Broadband query

In recent years I have become increasingly hard of thinking and more than ever inclined to grasp the wrong end of the stick. I have returned to this particular post because of what Dave says about master sockets below.

I have been thinking a lot about this but try as I might I can't see how wiring a second master socket up in parallel will have a materially different outcome to wiring them up in series as at present.

The current situation (the relevant part anyway) is that the original master socket is in the kitchen with the incoming line connected to the A & B terminals on the BT side of the face plate while the second master socket is wired from the consumer side at the original MS to its own A & B terminals with a secondary socket then wired from the other side on that MS. Both the second MS and the SS function as ordinary phone sockets. The broadband outlet doesn't work because presumably (as suggested elsewhere in this thread) the broadband signal has already been filtered out by the original MS.

I currently intend to suggest to BT that since this is a BT c*ck-up they should fix it free of charge but will tell them that if they are happy for me to switch the sockets from series to parallel if this will not have a damaging effect I will make the change for them. What does the panel think?

across the

original

already

What do you mean by "in series"? It is impossible to do. They have to be in parallel and you really don't need the third wire. I was under the impression that "normal" master sockets just produced the third wire for old phones and did not filter the broadband frequencies. Even with the BT I plate you still have to use an external filter.

With BT Infinity the only filter is in the master socket. In series is probably a bit misleading but I did describe the actual layout which should have made it clear what I really meant.

I will add my 2p worth here. Does your original master socket have one socket that has to have external filters at every extension, or is it like the one shown in CB's link (about how to set up BT Infinity), with a socket for the phone and a socket for data?

If the latter, it would have an internal filter, so you'd have all phones connected to the phone socket, and all computers connected to the data socket. Maybe your second 'master' socket has been wired to the phone side so all data has been filtered out.

You can have more than one master socket but they all have to be wired in parallel before any filters.

You need to get your phone company to sort it out, as you'll be breaking their rules if you try and correct it yourself.

I think that for modern installations we now may be back to external filters - either that or the BT web site is really screwed up.

this may be causing some confusion in this thread - certainly had me puzzled for a while.

Perhaps they had so many complaints that they just had to change the system. My sister cancelled Infinity when it became apparent that there would have to be a highly visible cable draped through half the house to connect the PC to the Hub. Given this change of picture I am certainly going to have a word with BT both on my own account and on my sister's.

Surely all Infinity systems include Wi-Fi? If your PC doesn't support this you can buy an add on receiver for pennies. Not quite so fast as cable - but unlikely to be any noticeable difference in practice.

There is a move to offering self install FTTC (where a dangly filter might be used), though as far as I am aware, only BT are offering it, most ISP's still seem to using the engineer install. Where they will install a faceplate filter.

Openreach started offering it as an option to ISP's earlier this year. Until then it was engineer install only. So it is all quite new, most ISP's still only offer engineer install.

Advantage is of course that it is potentially cheaper, no need for appointments etc. disadvantage is more chance of a poorly performing connection and complaining customers (AIUI VDSL is more prone to suffering problems due to bad internal wiring, interference etc.)

With ADSL the switch to wires-only meant the engineer could do all the work from the exchange, instead of an exchange visit and home visit.

With VDSL wires-only, presumably the savings are less, as the engineer has to visit the cabinet anyway, so is already quite close to your home? Plus there's de-jumpering to be done at the exchange, though they might save up several of those for a single visit?

I am afraid you have lost me with the reference to VDSL. I thought BT Infinity was ADSL regardless of whether you got a filter in the master socket or the new scheme where they are back to individual filters.

No, the copper section of "Infinity" is VDSL2, which you could think of as ADSL2 on steroids, but which only has benefits for short lengths of copper (such as between the cabinet and you).

I have the two outlets on the master socket and the extra master socket is indeed wired to the filtered output.

I am not adverse to breaking the odd minor rule but since the problem is on of BT's making I will be trying to persuade them to fix it FOC.

De-jumpering at the exchange? Not quite sure I follow that, especially in relation to the wires-only. Is not wires-only just a "marketing" phrase that means the customer has plug in any required filters and kit? The line still carries POTS so has to go back to the exchnage. What has to be de-jumpered? Are we assuming conversion from ADSL to VDSL? Thus the connection to the DSLAM.

Presumably there is also some sort of filter in the cabinet to stop the 4 km plus (or WHY) of line back to the exchange fupping up the VDSL.

Presumably most vDSL installs are upgrades from ADSL, so the copper pair will be de-jumpered from the DSLAM in the exchange after it's jumpered to the MSAN in the fibre cabainet.

Slightly more than marketing, it means you provide your own router, filter/faceplate, and you plug it in yourself ... remember when ADSL installs required a BT engineer?

yes, sorry I should have read ahead before starting my reply.

I assume there's a 3kHz low pass filter as part of the line card of the MSAN.

Given that the card in the cabinet can support either adsl or vdsl I expect they don't connect to a dslam in the exchange at all.

Depending on what they have put in the cabinet they may not go back to the exchange at all as they have cards that support POTS that can go in the cabinet.

I have better signal to noise figures on my adsl than I did have so I expect my adsl is terminated in the cabinet now.

And how is that POTS connected into the PSTN? Does it require the cabinet to have power? 'Cause that has some interesting implications given that POTS should work under powerfail conditions for extended periods of time.

I'd be most annoyed if the "POTS" went off before I'd had a chance to ring the DNO to tell them about the power failure. I'd be even more annoyed if I couldn't call for amabulance/police/fire be that 12 seconds after a power failure or 12 days.

No change in speed or are you flat out on ADSL anyway? The fiddling about with lines that happens with the arrival of FTTC (even if you don't take the service) may mean that a slightly iffy joint, length of cable or water from a jointing torpedo has been removed.

The downstream went up a bit, from 16K to 17k. The upstream went from 1k to 1k4.

Noise margins are > 6db so it could go faster.

I've always found the engineers to be pretty easy-going about anything irregular so long as you treat them well. In my last place, I had a similar experience as there was no NTE5. When they came to fix a break in the cabinet outside, then test at my socket, I asked what I had to do get an NTE5. He just tossed me one from the van and apologised for not having time to fit it for me, saying he was sure I could fit it as well as he could.