BT phone/internet installation to replace cable?

[Vir Campestris]

AIUI Openreach supply the fibre modem. I'll let you know if they turn up next week - the fibre has made it to my front door, but hasn't come in yet.

Andy

[Dave Liquorice]

I would hope so there aren't many in the retail chain. B-)

Real fibre? If you don't mind me asking how much is that costing (install and rent)? I'm 2+ miles from the cabinet so they won't even say VDSL is available as it would be the same as ADSL+ (up to 8 Mbps). Even though the line was rerouted through the new VDSL jumpering cabinet.

Interested in fibre as the fibre cable that feeds a cabinet further on passes our front door, there were rumours of a fibre node 200 m towards the exchange. Last time I looked at FTTPoD (Fibre To The Premises on Demand) the install would have been around £1000, even with a node so close. FTTP costed from the nearest main fibre aggregation point I've not looked at, as the nearest aggregation point is 40 km away...

[Adam Funk]

No, Utility Warehouse, but they seem to use BT's physical "stuff".

[Adam Funk]

Interesting link, thanks. I'm not considering BT itself but Utility Warehouse, which AIUI uses BT's physical connections.

So I've heard!

[Adam Funk]

Thanks for the information. (Apparently I'm using the wrong terminology about "BT".)

[Andy Burns]

Apart from Virgin (and the likes of gigaclear etc if you're in their patch) everyone uses openreach's physical stuff to some extent.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Strictly: BT wholesale.

Openreach maintain the copper and set up the links. BT wholesale rent openreach copper DSLAMS and backhaul , and onsell it to ISPs. Some ISPS have their own DSLAMS. ISPs then sell it all to you.

[Vir Campestris]

Free install care of the Govt. Nice to know I am getting something for my taxes.

It'll be an FTTPoD type install - but BT got a contract to do all the rural connections, and the £1000 comes out of that. We suspect there's a gigabit to the village - my neighbour has already noticed his slowing down.

Andy

[Martin Brown]

Whilst true in theory I find that up to 10m of high quality cable makes no perceptible difference to noise margin or maximum sync rate. That is unless you run it parallel to mains wiring or something equally stupid.

My master socket is conveniently located in the loft (thanks BT). I have a moderate length of cable running to the router downstairs but I have tried it the other way around running mains into the loft and a short signal cable - it made not one jot of difference.

Siting the router to get best coverage of the property is ideal.

[Adam Funk]

Let me make sure I have this right: for an OpenReach installation, the one master socket is the same piece of equipment for the phone and internet connections (as opposed to the cable set-up I have now)?

[Adam Funk]

I have a couple of TP-link powerline plug-in gadgets in the house to improve wi-fi coverage. (The master one is connected to the router with an RJ-45 cable; the others are just plugged into power sockets.)

[Adam Funk]

Thanks.

[Huge]

[26 lines snipped]

[Chris Bartram]

Less of an issue. As others have said, you'll end up using BT infrastructure anyway if you're not using Virgin's. It's who your contract is with that counts more IME.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

It is here. Basically a splitter/filter with ordinary phone on one side - extended to where you want in the house, and the ADSL side. So usually the closest socket to the incoming line.

My view is you'll get the best results by siting the router there using the supplied cable, and cable to any PCs etc using CAT 6. An ordinary phone type extension cable (with adaptors) to move the router to the best place for Wi-Fi coverage may pick up interference etc within the house.

My phone line comes in to the cellar. So that's where my master socket and router are. Very convenient for the CAT 5 wiring to other areas. The router is sited as high as possible in the cellar, so just above ground level. Wi-Fi coverage is fine in the house and nearby.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

We have early Virgin cable in this street, and much of it looks to be in a state. Boxes with the doors swinging open. Cables damaged where the covering has come off. And so on. Openreach do seem to look after their stuff rather better.

[Dave Liquorice]

Less than 10 m of crap cable here significantly affect the ADSL+ sync speed. The crap cable was a bit of telephone cable but CCS (Copper Clad Steel), Replaced with solid copper CAT5e sync speed recovered.

Router, coverage? How does a router have coverage? I guess you mean a single combined modem/router/switch/access point box. I'd have seperate AP(*) so you can put it in the best RF location without awkward cabling.

(*) A "cable" router/switch/AP may well be cheaper than a pure AP, just ignore the WAN side.

[Dave Liquorice]

Is that part of the BDUK stuff? There are a number of wasy they wan't to try and tackle the last 10% FTTP being one of them. If there is a chance I'm eligible I don't want to miss out. B-)

I mention ADSL (up to 8 Mbps) above, got yet another promo letter from BT this morning profering up to 17 Mbps (speed is not normally mentioned).

On the Sun 23rd just after 2200 the ADSL fell over and didn't reconnect. It had been very stable for weeks before hand. Kicked it a few hours later and got a connection but < 2 Mbps and with a stupidly high SN ratio. Tried everything to get it back to 5 to 6 Mbps and 6 db ish SNR but nothing worked. Had to use the SNR reset on my ISPs control pages, that got the sync speed and SNR back to normal but the BRAS hasn't recovered and it's been stuck for a few days now without me fiddling and it being stable.

With that letter I wonder if they have bunged some ADSL2+ kit in, Samknows doesn't seem to think so. And the last I heard from BT was "no plans to upgrade"...

[Vir Campestris]

Nothing happened here, except that each December BT moved the date to the next December.

Until someone _really_ fed up found a business with a plan. Fibre to a fixed point, P2P wireless to a building on the hill top, wimax to the village. (which would of course have limited us to ~100Mb total)

Whereupon BT announced that (a) they'd made a little mistake, and the cost of the fibre was going to be £5K as they had no capacity in the just-gone-to-FTTC next village and (b) they were going to connect us by Christmas - but this time said it in person, applied for some wayleaves, and _actually_ _did_ _some_ _work_.

Well, I still don't have a connection, and it's May now.

But they've installed three new cabinets - one for I don't know what, two for FTTC, and run fibre to the odd people left over. I don't know why we aren't getting FTTC, but that's about the only thing I'm not complaining about.

Andy

[Adam Funk]

Well, it's obvious if you're already familiar with it!

Yes. When we moved in, the house had cable telephone & TV (it was actually called Yorkshire Cable then); broadband was added later.

Thanks for the rest of the details (snipped here).