Hi Everybody,
I’ve just found this forum and I’m wondering if any of you good people can help me with a problem re my son and his wife who are hoping to shortly re-locate to Spain.
We have just returned from a fact finding break in the Moraria/Javea area. My son and his wife are hoping to buy a property in this region to settle on a permanent basis…however they would like to rent first for a few months at least to see if things work out. My son is self-employed working from home, and in order to do his particular type of work he is reliant on a fast reliable internet connection….does such a thing exist in the Moraira/Javea area ? This may sound like a silly question, but of the three villa’s he has looked to rent so far, he has had to turn them all down as none of them could guarantee a stable internet connection ( he needs a minimum 9mb at the very least !! )
Ideally this would be a cable connection, although we’ve been told that’s not likely as ADSL is more common…...ADSL would work as long as it was a fast connection…...a mobile connection is out of the question, it wouldn’t meet the demands of his job.
If anyone can advise or give us some help on this I would be truly grateful.
Janie.
Its highly unlikely that you will get anything like the speeds you are looking for in that area.
Cable internet is still in its infancy here and is generally only available in the major cities.
ADSL is available but the entire infrastructure is owned by Telefonica and whereas 10Mbps is available, again it is only in selected areas like the major cities. For the rest of Spain, the service is limited to 6Mbps or rurally 3Mbps. The best you are likely to get in Javea would be 3Mbps or maybe 6Mbps if you were lucky. Depending on usage in the area, speeds can drop dramatically at peak times, literally down to dial-up speed.
Don believe the hype from companies such as Jazztel who will promise you the moon to get you to sign up; they merely rent bandwidth from Telefonica and so are limited in their capabilities. In some areas, again major population centres, Jazztel do have their own infrastructure but just be aware they might not be able to supply what they say they can.
High speed internet is a pipe dream out here; and a lot of the time ADSL can be a joke. Its also very expensive at around 40? per month plus telephone line rental of 13?.
I’m paying for a 6mb service from Telefonica, I live 2 km from Fuengirola, so hardly rural, and generally only get a 700kb/s download speed.
Other companies promise you 10mb+ but they still have to use Telefonica’s infrastructure so in nearly all cases the speed will be exactly the same.
The main problem is the condition of the cables and until they lay fibre optic this will not improve.
I was speaking to a Telefonica Engineer the other day and he says fibre optic will be installed in maybe 1 month, 6 months, 3 years, 5 years. In other words don’t hold your breath.
Wireless Internet is a solution and it’s something I install for clients on the Costa del Sol but I’m not sure what’s available in your area.
Thanks so much Neil and Soltec for your replies.
You have both kind of confirmed what I was already fearing..it is such a shame as my son and his wife were so looking forward to starting in Spain. What I don’t understand is, surely banks etc need a fairly fast internet connection ? how do businesses manage to operate with such slow connection speeds ? Also do all ISP’s in Spain have usage limits ? because if so that would be the death toll for them..lol…If it were a question of just using the internet once or twice a day it wouldn’t be so much of a problem, but my son would have the computer running more or less all day ......I’m hoping they can work around this somehow, but from what you’ve both said, that’s beginning to look more and more unlikely :(
I think the answer is generally that what you’ve never had you’ll never miss!
Major businesses are mainly concentrated in the main metropolitan areas so they benefit from the faster speeds available in these areas.
The rest of us just have to put up with it.
Insofar as usage limits are concerned, Telefonica do not cap any excessive usage, nor do they have a ‘Fair Use Policy’ so beloved by the UK and Virgin in particular, particularly in respect of fast connections. All the mobile phone operators that provide an internet facility, Orange, Vodafone et al., cap their usage at quite ridiculously low levels. and all have a Fair (or should that be UNfair) Usage policy.
I looked into the Wireless Internet solution but this too is capped at quite a low level and the speeds aren’t that great either.
Having said all of that, we find that our typical adsl speed measured by Speedtest.net averages out at between 1.5 and 2.5Mbps not brilliant but good enough for my wife to maintain daily around a couple of hundred websites and blogs. Of course that all goes to pot if the villagers all decide to go online for chat and games and our local switching centre gets overwhelmed. (Or if someone nicks the phone cable for the copper content… oh yes it has been known and the 33Kv overhead transmission lines…)
Anyway I hope you find a solution you can work with…
It all depends on how far you are from the exchange.
I am on telefonicas 10meg service, and constantly get this and still max it out.
(dont use adls spped test sites..they give so different result each time you use it…just download a big file from a good server, (MS, google)...and use that instead!)
I am, however, less than 500m from the exchange.
But someone who i about 2 kms from the exchange is also on the same “10meg” but only gets a max of about 6meg.
The other thing is companies do not offer an actual 10meg service…usually the wording is “speeds of up to 10meg”. Crucial words are “up to”.
Thank you Ronnie, still trying to find out about adsl lines….but it’s a bit of a catch 22 situation…..before telephonica can check a line for download speeds they need a telephone number ? but trying to supply them with a number before we have a house is proving nigh impossible ..lol feel like we are going round in circles 😊
My pleasure Jonie as foxbat and soltac describe earlier that you can easily get 10MB+ link from Telephonica but if they required a telephone number than you should try Wireless Internet. Are you got information about it..?????
No operator can give any solid indication of what speeds may be available other than to quote the maximum for a given area. For instance in some parts of Manilva on the Costa Del Sol a 10Mbps service is available, in some other parts of the same town they wont even install a phone line let alone provide ADSL.
There really isn’t a solution to the problem until you have a property. Quite apart from anything else, all the major providers will require NIE numbers, passport numbers and bank account details before they will consider issuing a contract.
Thanks foxbat for kind information and @Janie now you must have a property first than try a ADSL service otherwise I don’t think you will success for it.
Forget wireless internet in Spain for anything other than occasional use.
Installation is expensive, dsl speeds are no better than 4mbps, the service is capped at a ridiculously low level and a Fiar usage policy is applied.
Ronnie your IP address shows that you are located in Lahore in the Punjab, Pakistan. How can you possibly be familiar with the telecomms set up here in Spain?
Yes I am in Pakistan now a days but I just read the different Articles and blog on the telecom setup in the Spain and I share the information which I got from them.???
Is there any wrong information from my side..
Hi Everybody,
I’ve just found this forum and I’m wondering if any of you good people can help me with a problem re my son and his wife who are hoping to shortly re-locate to Spain.
We have just returned from a fact finding break in the Moraria/Javea area. My son and his wife are hoping to buy a property in this region to settle on a permanent basis…however they would like to rent first for a few months at least to see if things work out. My son is self-employed working from home, and in order to do his particular type of work he is reliant on a fast reliable internet connection….does such a thing exist in the Moraira/Javea area ? This may sound like a silly question, but of the three villa’s he has looked to rent so far, he has had to turn them all down as none of them could guarantee a stable internet connection ( he needs a minimum 9mb at the very least !! )
Ideally this would be a cable connection, although we’ve been told that’s not likely as ADSL is more common…...ADSL would work as long as it was a fast connection…...a mobile connection is out of the question, it wouldn’t meet the demands of his job.
If anyone can advise or give us some help on this I would be truly grateful.
Janie.
Hi Janie
I won’t repeat what’s already been said here as you’ll know by now that those typres of connections are pipe dreams in Spain.
However, there is good news…
We offer a 20 Mbit/s connection (which realistically provides a D/S rate of up to 8 Mbit’s) which may be of use to you.
I am curious though… Both from a personal and technical perspective…
9 Mbit’s minimum…? I don’t wish to tell anyone how to do their job but I also work with the Internet and find 2-3 mbit’s quite sufficient…
Anyway, that said please feel free to get in touch through our website (ACT ADSL (BT Agent)) and I’ll see how I might help.
PS: I’ve also worked in IT and telecoms for around 16 years so may be able to help you analyse the line to determine potential throughput.
