Screamer ADSL

howzit said:
Hi Guys

We are conducting a major upgrade to accomodate the huge backlog of applications.
We decided that it was probably better to allow prospective clients to apply and then when we have completed the upgrade to contact them and ask them if they wanted to still be activated.

This was a fairer basis than to just open applications suddenly and if you happened to be watching our website you would jump to the front of the queue.

This way those clients that have been waiting the longest get their activations first.

We should be commencing with activations again in about a week and a half.
Click to expand...

I've submitted my application and was told to wait. But what I want to know is: is it safe to assume I will be activated once Screamer's upgrade is complete?
I want to cancel my subscription at my current ISP as I do not want to pay for both Screamer and current ISP now (Feb 2010) as well as next month (March 2010).
One month double subscription is already way too much :D
My current ISP wants me to give them 30 days notice of cancelation the faster I can get this done the better
 
Tripps said:
I've submitted my application and was told to wait. But what I want to know is: is it safe to assume I will be activated once Screamer's upgrade is complete?
I want to cancel my subscription at my current ISP as I do not want to pay for both Screamer and current ISP now (Feb 2010) as well as next month (March 2010).
One month double subscription is already way too much :D
My current ISP wants me to give them 30 days notice of cancelation the faster I can get this done the better
Click to expand...

If i were you, i'd wait until your account on Screamer is fully active and only then -start- cancelling other ISPs. You will need it to at least compare speeds/usability. If i didn't have my Telkom ISP account i would never be able to tell "is this the website being slow or the ISP or internet in general" . So i already decided i'll run my Telkom ISP with my Screamer for 2 months and see how much of the Telkom i feel obligated to use due to downtimes/slowness on Screamer, only once i feel it's accetable would i shut down my Telkom side.
 
Has there been any update on the public IP side of things? I still seem to be getting private IPs. I know this was supposed to be done at the end of last year, but doesn't seem to have materialised just yet. Can we get an ETA?
 
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eeCaJ said:
Has there been any update on the public IP side of things? I still seem to be getting public IPs. I know this was supposed to be done at the end of last year, but doesn't seem to have materialised just yet. Can we get an ETA?
Click to expand...

I have to admit. This seems to be one of my few gripes I have with Screamer. (I visit certain websites that don't allow access to Screamer based on this issue). The other gripe I have is that video streaming is very poor. Also, it seems as if torrents are being shaped. Not sure how long it is going to be before this is sorted otherwise everything else seems to be ok.
 
mrafiq1 said:
I have to admit. This seems to be one of my few gripes I have with Screamer. (I visit certain websites that don't allow access to Screamer based on this issue). The other gripe I have is that video streaming is very poor. Also, it seems as if torrents are being shaped. Not sure how long it is going to be before this is sorted otherwise everything else seems to be ok.
Click to expand...

out of interest - what web sites are these?
i primarily use news servers - and they really fly.
been getting close to 41KB/s fairly consistently - which is the max of my line.
 
mrafiq1 said:
Also, it seems as if torrents are being shaped.
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Torrents are, mostly likely, not being shaped. The lack of public IPs renders torrents completely useless. Really looking forward to our own IPs...
 
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I see there's a few people that are incorrectly using the terms public and private above.

Private IP = what we have now, which is an unroutable IP address. You need a NAT or similar device to talk to the Internet at large. RFC 1918 describes them.
Public IP = what we want, which is a unique, routable IP address.

According to a PM from howzit, they are several weeks away from allocating public IP addresses at this point. No final ETA given. I really hope they get this sorted out next month, otherwise I may have to start shopping for a different ISP again. I can only handle the impact of this for so long.
 
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I have found one way around this in the meantime. I've been threatening to play with IPv6 for a while now, and I managed to get it completely running over the weekend. So now I have a static public IP address for each of my machines for free. And I have a fully IPv6-enabled network for testing stuff on.

Of course, there are no IPv6 PoPs in South Africa I could find, so I am using one in Amsterdam. This means traffic between two machines on different networks traverse the international links twice. This makes working with realtime applications very hard. My latency on ICMP between two networks varies between 500ms and 1000ms, sometimes even higher.
 
apmcampbell said:
I just signed up for screamer on Monday 25th Jan. Spoke to the call centre agent, explained I need to be connected asap to the internet. Representative told me it takes 2 days for your order to go through. I submit my application along with bank details and all my personal details.

So today is Wednesday and still no email (as promised via the call centre) to give me my password and access details. I call the technical support.

They tell me that Screamer is waiting for an upgrade from Telkom and that no new customers are being connected until this is sorted out. First mention of it. He tells me it will be sorted by Friday (I doubt it!). And the reason is that overdemand is meaning existing customers are not getting the speeds they are paying for.

Thats enough for me to say GOODBYE SCREAMER!

I ask to speak to a supervisor so I can cancel my subscription. Supervisor number 1 is engaged after holding, try supervisor number 2, hold, oh no they are also engaged, lets try number 3, oh damn they are also engaged. So they take my number and say they will call me back. Still waiting.

Nice work SCREAMER. Just shows you cheaper is not always better. I'm voting with my feet and going elsewhere.
Click to expand...

Sounds like sour grapes. I have 2 Screamer connections for home and work and they are both Screaming.
So what if there is a waiting list to get a Screamer connection. Does this make it a bad service?!?!
You seem to be a 2 post wonder and both of them were the same post on different threads so I guess the opposition is doing what it can do bad mouth Screamer.

If you dont want to wait then go somewhere else but dont call it a bad service.
 
now, let's hope that Screamer has enough bandwidth for these new people and that the existing users get their line speed still 'screaming' because the last time they did this... we got hammered by slow speeds.
 
Valerion said:
I have found one way around this in the meantime. I've been threatening to play with IPv6 for a while now, and I managed to get it completely running over the weekend. So now I have a static public IP address for each of my machines for free. And I have a fully IPv6-enabled network for testing stuff on.
Click to expand...
Yeah - IPv6 is a great way to get public IPs for all your devices. Its apparently quite good for torrents too ;-)

Valerion said:
Of course, there are no IPv6 PoPs in South Africa I could find, so I am using one in Amsterdam. This means traffic between two machines on different networks traverse the international links twice. This makes working with realtime applications very hard. My latency on ICMP between two networks varies between 500ms and 1000ms, sometimes even higher.
Click to expand...
There is IPv6 in SA but its only in a few data centres at the moment. If you using 6to4 then there is a local gateway and your pings should be a little better. Native IPv6 on DSL is a little way off though.
 
Hi guys. Just want to know. I have screamer internet and when i send mail from outlook it come back with an error msg something about blacklist reject policy. This happens with all my mail accts and doesnt matter to who i send it. Is it outlook related or isp? Thanks
 
Why would you even want it? My advice, use gmail, or hotmail or another one if you must. ;) Then the email address is not tied into your ISP, so you can jump to another without worrying about your address changing.
 
MetalCut said:
Hi guys. Just want to know. I have screamer internet and when i send mail from outlook it come back with an error msg something about blacklist reject policy. This happens with all my mail accts and doesnt matter to who i send it. Is it outlook related or isp? Thanks
Click to expand...

Make sure you are sending mail out through smtp.dsl.co.za and not through another ISP's mail server, or directly to the internet.

ambo said:
If you using 6to4 then there is a local gateway and your pings should be a little better.
Click to expand...

Could you elaborate on this a little for me, please?
 
Valerion said:
Could you elaborate on this a little for me, please?
Click to expand...
6to4 is a method for carrying IPv6 over IPv6 networks. It can be dynamically configured and automatically uses the closest gateway.

Just realised that it won't work with Screamer though - it need public IPs... :-P
 
ambo said:
6to4 is a method for carrying IPv6 over IPv6 networks. It can be dynamically configured and automatically uses the closest gateway.

Just realised that it won't work with Screamer though - it need public IPs... :-P
Click to expand...

Ahhh, yes, I did look at that before, and was confusing it for something else. But I like the idea of static addresses, so I guess a tunnel is the only way to go to get a permanently-delegated prefix. Also, as you said, you do indeed need a public IP address.
 
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