Virgin Media launches 360Mb broadband
Simon Moynihan
Staff Writer

The fastest broadband in Ireland just got even faster. Virgin Media's superfast 360 Mbps home broadband is now available to 750,000 homes across the country.

We’re all used to getting very fast broadband these days, and we’re all online nearly all the time, but I feel I it needs to be said that 360Mb home broadband is pretty remarkable. It’s so fast that you could download The Matrix in less than 20 seconds, it’s nearly twice as fast as Virgin Media customers are able to get in the UK, it’s more than three times faster than most other Irish broadband providers can offer… and it makes me feel really rather old!

I remember modems when they really were modems. They actually modulated and demodulated. When 33.6Kbps modems were launched in the late nineties, they were so fast that the geeks were all worried about the baud rates (no I don’t know what that means either). In fact, 33.6 modems were such a breakthrough that they were actually called V.FAST!

Easy there old man… What’s that sonny? Well, it would have taken more than 2 days to download The Matrix back in 1999 with a V.FAST 33.6 modem. You’d have been better off hitchhiking to Cork and watching it in the Cineplex on Grand Parade instead.

Now you can download The Matrix nearly as fast as you can say: “Actually I prefer The Matrix Reloaded because Keanu Reeves gives an Oscar worthy performance in that one.”

Ok sure, we all know that Keanu Reeves is hella phat in The Matrix Reloaded, and broadband is like totally slammin nowadays… so we should really take a look at what Virgin Media’s 360Mbps broadband is all about.


Virgin Media 360Mb broadband – the details

Virgin Media is increasing top broadband speeds from 240Mb to 360Mb. It’s a massive jump and the second time the company has increased speeds in the last year. They say that the 360Mb speed will be available to 750,000 homes across Ireland, and is available to new and existing customers.

The 360Mb broadband deal comes with unlimited data, which is essential for that kind of speed. It also comes bundled with a home phone (as do all Virgin Media broadband products), but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. That’s because the home phone includes unlimited calls to Irish mobiles, unlimited calls to Irish landlines and unlimited calls to 22 international destinations – which makes it almost worth getting a home phone back into your house again. It all costs €60 a month with the first 4 months for €30.


Unlimited

The new 360Mb offer is €10 more expensive than its cousin the 240Mb broadband deal that Virgin Media/UPC has been selling since January 2015, but you definitely get your money’s worth for the extra tenner. Speed is 50% faster, it includes unlimited calls to Irish mobiles and there’s unlimited international calling too.

This plan is pretty much unlimited everything, and one thing that unlimited everything really offers is peace of mind. There should be no overage costs, and no worries that calling your brother Bob in Bodai Beach is gonna cost bundle.

Because of the unlimited calls and unlimited data, this plan should suit families and households with lots of people - like roommates and houseshares. Virgin Media reckons it can support 8 people online at the same time without degrading performance.


Bundles

Of course, you can bundle the daylights out of Virgin Media’s 360Mb broadband by adding TV, movies and sports.

Virgin Media’s headline bundle is €95 per month with the first 4 months discounted to €45 and includes the 360Mb broadband, the calls, and Horizon Max TV.

The Horizon Max package has more than 100 channels (25 in HD), you can record 4 shows at once and it comes with My Prime which is Virgin Media’s on demand service. You can also watch Live TV on any device which is handy when unreasonable members of the family insist on watching Peppa Pig when you want to watch Fair City.

When Bill Blake from Virgin Media said today that: “We already had the fastest broadband in Ireland but things have just got even faster with our new sky-ripping 360Mb.” I wondered to myself… did he mean for the “S” in “sky” to be capitalised there?