Landline conversion to digital

That is expensive on a unit price per mbit basis

Gigafast is £50 a month for 900 Mbit both ways or £40 for 500 mbit both ways.

If you're in one

Meaning that during a power cut I get no phone service? How is UK Power networks going to call me?

Mobile. Or a battery backup unit powering your router/etc.

Theo

Meaning that after the analogue part is turned off, you'll never get

There were three steel catenary wires inside, when I <cough> repositioned my drop wire, and moved the junction box etc.

More significantly it'll be harder to determine what are unused pairs when BT/Kelly/Quinn are looking to nick a spare pair ?

Already got the battery backup.

My son with his green field FTTP install, was offered exactly the same packages, speeds, and pricing as their FTTC packages.

In fact, at the time (Dec 2017) he couldn't buy anything above 80/20 anyway, (without getting into  business  packages)

I have an APC UPS connected to both the ONT and the vodafone router so that I still have a working "POTS" telephones throughout the house.

These phones are connected back to the RJ11 ATA port at the back of the router.

And since my parents died, there's only one neighbour who regularly calls the landline plus a few other sporadic callers, everything else is mobile ...

Except that the network cabinets have no battery back-up in most cases, so they will go down and many mobile masts have little or no battery backup and, even if they do, they use the landline system to connect to!

Once everyone is on fibre to the premises the network street cabinets will be redundant so no problem. Mobile masts generally have optical fibre connections, so they should carry on working while their batteries last (for those that have batteries). John

ROFL. There are millions of houses, mine being one, where the copper phone lines are underground and definately not in ducts. There will never be a time when 'everyone is on fibre'.

On the other hand just walk into the fax room and pick them up :-)

If it matters to you, then either: have a mobile handy, or power your comms equipment via a UPS so that it will keep running during a power cut.

You will have to do it with slightly more sophisticated testing than using a voltmeter!

(this was a problem that used to bite people on ISDN, when less clued up linesmen were looking to "lift and shift" a line to a new pair, and found one with no line voltage, and just assumed that meant "unused")

In message snipped-for-privacy@googlegroups.com, at

Won't they be needed to splice the fibre between the subscriber and the exchange, or is FTTP always a single unbroken fibre from end to end (seems a bit ambitious). In fact, I've have expected the cabinets to have an industrial strength fibre back to the exchange, then some sort of splitter to the individual premises.

ps Not all the 'cabinets' are surface-mounted green cabinets. Quite a few are in holes in the ground with BT manhole covers above.

There will be, you're likely to find a telegraph pole erected in your street in the next few years.

That's what they've done in an area near me with no ducts.

There are a few places after the head-end kit where the fibre is jointed before it reaches the final passive optical splitter which will be near a cluster of customers, either up a pole or underground.

A bit slow-paced, but ...