Cool Ideas FTTH

[koeksGHT]

1000GB 7-7 + 200GB otherwise (two separate caps, one doesn't impact the other)
I haven't exhausted my cap yet, but sure, yes it is "capped".

Well apples and oranges then. Cybersmart do have a different type of last mile network unlike the open-access providers.

 

[Gnome]

Well apples and oranges then.

There is a certain point where uncapped is just a buzzword.
At 200GB, I'm willing to risk it.
I would suggest to anyone to think hard about how you would consume that much data every month.
Especially considering that you would have another 1TB to chow throw after hours.

Cybersmart do have a different type of last mile network unlike the open-access providers.

Cybersmart use DFA which is pretty much a bog standard ethernet (1000BASE-X)
Not sure what the other guys use.

Judging by the talk of GPON, I'm going to guess they either use Telkom, their own network or DFA and cheaped out on the last mile to save on equipment costs.
Any of those seem as likely as the others.

EDIT: These packages actually look far more acceptable: http://frogfootfibre.co.za/Home/Home/Packages

 

[koeksGHT]

There is a certain point where uncapped is just a buzzword.
At 200GB, I'm willing to risk it.
I would suggest to anyone to think hard about how you would consume that much data every month.
Especially considering that you would have another 1TB to chow throw after hours.


Cybersmart use DFA which is pretty much a bog standard ethernet (1000BASE-X)
Not sure what the other guys use.

Judging by the talk of GPON, I'm going to guess they either use Telkom, their own network or DFA and cheaped out on the last mile to save on equipment costs.
Any of those seem as likely as the others.

Well people only can use so much... so yea. From 100mb to 1gbps usage isn't gonna x10.

Depends on the network, TTConnect went with active as there is less maintenance costs and incidents are isolated. Others use gpon for cost effectiveness. The bulk of the sales price is the line access costs. DFA is cost effective in bulk for Cybersmarts "micro" FTTH deployments.

 

[Gnome]

Depends on the network, TTConnect went with active as there is less maintenance costs and incidents are isolated. Others use gpon for cost effectiveness.

I'm really curious how much cheaper GPON is.
You still need to run SM fibre to the customer premises.
So you are saving on the last mile switch.

I bought an SFP switch recently and SFPs themselves cost $4 each.

In my mind GPON is short sighted and cheap, but that is my opinion.

The bulk of the sales price is the line access costs.

I would be surprised if it were otherwise

DFA is cost effective in bulk for Cybersmarts "micro" FTTH deployments.

Well they limit you to 200mbps total but the actual connection is gigabit ethernet which leads me to believe they either
a) have a limit imposed by DFA
b) want their long haul fibre to have overall lower contention at the cost of bandwidth

The guy told me they run 10GBit ethernet to the last mile switches (eg. our block is about 20 people on a switch with 10Gbit ethernet coming in and Gbit ethernet to each premises)

 

[koeksGHT]

I'm really curious how much cheaper GPON is.
You still need to run SM fibre to the customer premises.
So you are saving on the last mile switch.

I bought an SFP switch recently and SFPs themselves cost $4 each.

In my mind GPON is short sighted and cheap, but that is my opinion.

Yea, it is shared access on a port but glass is glass and the modules will get better over time too so not a huge issue.

Well they limit you to 200mbps total but the actual connection is gigabit ethernet which leads me to believe they either
a) have a limit imposed by DFA
b) want their long haul fibre to have overall lower contention at the cost of bandwidth

The guy told me they run 10GBit ethernet to the last mile switches (eg. our block is about 20 people on a switch with 10Gbit ethernet coming in and Gbit ethernet to each premises)

Profit

 

[PBCool]

Paying R599 for Cybersmart:

London:

Virginia USA:

Can't help but think the Cool Ideas is really expensive for what you get.

Have a look at Cybersmarts pricing on the other respective networks and compare, if we had our own network then it would make things a lot more flexible. We are layer3 and want to focus on as much for now considering there are around 14 operators. We were the ISP to set the standard in pricing across all networks and so find it interesting with the slander from said folk

 

[Johnatan56]

There is a certain point where uncapped is just a buzzword.
At 200GB, I'm willing to risk it.
I would suggest to anyone to think hard about how you would consume that much data every month.
Especially considering that you would have another 1TB to chow throw after hours.


Cybersmart use DFA which is pretty much a bog standard ethernet (1000BASE-X)
Not sure what the other guys use.

Judging by the talk of GPON, I'm going to guess they either use Telkom, their own network or DFA and cheaped out on the last mile to save on equipment costs.
Any of those seem as likely as the others.

EDIT: These packages actually look far more acceptable: http://frogfootfibre.co.za/Home/Home/Packages

I currently use about 140GB during normal hours, planning to use it for streaming as well, so will definitely breach the 200GB a month, I'll probably be at about 300GB.
Frogfoot is trying to roll out in my area, probably by next year, they are currently trying to start in Parklands but are waiting for way-leave approval from the City of Cape Town.

I'm really curious how much cheaper GPON is.
You still need to run SM fibre to the customer premises.
So you are saving on the last mile switch.

I bought an SFP switch recently and SFPs themselves cost $4 each.

In my mind GPON is short sighted and cheap, but that is my opinion.


I would be surprised if it were otherwise


Well they limit you to 200mbps total but the actual connection is gigabit ethernet which leads me to believe they either
a) have a limit imposed by DFA
b) want their long haul fibre to have overall lower contention at the cost of bandwidth

The guy told me they run 10GBit ethernet to the last mile switches (eg. our block is about 20 people on a switch with 10Gbit ethernet coming in and Gbit ethernet to each premises)

Well, Google is also using GPON, so I am sure they have a solution for higher speeds once we get there. Currently 1Gbps is useless in South Africa as there are no/few servers capable of maxing it.
I'm contemplating 50 or 100Mbps because of it, not sure if 100Mbps will be worth it.

 

[MattCentralOffical]

Thanks for the Feedback

 

[Swa]

Have a look at Cybersmarts pricing on the other respective networks and compare, if we had our own network then it would make things a lot more flexible. We are layer3 and want to focus on as much for now considering there are around 14 operators. We were the ISP to set the standard in pricing across all networks and so find it interesting with the slander from said folk

You were the ISP that set the standard for pricing? ROFLOL

PS: You also don't seem to know what slander is.

 

[PBCool]

You were the ISP that set the standard for pricing? ROFLOL

PS: You also don't seem to know what slander is.

CellC, Webafrica, CrystalWeb, Cybersmart and RSAWeb all changed their uncapped pricing to match ours across the multiple networks? Not true?

 

[Johnatan56]

CellC, Webafrica, CrystalWeb, Cybersmart and RSAWeb all changed their uncapped pricing to match ours across the multiple networks? Not true?

Swa is a troll of note, I would just ignore him.

 

[Swa]

CellC, Webafrica, CrystalWeb, Cybersmart and RSAWeb all changed their uncapped pricing to match ours across the multiple networks? Not true?

Cell C was a late entrant. What about all the ones who had their pricing way before you? Any chance they all just adjusted to the market like you also did? You're making some pretty bold claims here seeing as you are generally still more expensive...

Swa is a troll of note, I would just ignore him.

LOL, form the one who can never substantiate a single one of his claims...

 

[PBCool]

Cell C was a late entrant. What about all the ones who had their pricing way before you? Any chance they all just adjusted to the market like you also did? You're making some pretty bold claims here seeing as you are generally still more expensive...


LOL, form the one who can never substantiate a single one of his claims...

Please advise who had the current pricing before we did, also advise how we are generally more expensive? It's not bold if it's the truth .

 

[koeksGHT]

Please advise who had the current pricing before we did, also advise how we are generally more expensive? It's not bold if it's the truth .

 

[PBCool]

View attachment 373133

Lol .

 

[Gnome]

Have a look at Cybersmarts pricing on the other respective networks and compare, if we had our own network then it would make things a lot more flexible. We are layer3 and want to focus on as much for now considering there are around 14 operators. We were the ISP to set the standard in pricing across all networks and so find it interesting with the slander from said folk

When I compare your packages to that of Cybersmart (both quoting DFA), your packages are definitely less competitive.
Perhaps it would make sense to offer capped package that is more affordable.
High throughput and low latency is just as important as total bandwidth.
If not more important.
To many, my self included, the most important is low latency and high throughput.
I don't need to download the internet every month, but when I download something I want it quickly.

Slander? Who is slandering you?
Are you actually a manager or similar at "Cool Ideas"?
You guys seem to me to be quite a small ISP. At least that has been my impression, but calling others slanderous just makes you look weak.
You don't see Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon, etc. constantly calling their competitors slanderous. There is a good reason for it.
Impressions are important. Nobody likes a someone who whines about their competitors and brags about being first.
What makes it weaker is that all they needed to do was lower their prices to get the competitive edge (hardly innovating)

#JustSaying (Also I don't work for Cybersmart)

I currently use about 140GB during normal hours, planning to use it for streaming as well, so will definitely breach the 200GB a month, I'll probably be at about 300GB.
Frogfoot is trying to roll out in my area, probably by next year, they are currently trying to start in Parklands but are waiting for way-leave approval from the City of Cape Town.

300GB is an obscene amount of data every month.
What on earth are you doing? (serious question)

Well, Google is also using GPON, so I am sure they have a solution for higher speeds once we get there.

Well, if Google are using it, then it must be the best!

In all seriousness, from the technology perspective I find it fascinating (GPON).
The network operates on the principle that many customers share a single port.
You "reflect" the light to all the customers. (so you can't be far from your customers obviously, attenuation and all)
Everyone on the port gets everyone's data in other words.
Everyone gets their "slice" of time on that port.

What I don't like:
- Latency: They encrypt, else you could eves drop (You possible still can, but let's pretend it is perfect encryption)
- More latency: Any network port has a limit of packets it can process per second. This is divided by the number of customers
Lastly I wonder how high throughput or high packet count by a noisy neighbor impacts other users.
I also wonder if the time sharing is constant or variable.
If it is variable, then latency will get terrible when a port is close to saturation (eg. many customers signed up)

Currently 1Gbps is useless in South Africa as there are no/few servers capable of maxing it.

At some point it becomes arbitrary.
I currently download at around 23MiB/s.
Since a single movies downloads in a minute or two, I don't really feel that higher than that would matter to me.

That said, the biggest advantage is the low latency (eg. 1ms, web sites load instantly)
It isn't just the HTML download that is a problem.
HTML specifies resources that also need to be downloaded (which often specify more resources)
So a web page has a first and last resource. The lower the latency, the faster the page appears completed due to the first and last resource.
All of this is largely driven by latency and not throughput.

I'm contemplating 50 or 100Mbps because of it, not sure if 100Mbps will be worth it.

I guess that is where we differ.
I like the fact that if I want to watch a movie now (in 1080p), I can watch it in 2-3 minutes from now.
I don't quite do it often enough to download 300GB in a month tho

 

[koeksGHT]

When I compare your packages to that of Cybersmart (both quoting DFA), your packages are definitely less competitive.
Perhaps it would make sense to offer capped package that is more affordable.
High throughput and low latency is just as important as total bandwidth.
If not more important.
To many, my self included, the most important is low latency and high throughput.
I don't need to download the internet every month, but when I download something I want it quickly.

How can you compare capped to uncapped? It's not even the same regardless if you can't even use 300Gb.

 

[Scary_Turtle]

When I compare your packages to that of Cybersmart (both quoting DFA), your packages are definitely less competitive.

300GB is an obscene amount of data every month.
What on earth are you doing? (serious question)

At some point it becomes arbitrary.
I currently download at around 23MiB/s.
Since a single movies downloads in a minute or two, I don't really feel that higher than that would matter to me.

I like the fact that if I want to watch a movie now (in 1080p), I can watch it in 2-3 minutes from now.
I don't quite do it often enough to download 300GB in a month tho

I disagree 300gigs of data for me is 1.5 - 2 weeks of use and I have a 10 meg line. I stream all my TV either through DSTV app or other sources, so considering Netflix consumes around 3gigs per hour of watching in 1080p and the TV is on for an average for 4 hours a day whether someone is watching or not, that is 360gigs just on the TV for a month.

Often with the TV on I'll go watch Youtube or play a game which consumes extra gigs.

So comparing a 300 gig package to a package where 2TB is a realistic option is like apples and a all you can eat buffet.

With the speed of 100mb/s instead of getting a movie in 1-2 mins you get it in 3-4 mins really what difference does it make.

 

[PBCool]

@Gnome I didn't once say that Cybersmart was slandering us at all, so not sure where you are getting that from. And haven't slandered them in any event.

Also DFA has different deployments so I don't think you are comparing the same service, the DFA we run services on as listed on our site was an actual FTTH deployment in a respective suburb (Parkview) and certain buildings in Sandton. This is different to deploying your own network over the existing DFA infrastructure and doing your own in builds.

On the GPON networks vs Active we really don't see any difference in performance as things stand, the network operators generally would split a 2.5Gbps port 16 or 32 ways on offering a 100Mbps service, realistically not every customer would opt for 100Mbps service so these ports go under utilised.

DFA offer a 1Gbps symmetrical service over the Calix PON kit but we are not aware of how this is split on the optical side as yet.

 

[Chevron]

300GB is an obscene amount of data every month.
What on earth are you doing? (serious question)

If you think 300GB is obscene, then we need to bring you into the digital age. Just buying a couple games on steam and generous use of Netflix/Deezer/YouTube you can breach that. Not hard at all. Especially with multiple users.