LebGeeks

m0ei

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

Actually i don't mind paying the same price for a better speed and quota. I hope private companies will be able to give the same speed as Ogero ? Anyone have an idea?

belal

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

BEIRUT: A submarine cable which will give Internet service providers the capacity they need to supply high-speed Internet services, including 3G, was put into action Monday, after months of waiting.

“The tap was closed, and now it’s open,” said Riad Boustany, an adviser to Telecoms Minister Nicolas Sehnawi Tuesday.

In a statement released by the Telecommunications Ministry Tuesday, Sehnawi confirmed that people could expect “important developments” in the sector that “will coincide with the liberalization of the international capacities known as IMEWE and Cadmos.”

The statement added that Sehnawi would present a draft bill to the Cabinet in the coming three weeks that would reduce the prices of Internet services in the country.

The ministry contacted ISPs Monday morning to inform them that capacity they had requested several months ago from the India-Middle East-Western Europe submarine cable would now be available, Habib Torbey, the head of the Lebanese Telecom Association and president of GlobalCom Data Services, which groups all of the country’s private ISPs, told The Daily Star Tuesday. Torbey said IDM, the ISP owned by GDS, had noticed the increase in capacity Monday afternoon.

“This will really change the Internet landscape in Lebanon,” Torbey said.

The 13,000 kilometer IMEWE cable runs between India and France and has a potential capacity of 3.84 Terabits per second. It has been operational since 2009, but its implementation in Lebanon has been repeatedly delayed. Its intended launch date of Dec. 13, 2010, was postponed by the IMEWE consortium, which controls the supply, because of a dispute between the Telecoms Ministry, then headed by Charbel Nahhas, and OGERO, the semi-autonomous company responsible for administering telecoms in the country.

According to Boustany, access to the IMEWE cable was made possible after the previous minister, Charbel Nahhas, wrote to the consortium to inform them that the ministry had sole authority over the country’s Internet supply.

In January the ministry announced plans to bring relatively high-speed 3G technology on to the market via cellular companies Alfa and mtc within seven months, and Nahhas has said the network, which will require significantly more capacity, will utilize the IMEWE cable.

The cable will also mean ISPs are able, in the long run, to provide faster speeds to users. Imad Tarabay, CEO of ISP Cedarcom welcomed the move, in particular the ministry’s announcement that lower pricing would be introduced. Unlike government-owned Alfa and mtc, ISPs currently pay $3,000 for a line which costs the government $100 to supply, and Tarabay said this is prohibitive to ISPs being able to provide affordable fast Internet to users.

“At the moment it’s as if they were inviting you to buy property in Downtown [Beirut],” he said. “There’s a lot of land, but nobody can afford it.”

The ministry did not specify in its statement by how much prices would be reduced, but Tarabay nonetheless said the decision was “a very good step.”

Activists campaigning for an increase in Internet speeds also greeted the news with cheer Tuesday. Mark Daou, one of the co-founders of advocacy group Fast Lebanon said he welcomed the move “100 percent,” although he said the most immediate impact would be on 3G services which would be “guaranteed” by the increased capacity.

Samer Karam, the founder of Flip the Switch, which has been campaigning for the IMEWE cable to be put in use, said the move had been “a year in the making.”

Should the move lead to faster and cheaper Internet, it will have “a big impact on the local knowledge economy,” said Karam, as those Lebanese companies which rely on the Internet are put on a more competitive footing.

Cedarcom’s Tarabay agreed that the move was significant. “With lower prices and increased capacity, we can start to talk about real internet services in the country.”

Read more: http://www.dailystar.com.lb/Business/Le … z1RFeXQqBM
(The Daily Star :: Lebanon News :: http://www.dailystar.com.lb)

Flakk

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

That is great news, do you guys think this will apply to Pescotel (WISE and wirelessbits etc...) ?

Mhmd

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

Torbey said IDM, the ISP owned by GDS, had noticed the increase in capacity Monday afternoon.

Any IDM Subscribers  ?

al_jamal

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

i wish it for you that its true :-) hopefully it comes soon :-)

good work mr. nahhas!

AvoK95

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

who wants to celebrate
seriously lets have a geek feast  or a beach party or somthing ..

EddieEC

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

F***ing finally.

Monkey D. Luffy

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

downloading a 60MB file in less than 4 minutes

Mhmd

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

downloading a 60MB file in less than 4 minutes

What's this ?

vengeance666

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

This F***** Made My F***** Day !!

Mahmoud Brk

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

Guys, is 420ms ping to Manchester server normal for a 128K subscriber from Ogero? Or it's an IMEWE effect ?

EDIT: My pings to bbc.co.uk are still the same ~120ms and to google.com get lowered by ~20ms to become 180ms.

Last edited by Mahmoud Brk (July 5 2011)

vengeance666

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

speaking about pings , 512ms to frankfurt with ~60ms jitter ... nothing new here

Bassem

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

So far, I'm being Thomas on this one.

But! Once it does happen, I vote we have ourselves a fireworks display, with media coverage. I'm 100% serious here. This is way more deserving than some political or sectarian crap that people are so eager to celebrate. This will be a real positive influence on Lebanon!

incinerator

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

http://www.tayyar.org/Tayyar/News/Polit … ek-499.htm منرجع منسجيل

xazbrat

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

http://www.tayyar.org/Tayyar/News/Polit … ek-499.htm منرجع منسجيل

One great thing I see from that article is that E1 lines are going to drop to $300 from the current $2700 or so.  Not only should the speed improve, so should the prices and the quotas will be lower and less prohibitive than before.

Chup

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

Torbey said IDM, the ISP owned by GDS, had noticed the increase in capacity Monday afternoon.

Any IDM Subscribers  ?

Nothing so far,
but i did find games on Black ops much faster , and i played a round with a ~100 ms latency ( 3 Green Bars )
but the other rounds were .... *sighs*

MrClass

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

What does this mean? Are they going to boost the ADSL, HDSL, and Dedicated Lines speeds drastically? Or are there going to be new services which we'll have to subscribe to? At work we have dedicated line and we did notice some major performance improvement. We usually top at 200KBps, but for the last 2 days, we were able to reach 700KBps download speeds. Cool :)

Mhmd

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

فهو سيرفع نظرياً السعة الإجماليّة إلى 3.8 ملايين ميغابيت في الثانية (Mb/s)

3.8 Tb/s theoretically ?? That's so nice

The-MMMs

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

Torbey said IDM, the ISP owned by GDS, had noticed the increase in capacity Monday afternoon.

Any IDM Subscribers  ?

Nothing so far,
but i did find games on Black ops much faster , and i played a round with a ~100 ms latency ( 3 Green Bars )
but the other rounds were .... *sighs*

Constant all the time 3 bars in MW2 even in ground war (i shit you not); tried FFA and TDM as well same

Im quite familiar  with ping rates in games, for i play on PC, and it definitely feels like a good 150MS (sniping has never been so good)

Yay !

bbc.co.uk ping is like 110ms now, Ogero 256kb/s Khaldeh.

In general my connection is much better, but hopefully more bandwidth will be available soon (for 256kb/s is the fastest i can get)

Chup

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

Torbey said IDM, the ISP owned by GDS, had noticed the increase in capacity Monday afternoon.

Any IDM Subscribers  ?

Nothing so far,
but i did find games on Black ops much faster , and i played a round with a ~100 ms latency ( 3 Green Bars )
but the other rounds were .... *sighs*

Constant all the time 3 bars in MW2 even in ground war (i shit you not); tried FFA and TDM as well same

Im quite familiar  with ping rates in games, for i play on PC, and it definitely feels like a good 150MS (sniping has never been so good)

Yay !

bbc.co.uk ping is like 110ms now, Ogero 256kb/s Khaldeh.

In general my connection is much better, but hopefully more bandwidth will be available soon (for 256kb/s is the fastest i can get)

TRY BLACK OPSS !!!

Apple Safari

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

It's sad that I haven't noticed a single improvement in my connection (Cyberia 256 kbps ADSL).
Latency just got worst (504 ms).

Chup

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

It's sad that I haven't noticed a single improvement in my connection (Cyberia 256 kbps ADSL).
Latency just got worst (504 ms).

That's what i'm fearing most...
Is that the latency would improve for ogero users only ...

GreenM

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

I'm Cyberia 256 kbps ADSL too, and it has the highest ping over all other ISPs.

nuclearcat

Member

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

ISP's will start getting upgrades in 2 weeks

vegetaleb

Banned

Re: IMEWE cable launching in Lebanon this summer

There are no ways to download a file more than 150mb with megaupload,rapidshare and co. Download will stop in the middle!!
I am using HDSL 2mbs
On ADSL it's at least more stable