Fibre broadband speeds with different suppliers

dezza

Ah yes, the address checker, completely overlooked that
That worked, seems to bring up the same as the ISPs results.

iniltous

dezza wrote: »

We get around 3.5Mbps speed on our standard ADSL connection, and a few months ago decided to get Sky Fibre installed. Despite a speed range of 23 - 33Mbps being estimated, our line could only support a maximum of 7Mbps (Openreach said this was because of the length of the line to the cabinet), and so we downgraded to ADSL again.

I was wondering if changing supplier would have any effect on the fibre speed. All the suppliers I've tried (including BT Wholesale's checker) state the same estimate Sky gave, and I do find it a little odd that this estimate is so far off the mark.

I assume all suppliers utilise the same cabinet - Openreach did say that the cabinet we were (are?) connected to wasn't the closest one.

Thanks.

I think the difference between what you are getting and what was estimated is that your line is probably mis-recorded as being from a cabinet that's closer to your home that the cabinet you are physically connected to....if your home is close to a cabinet boundary, say cab 4 and cab 2, and the records are wrong, showing you on cab 2 when in fact you are on cab 4, the line estimate is using the wrong cab data, the engineer when installing FTTC gets a port swap onto the actual cab (4), to get you service ( the port on cab 2 being no good to you coz physically you are not connected there)...unfortunately it's the physical connection that counts, if it will only deliver 7Mb, then that's all it will deliver
If you swap provider, but they also use the same infrastructure you will get the same result
If you want the estimate to be accurate presumably they should amend your records to show cab 4, so the estimate better reflects the actual performance

What you need to consider is that the BT cable that leaves your house in most cases heads towards on of those (usually) green street cabinets , and your line may not go back to the one that's closest to your home, so you may drive or walk past one close to your home but it isn't necessarily 'your' cabinet...BT cables tend to follow roads/footpaths, not as the crow flys.

The 15Mb thing is a BT consumer rule,they won't sell 'infinity' which is a BT brand (nothing to do with Sky) on a line that won't achieve at least that, they apparently have a product called something like broadband over fibre for lines likely to get less than 15Mb....Sky will have their own product names etc and have their own rules about speeds etc.

dezza

I would assume it'd be more to do with the routing of the cabling - I know the cabinet number and the location of the cabinet (according to the BTW checker) - unless the cabinet number is incorrect on there. I guess that might also explain why we can only get 3.5meg on an ADSL connection.

I'm not sure whether the openreach engineer said the actual cabinet was 3km (it could have been 5km?), or that the cabling ran for that distance.

iniltous

dezza wrote: »

I would assume it'd be more to do with the routing of the cabling - I know the cabinet number and the location of the cabinet (according to the BTW checker) - unless the cabinet number is incorrect on there. I guess that might also explain why we can only get 3.5meg on an ADSL connection.

I'm not sure whether the openreach engineer said the actual cabinet was 3km (it could have been 5km?), or that the cabling ran for that distance.

The architecture of FTTC is simple , but not particularly flexible, it's effective piggy backed onto the existing copper network , if a PCP (what the green cabs are called) is enabled for FTTC , then a fibre cabinet is erected next to or near by the existing copper PCP, and copper cables link them together, this has the effect of moving the 'exchange equipment' nearer to you, usually you are a lot closer to the PCP than the exchange, most people would be within a few hundred metres of their PCP so would get acceptable speeds, if you are kilometers from the cab ( but that's the distance most would be away from the exchange not the PCP) your FTTC performance would be poor, but, if you are getting 3.5Mb from ADSL , that would but you in the order of 5Km from the exchange, so how far are you from your cab? Perhaps you are in an unusual situation that the PCP that serves you is close to the exchange but miles from you, so in your case you don't benefit much,

What ever copper cabinet you are connected to, dictates the FTTC cab, the FTTC is physically connected to the copper cab, you cannot have a FTTC port in any other cab than the one linked to your copper cab
Is your location unusual ?, perhaps you were originally an E/O copper line, (no copper cab) , these can be converted to lines that go via a copper cab, but they site the new cabinets near the exchange so if you were on a long e/o line, you wouldn't benefit much, most e/o lines are close to the exchange , but not all

lee111s

Ok so you can get between 13 and 33meg according to that checker. Does the checker tell you what cabinet you're served from when you use the address checker? If it does, does that match the one you think you're connected to? Or the closer one?

If I were you, I'd order it and if the speed is below this, then you need to raise it as a fault with your ISP who will task an Openreach engineer to investigate why your line is not performing within the expected parameters.

dezza

I wouldn't say our location is 'unusual' - on the outskirts of town on a street off a main road. The cabinet is located in a housing estate nearby. I'd say the exchange is about a mile from the cabinet (in a straight line).

Looking through some paperwork, I found some notes we made following a conversation with Sky after Openreach had been round and investigated. Sky said, according to Openreach, that we were connected to a cabinet 5km away - to which they mentioned the road name. This is a good 2 miles away from our house, and a completely different cabinet to the one specified by the wholesale checker. This doesn't make a great deal of sense to me; I've tried a few addresses on the wholesale checker between here and the cabinet and none are connected to that cabinet.

I was thinking of placing an order for fibre again - the only thing I was thinking that if the same thing happens, is there anything to stop Openreach from reporting back to the ISP that they've been out previously for the same issue and already informed us of the outcome and reasoning? I assume they keep records of previous visits.

lee111s

Knowing Openreach, probably not any records

If you were 5KM from the cabinet, you wouldn't get any service at all on FTTC. It just doesn't reach that far.

As I've said, I'd go for it, worst case you can regrade back to ADSL if the service doesn't meet the expectations and then you'll know for sure.

dezza

Yeah you're probably right!
I'll give it a go anyway and see how it goes - 3.5meg is really starting to drag of late so it's no harm trying.
Thanks

lee111s

Let us know how you get on

dezza

lee111s wrote: »

Let us know how you get on

Shall do, thanks for the tips