Fibre to the premises

jamesfalky · May 6, 2022

Lincs Lass said:
We have had Kcom (Hull based company) digging up everything for months ,,they came down my little road and the site boss took one look at my garden wall and wouldn't come any closer .
The wall is crumbling and he didn't want to risk the vibration of the digger knocking it apart ,,I now have a connection box 100ft away from the house so no hope of it getting connected ,,not that I'm bothered ,,didn't want it anyway after reading all the bad press Kcom get .
One of those companies that once you sign up to them ,they lock you in at ridicules rates and insane exit fees .
No thanks ,EE works well enough for my needs

I don't really get the all the bad press KCOM get, I think it must come from in Hull where they have a captive market as they own the network (I think this is still the case). I switched my home broadband to KCOM full fibre as they did our village just before we moved there, best decision ever, BT was so unreliable it made working from home almost impossible, not once had an issue with the fibre internet, had 900mbps to start with as they had an offer on but gone back to 300mbps now, I wouldn't go back to broadband over copper for sure and can't complain about KCOM, great service getting set up, far better experience than BT who were an absolute shambles, and KCOM paid the exit fees to get me out of the BT contract to move over to them!

pat kcotnit · May 15, 2022

Cowabunga said:
Had contractors turn up out of the blue about eight weeks ago to dig a fibre-optic cable down from the village to my farmyard. I never asked anyone for this but I’m very pleased that they’ve done so. It’s about three quarters of a kilometre and because they could not source wire armoured cable, they lay overhead cable in a 4” plastic pipe conduit with manholes for access every 200m or so.
Anyhow, they’ve done the job and connected to terminals at either end, one in my yard and one near the top of my lane where there is active fibre.

Thing is, OpenReach still have my place listed on their web site as having no plans to connect to fibre. BT nor any other provider will connect us until OpenReach has listed my place as being ready. It’s been ten days since the contractors finished and did their quality audit yet still the OpenReach website says there are ‘no plans’.
What’s the point? Since I already have 4G wi-fi, which is mostly fast enough but disappointingly unreliable, I could just ignore the FTTP and stay as I am. This would waste what probably cost the taxpayer about £10k to provide even though it is unsolicited. I’m in two minds whether to bother to connect of not or wait until I have to in a few year’s time when the copper system is switched off nationally and all calls become VOIP.

We had fibre cables fitted up our road last summer but it took about another couple of months before the cables went live. Even after it did go live (I think it did say online that fibre was available to the premises), when we contacted BT to arrange connection from the pole to the house, the department that we contacted to do so said that it wasn't available at our address. This I knew to be wrong as I had been speaking to the contractors and they told me when it would be live. Was advised to speak to another local department (in Edinburgh I think). Cant remember what they were called but it was dedicated to arranging fibre connection for small businesses in rural areas. Once I spoke to them it was all arranged. Still took about a month to get connected due to covid in the staff doing the job (needed a cherry picker and only one available and the driver was isolating).

Cowabunga · May 15, 2022

If it wasn't for the fact that my 4G internet has crashed yet again, I would undoubtedly tell them to stuff their fibre where the sun don't shine. Still no sign of the relevant Openreach department being told that my cable is connected so that I can source a service provider and link the last 15metres across my farmyard to the house/office. It's been installed for nearly eight weeks now.

Cowabunga · May 16, 2022

After four days without a 4G service, it’s back working today at full pelt. 40mbps down and 27 up at 1.30 pm. That is a very acceptable speed compared to BT copper at 2.6 and 0.6 respectively at 1.32 pm.

Cowabunga · May 16, 2022

Just to prove how fickle 4G service is here, the post above shows the speed tested at the time but it is now 20 past 4, so about three hours later and I barely get 3.6mbps downloads and 15 uploads. Terrible! Tried several regularly used servers and that is the best I can currently get.

Timbo · May 16, 2022

Cowabunga said:
Just to prove how fickle 4G service is here, the post above shows the speed tested at the time but it is now 20 past 4, so about three hours later and I barely get 3.6mbps downloads and 15 uploads. Terrible! Tried several regularly used servers and that is the best I can currently get.

Weather conditions ? Very humid and thundery here atm and my mobile wont work where it normally does...

Cowabunga · May 16, 2022

Timbo said:
Weather conditions ? Very humid and thundery here atm and my mobile wont work where it normally does...

Nice and clear here now with the sun out, just as it was lunchtime. Had a bit of drizzle in between though.

Old Boar · Jun 10, 2022

I was recently quoted for FTTP - £73,000 (with the grant). There is fibre a mile away... they had already put in the infrastructure under Superfast Cymru.
Aluminium phone line, and on a good day I get dial up speed.
The local mobile mast is down more than it is up, and no signal in the house anyway.
I am not on any "not spot" list. I have given up.

Cowabunga · Jun 10, 2022

Openreach have installed a fibre cable a kilometre exclusively to my farm premises from the village, unsolicited. Very pleasantly surprised. They completed this at least six weeks ago. Only now have they signed it off and I have signed up with BT for their 300mbps service with a 150mbps service for my brother’s house in the village to follow immediately after. Signed up over the phone yesterday and Openreach have booked to connect me up on the 22nd of this month.
The 4G service from Orange has been worse than useless since before the bank holiday, ten days ago, so their contract will be terminated on Monday. Their service has been unavailable for hours at a time and only 3mbps at best when available for the last ten to fourteen days. Also to be terminated will be the BT copper landline. 4G should still be available because it is part of BT’s Halo300 Advanced + Digital Line business package. They provide an indoor modem that automatically switches when fibre fails, which does sound a bit ominous I must say.
On balance I should end up paying less than currently. If I get anywhere over 250mbps I will be cock-a-hoop. If I get less than 150mbps I will downgrade the contract to the 150mbps rate. They guarantee more than that on the 300 contract.

What will I do with all that speed? Who knows? I have little doubt that technology will find a way of gobbling it up over the next few years through Ultra High Definition high dynamic range broadcasting, The Metaverse [whatever that will be] and stuff we haven’t even thought of yet.

Hilly · Jun 10, 2022

Old Boar said:
I was recently quoted for FTTP - £73,000 (with the grant). There is fibre a mile away... they had already put in the infrastructure under Superfast Cymru.
Aluminium phone line, and on a good day I get dial up speed.
The local mobile mast is down more than it is up, and no signal in the house anyway.
I am not on any "not spot" list. I have given up.

Nothing to even give up on here , starlink fixed us up but its ££

sjt01 · Jun 10, 2022

Old Boar said:
I was recently quoted for FTTP - £73,000 (with the grant). There is fibre a mile away... they had already put in the infrastructure under Superfast Cymru.
Aluminium phone line, and on a good day I get dial up speed.
The local mobile mast is down more than it is up, and no signal in the house anyway.
I am not on any "not spot" list. I have given up.

Starlink??

Cowabunga · Jun 10, 2022

Since Openreach are going to switch off the old cable network including voice and ADSL internet, everything, in two year’s time. They will by then have workable alternative fully digital high speed services alternatives available for everyone. For many that just cannot even get 4G signal, then I suspect that they will subsidise satellite internet rather than spend an absolute fortune running miles of fibre cable to very isolated properties. It’s coming to everyone one way or another and it won’t be too long. Forget paying huge fees, as it is coming ‘free’ anyway.

As an already BT business customer, all that I’m paying is the carriage of the new router, which arrived this morning. No connection fee.

J B · Jun 12, 2022

Cowabunga said:
Since Openreach are going to switch off the old cable network including voice and ADSL internet, everything, in two year’s time. ...........

Our (domestic) house, three others and one farm are in our 'cluster'. We are around two miles from the exchange.
Will O/R want to replace 2m of copper with 'fibre' just for the five of us?
:scratchhead:

pat kcotnit · Jun 12, 2022

J B said:
Our (domestic) house, three others and one farm are in our 'cluster'. We are around two miles from the exchange.
Will O/R want to replace 2m of copper with 'fibre' just for the five of us?

We are about 4 miles from the exchange with only 7 houses and we got fibre installed last year. Copper wires are still there though. There is another cluster of houses off the same cable but they are less than a mile from the exchange. Honestly I think it is down to luck if your area is getting upgraded or not.

Cowabunga · Jun 12, 2022

J B said:
Our (domestic) house, three others and one farm are in our 'cluster'. We are around two miles from the exchange.
Will O/R want to replace 2m of copper with 'fibre' just for the five of us?

Well they installed the best part of a mile of underground fibre cable just for me, so yes you will probably get fibre to the premises within the next two years whether you wants it or not. I don’t think they are bothering with just fibre to the cabinet any longer.

upnortheast · Jun 12, 2022

J B said:
Our (domestic) house, three others and one farm are in our 'cluster'. We are around two miles from the exchange.
Will O/R want to replace 2m of copper with 'fibre' just for the five of us?

Noticing in South Northumberland fibre cables being installed to some very remote spots.

If your ADSL download speed is in single figures, then make a lot of noise to your parish council. Your county council dept that deals with rural connectivity, BT, your MP & anyone else you think might help.

Took 2 years, but that worked in our parish

J B · Jun 12, 2022

Cowabunga said:
Well they installed the best part of a mile of underground fibre cable just for me, so yes you will probably get fibre to the premises within the next two years whether you wants it or not. I don’t think they are bothering with just fibre to the cabinet any longer.

Yes, but you're a) a business and b) a celebrity

upnortheast said:
Noticing in South Northumberland fibre cables being installed to some very remote spots.

If your ADSL download speed is in single figures, then make a lot of noise to your parish council. Your county council dept that deals with rural connectivity, BT, your MP & anyone else you think might help.

Took 2 years, but that worked in our parish

We have Airband (WISP) here which (*) gives us 30Mbps so we struggle to play that card.
* = it's been broken for the last four months, but otherwise ......

Cowabunga · Jun 12, 2022

J B said:
Yes, but you're a) a business and b) a celebrity

We have Airband (WISP) here which (*) gives us 30Mbps so we struggle to play that card.
* = it's been broken for the last four months, but otherwise ......

Oh yeah, OpenReach obviously know that I’m known globally with influence from the Kremlin to The White House and beyond into the deepest realms of our solar system. I say ‘jump’ and they say ‘how high’.

Don’t think so. In fact I know that my business and myself are totally insignificant to any other business, large or small.

When the 4G EE service is working, it too gives a just about acceptable 30mbps. Problem is that this kind of service is a rarity and from now until the end of Summer it becomes very slow and even disconnects at times. Most of this weekend it has been down to an useless 3mbps but has improved this evening to give an acceptable upload speed for posting a few photos top this web site.
Whoops, spoke too soon and EE is now unable to connect again. Tomorrow I shall be cancelling my contract with them as the two year minimum term is up this month. Back on BT 2mbps just now.

Cowabunga · Jun 22, 2022

A nice man from Openreach came this morning and connected the fibre to the house. Yaba daba do!!!!

Consistent 300mbps on iPhone tests. 250mbps on iPad and for some reason 200mbps on the iMac downloads. Uploads are in the upper 40’s.
That’s fast enough for me for a while. The VOIP phone isn’t working yet but that will probably be working by tomorrow morning. Very pleased so far but I need to connect repeaters in other rooms and to the new router to see if they connect to the system.

PSQ · Jun 22, 2022

Cowabunga said:
A nice man from Openreach came this morning and connected the fibre to the house. Yaba daba do!!!!

Consistent 300mbps on iPhone tests. 250mbps on iPad and for some reason 200mbps on the iMac downloads. Uploads are in the upper 40’s.
That’s fast enough for me for a while. The VOIP phone isn’t working yet but that will probably be working by tomorrow morning. Very pleased so far but I need to connect repeaters in other rooms and to the new router to see if they connect to the system.

Just out of interest, what is the monthly cost of this ‘300 mbs’ you speak of?

Fibre to the premises

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Up to 25%

25-50%

50-75%

75-100%

100% I’ve had enough of farming!

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