Do I have to switch to full fibre?

Rob5342

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82008987#Comment_82008987

It depends on the provider, my FTTP is via CityFinre and they have cabinets dotted along my street. They are small cabinets that just have optical splitters inside the, Openreach put their splitters under the manholes and presumably there wasn't enough room for Cityfibre too.

iniltous

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82055337#Comment_82055337

The comment was in reply to a poster that specifically states it’s Openreach FTTP , so the point is valid .

Eldi_Dos

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82053601#Comment_82053601

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82053601#Comment_82053601

Ah, the joys of working and living in central Edinburgh, where nothing is simple, on time or under budget.

Eldi_Dos

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82055337#Comment_82055337

It is a good policy for a utility to have as much of its plant not obstructing the pavement with unnecessary street furniture which can be a nuisance to people with limited mobility or sight.

From what I have observed OR fibre enclosures in the jointing chambers are on a bracket that lifts up to a working position and then drops back down below ground level, which to me seems a good system even if it is more costly at the inital stage.

iniltous

You seem to not appreciate is that most FTTP systems are passive (PON , passive optical network) ,this means the only powered devices on the network are the headend OLT (in Openreach case mainly housed in exchange buildings ) and the ONT within the customers premises, there are no active network components in between, so there is no need for cabinets as generally these only house powered equipment, and there is no external powered equipment with a PON architecture , you clearly can put optical splitters in cabinets if you wanted , but that serves no purpose and is unnecessarily expensive afterall once built there us very little requirement to constantly intervene in the network so why prioritise easy access ….as far as City Fibre , if they use street cabinets , the chances are they are subtended headends , (OLT’s) and are powered , thats why they are housed in street furniture, street cabinets don’t generally house passive devices , only powered devices.

Eldi_Dos

@iniltous Which reinforces my point about it being a good policy for utilities to do their best to limit the amount of street furniture installed on and by pavements.

Their was a lot of discussion in the early days of the fibre build about this, some companies made the decision to house their fibre splice points above ground level, along with any Krone type connections.Their thinking being that it would save on the amount of jointing chambers needing built, also it made it easier for their staff to set up a worksite and curtailed the need for gas testing while carrying out any work.

In my view not a good policy, especially in busy areas, but you can understand why some did.

squashed42

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82054068#Comment_82054068

Well the OpenReach staff came out and their proposal was what I outlined above- over my street, drill around the building on the other side of the street to pin the cable around it to access something in the next street over. I was working on the assumption that there would be an superior solution if there was any access to fibre within my street.

There are no freeholders or managing agents. The buildings are subject to Scottish tenement laws so are owned by the owners of all the individial properties within. My building has 6 properties and the one they are proposing to drill holes in to access wherever they need to get to has maybe 3 or 4 main doors and is taller so it's probably looking at tracing and obtaining consents from 20+ property owners/landlords. Drilling into the stonework of Grade B listed buildings will require listed building consents and I'm pretty certain that the proposed approach of draping cabling across the street won't be allowed in a conservation zone.

To be honest, I'm not even that bothered about getting full fibre, but I'm stuck on a terrible contract now that my initial deal has expired because Openreach say my property is served by full fibre when, in any practical sense, it is not.

iniltous

MDU of a certain type and age (often built by the local authority in the 1950’s through to the 1970’s) the copper pair distribution method was one or more (depending on the number of units etc ) external wall blocks , typically fitted on the ‘gable end’ ,high enough up the wall to stop opportunistic vandalism , and from here an external ‘cable on wall’ ran to each unit within the MDU , the fact that to get (for example) to unit 6 it’s ‘cable’ ran across units 4 and 5 wasn’t an issue (the council owned the MDU , each occupant simply a tenant with no say over how these cables were installed ) later when councils had to sell these to private buyers this arrangement was an easement so unit 4 or 5 (or both) couldn’t say get your cable off my wall .

The normal FTTP upgrade in these MDU’s is to place a fibre distribution point (called a CBT) in the same way as the copper distribution, and cable on wall (in the the same way as the copper distribution) to each flat as and when they order FTTP , new permissions are needed for the CBT to fitted , which can make this more problematic, so depending on the individual circumstances you could get telegraph poles installed where none were previously but that’s not likely in your situation.

Given this is probably how the copper pairs are distributed it seems wrong that the solution you were offered was to basically to use an adjacent building and span between buildings .

You can see what the designed method for FTTP is by putting your address in here

https://www.broadbandchecker.btwholesale.com/#/ADSL/AddressHome

QrizB

My building has 6 properties and the one they are proposing to drill holes in to access wherever they need to get to has maybe 3 or 4 main doors and is taller so it's probably looking at tracing and obtaining consents from 20+ property owners/landlords. Drilling into the stonework of Grade B listed buildings will require listed building consents and I'm pretty certain that the proposed approach of draping cabling across the street won't be allowed in a conservation zone.

All of this is Openreach's problem, though, not yours. Openreach have probably got a team who do this sort of thing every day, but even if they don't it's not your concern.

You can either stick with your current "terrible contract" for (perhaps) another decade until FTTC is switched off, or you can apply for FTTP and start the ball rolling.

If it's going to take OR a year or two to get all the consents, it must be better to start as soon as you can.