Oh, and in the end... I had to use a friend's inside contact in Telkom to get my line working at all. If I hadn't, I would probably have been waiting for months.

THe thing is I already have a working land line so all they need to do is allow for ADSL connectivity on my line
 
The network IS fixed. It IS running 100% again. The only thing is that the shaping policy has changed a ****load since the move to MTN. What I know is browsing, youtube and such is not affected, but all downloads are. Your downloads are throttled to EXACTLY 23.4% of whatever your line speed is. If your download speeds are crappy, you've been shaped. It is that simple. I'm not sure where the limit is sitting at now, but I do know it's below 30GB (based on posts in this thread). It may be more on higher line speeds, I'm not sure.

I believe we can determine what the new limits are if all the people with crappy speeds post their usage and line speed.
 
THe thing is I already have a working land line so all they need to do is allow for ADSL connectivity on my line

That's the thing that took the longest in my case. As I said, from the point where Telkom actually hooked the then existing line up to the DSLAM to the ADSL connection actually working took 3 weeks of non-communication between Afrihost and Telkom.

In my experience, getting the physical line installed is much less hassle than getting the physical line hooked up to Telkom's ADSL equipment, sad as it may sound.
 
@Afriman

I applied for a 1 mb bundle. Afrihost service advised it can take upto 30 days. Whereas telkom can activate it immediately, why the difference in time frames?

If you are applying for ADSL line activation, that is the time period Telkom give us. they can do it for you quicker directly, but usually only if you enter a contract with them. If you do a "self install" it pretty much the same waiting period.
 
That's the thing that took the longest in my case. As I said, from the point where Telkom actually hooked the then existing line up to the DSLAM to the ADSL connection actually working took 3 weeks of non-communication between Afrihost and Telkom.

In my experience, getting the physical line installed is much less hassle than getting the physical line hooked up to Telkom's ADSL equipment, sad as it may sound.

Ok so they have to physically come out to connect the line to the exchange?
 
Come on AfriMan....give me reason to move over to AH. If I'm convinced enough, I bring another +/- 50 clients with me who are now gatefull of MWEB....SHOW ME THE INTERWEB

We have some problems now, that much is evident. But our track record shows that we are the best team in the country to pull the rabbit out of the hat, and make the internet more awesome.

We've only sold ADSL for three years, and won ISP of the Year for the last two of those. We're definitely on the right track, we might have growing pains, but when the dust settles, it's going to be milk and honey for Afrihost clients :)
 
Ok so they have to physically come out to connect the line to the exchange?

A technician has to be dispatched to connect you to the DSLAM exchange. A normal landline runs on the POTS exchange, they are totally separate. They don't have to enter your premises to do so, but there is a physical process involved, not just a mouse click activation.
 
A technician has to be dispatched to connect you to the DSLAM exchange. A normal landline runs on the POTS exchange, they are totally separate. They don't have to enter your premises to do so, but there is a physical process involved, not just a mouse click activation.

Ok.... lets hope it happens soon.. Need to start using the uncappeds internets again....
 
Afriman, I don't know what you did within the last hour or two, but my games are now lagging so badly that they're nearly unplayable.
 
i did a self install 3 years ago. telkom guided me through the whole process of activating my line which happned on the same day i applied for it. the problem is the third party...it takes afrihost 3 weeks to cantact them

a year ago afrihost begged us to take over our line rental from telkom. 6 months ago my line went dead, after numerous emails to afrihost support nothing got fixed and afrihost support gave me telkoms number so i can call them myself. 1 10 minute call later and everything was fixed.

when they say "we deal with telkom so you dont have to" actually means telkom will never get dealt with
 
i did a self install 3 years ago. telkom guided me through the whole process of activating my line which happned on the same day i applied for it. the problem is the third party...it takes afrihost 3 weeks to cantact them

a year ago afrihost begged us to take over our line rental from telkom. 6 months ago my line went dead, after numerous emails to afrihost support nothing got fixed and afrihost support gave me telkoms number so i can call them myself. 1 10 minute call later and everything was fixed.

when they say "we deal with telkom so you dont have to" actually means telkom will never get dealt with

i'm sorry that happened in your case, truly. We should have handled that a lot better, and to ask you to phone Telkom is unacceptable!
 
Test conducted on Friday, November 16, 2012 5:12:50 PM

Download Speed: 88 kbps (11 KB/sec transfer rate)

Upload Speed: 402 kbps (50.3 KB/sec transfer rate)

Latency: 77 ms

i rst my case. i wanted to post my speedtest.net results but the test fails to load....
 
could u be so kind to give me the telkom number again because there is obviously something wrong with my connection because changing isp's doesnt make a difference
 
Test conducted on Friday, November 16, 2012 5:52:21 PM

Download Speed: 41 kbps (5.1 KB/sec transfer rate)

Upload Speed: 417 kbps (52.1 KB/sec transfer rate)

Latency: 78 ms

im starting to break records here. keep up the good work
 
could u be so kind to give me the telkom number again because there is obviously something wrong with my connection because changing isp's doesnt make a difference

You can also change your username to guest@telkomadsl (password guest) and then run a speedtest on saix.net to see if there is a line issue.

Please PM me so we can look into this :(
 
Afriman, I don't know what you did within the last hour or two, but my games are now lagging so badly that they're nearly unplayable.

I've seen a couple of similar reports, though my results at home seem OK for now.

Will check if anything has changed on our side :(
 
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