Royal Ascot Fibre (Milnerton, Cape Town)

[StoneCold]

Here's my main concern: Is Telkom 100Mbps FTTH symmetrical or not? An ISP chat agent claimed it is, but I vaguely remember reading 100 up and 10 down. I would rather take 50 symmetrical than 100/10 if I have a choice, but I'll take any fibre I can get as soon as I can - using any kind of cloud backup at 700Kbps upload is painful.

As for price, if I take the FTTH pages on webafrica or vox and try to compare 100Mbps Telkom and Vumatel, it seems similar enough to me to not worry about it. I'm still not clear on whether you *must* take data with the line (telkom's site also doesn't make this immediately clear), but with Telkom I can take the smallest data package and use other ISPs. With Vumatel it looks different.

Telkom is not symmetrical.

Download and upload speeds are as follows:

100mb 25mb
40mb 10mb
20mb 5mb
10mb 2mb

 

[Garson007]

Does anyone know what the status of this project is?

 

[paul5186]

Rollout is supposed to start this month

 

[FHTheron]

Some news was posted here:
http://royalascotfibre.co.za/news

They mention a letter from RAMPOA but I never got it. Feel like I missed a mailing list somewhere. Regardless, the explanation makes it sound like there won't even be a lot of trenching which I find surprising. Can't wait to get it.

 

[Garson007]

Update: http://royalascotfibre.co.za/news/2016/5/17/update-1



Edit: In area 1.

 

[paul5186]

Update: http://royalascotfibre.co.za/news/2016/5/17/update-1

View attachment 362472

Edit: In area 1.

fml, area 4

 

[Garson007]

Telkom coverage map updated:

http://www.telkom.co.za/coverage/

 

[FHTheron]

Also got a call from Vox today letting me know that they'll call again once fibre is active and I can apply.

I know we should be able to use any ISP, but for the actual fibre provider it seems like there are worth noting. Can't quite decide which one to pick, wondering what others will do.

Comparing 100Mbps packages with smallest amount of data possible:
Telkom => R1599 x 24, 200GB soft-cap (can you actually get just a line from them?)
Webafrica => R928, 20GB (R1248 for 200GB)
Vox => R988, 75GB, Vox phone (R1288 for 200GB)

So aside from cost and installation fees, does it really matter which one you go with?

 

[Foxhound5366]

Comparing 100Mbps packages with smallest amount of data possible:
Telkom => R1599 x 24, 200GB soft-cap (can you actually get just a line from them?)
Webafrica => R928, 20GB (R1248 for 200GB)
Vox => R988, 75GB, Vox phone (R1288 for 200GB)

Ouch ... where's that guy who was giving me grief for stating that fibre is prohibitively expensive in South Africa?

Compare this to my humble 10Mbps ADSL connection (which performs just fine thank you), and my 100GB daytime + 1000GB nightime data through Webafrica, and all for R650/month. 75GB for WHAT, comrades, FOR WHAT?

Edit: Incidentally I'm currently staying in Royal Ascot too, so this is something to consider if you're actually planning to USE the internet and not just admire your speed test results.

 

[Garson007]

Edit: Incidentally I'm currently staying in Royal Ascot too, so this is something to consider if you're actually planning to USE the internet and not just admire your speed test results.

Nah, I'll get it for the speed test results.

 

[Garson007]

I'm not seeing any trenching or anything going on. Somebody spot some physical activity yet?

 

[GlynnR]

I live in The Stableyard and noticed guys digging up the paving with maos and site plans with them on Thursday, 16 June(yes, on. Public holiday *impressive*)... Turns out they're from Openserve and are busy getting the fibre pulled through the area, with an ETA to get it lit and working by the end of July.

I can't wait to get my hands on the fibre! The only thing I'm trying to figure out is how to just get a fibre link without and bandwidth, so that I can keep my data through Afrihost... Anyone know how to do this?

 

[FHTheron]

Glad to hear that.

It sounds like the best is ISPAfrika at R729 for 100Mbps with a token 10GB data. I plan on going with this and data from wherever.

 

[GlynnR]

Glad to hear that.

It sounds like the best is ISPAfrika at R729 for 100Mbps with a token 10GB data. I plan on going with this and data from wherever.

Yeah that's my plan as well... Based on my calculations, I'll end up paying more or less the same as I am currently paying for my 40Mbps VDSL line with Afrihost.

 

[paul5186]

Same here, I will be going from 2mbs to 100mbs! Bought an android box and nas in preparation. This weekend I am going to run some network cabling sigh

 

[GlynnR]

Same here, I will be going from 2mbs to 100mbs! Bought an android box and nas in preparation. This weekend I am going to run some network cabling sigh

Good luck with the cabling! Out of curiosity, which NAS did you buy?
I'm running Plex media server on my windows PC that used to be my gaming PC... I've got my AppleTV connected to watch everything. It works great but I've decided to do cabling myself too(too many WiFi AP's in the area affecting my coverage.
I've got the cables connected (running across the floor for now which looks terrible) and going to need to put in some trunking to make everything nice and pretty again haha.

 

[paul5186]

Good luck with the cabling! Out of curiosity, which NAS did you buy?
I'm running Plex media server on my windows PC that used to be my gaming PC... I've got my AppleTV connected to watch everything. It works great but I've decided to do cabling myself too(too many WiFi AP's in the area affecting my coverage.
I've got the cables connected (running across the floor for now which looks terrible) and going to need to put in some trunking to make everything nice and pretty again haha.

Thanks! Just decided to cable where possible and keep my cheapie wifi ap for e.g phone and tablet wifi only when the fibre is installed, the network cabling will be for the computers, nas, Android box and TV.

I looked long and hard at which nas I wanted. In the end I decided on a small nas, I.e one bay with gigabit ethernet and USB. I bought a Seagate personal cloud 4tb version. It's running great, getting good file read and copy speeds. One of the main features I wanted was the ability to e.g load torrents and to be able to sync e.g my photos to the cloud via the nas to Amazon. In that way I have a backup of my most important content offsite and when I want I can just upgrade the hard drive. It was just over 3k. Where as a fully featured 2 bay nas without any drives is around 4k, most of the features I would never use in my home situation. Though if you are looking for One would recommend the asustor 202T.

Once I have cables my place I can finally mount the nas to my android box and use kodi etc

 

[Karel Kat]

Regarding physical activity, as far as I understand there will be minimal as Royal Ascot is a newish development and Telkom would have done most of the trenching when they installed the MSAN.

As for ISPAfrika, the R2299 installation fee is a bit off putting, considering that Cybersmart is charging R1500 and other ISPs R1700 ish. I probably matters less if you are a permanent resident and can recoup the cost in the long run. (I am speaking out of my ass here, just did the calculation and it works out better in the short term as well)

A question to the community at large because I am renting currently:

When you get fibre through Openserve, part of the installation is a ONT modem. Who does that end up belonging to? If you move do you take it with you? Is it a permanent part of the installation that you leave behind?

 

[paul5186]

Hmmm I wonder if there would be an install fee, as everything is already in conduits underground etc, Royal Ascot is quite a unique install for openserve. But I am not holding my breath that they would waive it or decrease the fee.

 

[FHTheron]

As for ISPAfrika, the R2299 installation fee is a bit off putting, considering that Cybersmart is charging R1500 and other ISPs R1700 ish.

I somehow missed that R2299, that is a bit off putting yes. WebAfrica offers free installation and router at R928pm and over live chat they said you need to pay the router if you cancel before 6 months and you pay installation if you cancel before 12 months. Over a year that puts ISPAfrika at R11047 and WebAfrica at R11136 and Vox at R13200+. Knowing that, I'm rather leaning towards WebAfrica for their night data and familiarity.