[ Date Index ] [ Thread Index ] [ <= Previous by date / thread ] [ Next by date / thread => ]
On 05/10/12 19:08, James Kilty wrote:
Hello I am under pressure at home to get a bigger allowance than the 100GB/30 days and a faster connection than the 2MBps rate we get out here in the sticks so they can all download and stream films and video. The nice lady at Sky reckons they will bring a fibre from the cabinet to our home (a good mile from the nearest one AFAIK) and says there is no limit on our downloads. She also says we should get 11Mbps. I am confused about this as my reading was that there was FTTC and then copper, but she says they have been doing fibre all the way for about 2 months. All for an engineers fee of £50. Interesting that someone down the road is alleged to get 24MBps from BTInfinity. About a half mile to the cabinet. I would be grateful for comments. James
From what I understand (from reading ThinkBroadband.com) BT are rolling out fibre to the cabinet, so that is they'll put in another cabinet (with a mini DSLAM in it) next to the existing cabinet, run fibre to the new cabinet and then link from the new cabinet to the old cabinet, so the VDSL signal doesn't have as much length to go to your house.
I gather too that BT are giving customers the option of going for a full fibre to the premises connection if they wish to pay for it where they will run fibre from the cabinet to the premises, but I gather it's not cheap at the moment (they have to run a fibre connection from the cabinet and I presume clear ducts and shoot the fibre down or run it over a pole etc).
There's a little bit more about FTTC and FTTP here: http://www.thinkbroadband.com/guide/fibre-broadband.html
I'd suggest putting your postcode into the checker here: http://www.samknows.com/broadband/exchange_searchIt will tell you what is available at the exchange, although saying that even if an exchange has FTTC available from what I've read not every cabinet is enabled (not sure if this is the case in Cornwall though as it's had EU funding, so maybe all cabinets are going to be enabled).
As for the speed you'll get, the Thinkbroadband link above gives estimates based on how far you are from the cabinet. You have to bear in mind that although the distance from the cabinet as the crow flies might be 500 metres, the cable itself might be longer. According to the Thinkbroadband link at 24Mbit/sec the length might be about 1KM.
Rob -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/listfaq