In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

Unfortunately, DLM continues to be a problem even for FTTC!

However, close you may be to your cabinet there's no guarantees that you'll get 80/20 Mbps forever. There may come a point due to crosstalk/congestion your speeds will drop. After 2 years sycing at 80/20 I'm no longer syncing at 80/20 last 5 months with TalkTalk. It's now 76.3/19.8Mbps and there seems to have been no recovery to this, though I have not tried rebooting the router.

None of that has anything to do with DLM.
Your loss of sync speed is crosstalk, not the DLM.

Not to mention in the event of a power cut or faulty router, DLM may trigger interleaving thinking your line is unstable and drop your speeds down until it interprets your connection as stable again. Connecting and reconnecting telephone wire into the faceplate socket may also cause drop outs and speed drops.

The DLM doesn't apply interleaving on Huawei cabinets either, which you are connected to. Your connection couldn't be interleaved unless you use a modem that doesn't support downstream G.INP.

The DLM is what can increase your speed by lowering the SNRM target. How is that a problem?

In countries/networks with no DLM they tend to simply apply high interleaving downstream/upstream to all lines by default.
The Openreach DLM prevents the need for this.

Indeed loss of sync speed is mostly to do with cross talk that's why my speeds don't recover back to 80Mbps.

However, I will admit DLM still has a role in dropping speeds (at least temporarily). For example I had an occasion where I tried plugging my telephone line into the NTE5C MK4 Faceplate socket and after unplugging it again, it caused my internet connection to drop out causing the speeds to slightly drop.

This then triggered a 10 day interleave where every day for the next 10 days at approximately 2am the internet would drop out the speeds would yo-yo up and down before they went back up and the drop-outs eventually stopped.

Another occasion the firmware update for the TalkTalk WiFi Hub got updated at 5am (I know this as firmware version number increased) and immediately I saw connection speed was slightly reduced from 80 to 77.9Mbps in router stats. Had to wait for a while before the speeds recovered.

The SNRM target used to be 6dB and was syncing at full 80Mbps 2 years ago! Then cross talk came in effect roughly a year ago to combat cross talk by reducing noise margins to 3dB in order to achieve full 80Mbps sync.

The problem now is that the past 5 months 80Mbps sync no longer occurs even with 3dB. This is despite the fact that the broadband checker displays as 80Mbps as highest attainable speeds for both Clean and Impacted lines.

High Low High Low
VDSL Range A (Clean) help 80 60 20 16.2 55 Available Available
VDSL Range B (Impacted) help 80 55 20 14.3 45.4 Available Available
If you actually look at my screenshot https://i.imgur.com/EXWQxfk.jpg from 2 years ago. This used to be 68.2Mbps minimum and now it has dropped to 60Mbps. Impacted was 64.8Mbps and now it's 55Mbps.

Of-course cross talk is the main culprit, but that is also something that FTTP takes care of. Too many customers seemed to have joined and cabinet 20 must be overloaded as Altnet providers don't seem to be serving them yet.

FTTP is ultimately the solution. Or if larger number of FTTC customers migrate to FTTP to ease cross talk then my speeds will probably go back up. But then again, it probably will be futile as I won't care about FTTC any more unless my post code wasn't served with FTTP yet.

In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

Unfortunately, DLM continues to be a problem even for FTTC!

However, close you may be to your cabinet there's no guarantees that you'll get 80/20 Mbps forever. There may come a point due to crosstalk/congestion your speeds will drop. After 2 years sycing at 80/20 I'm no longer syncing at 80/20 last 5 months with TalkTalk. It's now 76.3/19.8Mbps and there seems to have been no recovery to this, though I have not tried rebooting the router.

Not to mention in the event of a power cut or faulty router, DLM may trigger interleaving thinking your line is unstable and drop your speeds down until it interprets your connection as stable again. Connecting and reconnecting telephone wire into the faceplate socket may also cause drop outs and speed drops.

At least we don't have this headache to worry about with FTTP. I can't wait for CommunityFibre to soon go live and end FTTC for good!

I must be lucky then, because the only time the speed drops is due to congestion and that is few and far between. I am a fair distance away from the cabinet and I get around 36Mb/s according to the TB speed tests and that is going through a VPN, it is normally around that even without the VPN.

I did have some problems around 5 years ago, just had a check on my emails, and it is scary that it was that long ago. But that was something to do with Open reach network and the only thing that would sync was a Huawei Modem for some strange reason, even confused Openreach engineers. But apart from that, it has been fine and even last week when we had a large thunderstorm, and it knocked the power out a couple of times, it made no difference whatsoever with the speed or if it did, it was not noticeable.

As i have said before, i am not paying more for something I don't need, I don't need 150Mb/s and i don't want the hassle of someone digging up my garden.

But if it is for you then great, I still have a way to go before FTTP comes here, i may change my mind by then, but I can't see it unless circumstances change.

So, you still had a faster sync rate on G.fast in the Summer than you do now on VDSL, surely you'd want to be on G.fast?

In reply to a post by Grimers:

surely you'd want to be on G.fast?

Lots of the regulars here will be wishing you didn't ask that question

Whoops

In reply to a post by Grimers:

So, you still had a faster sync rate on G.fast in the Summer than you do now on VDSL, surely you'd want to be on G.fast?

Answer is NO

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

Unfortunately, DLM continues to be a problem even for FTTC!

However, close you may be to your cabinet there's no guarantees that you'll get 80/20 Mbps forever. There may come a point due to crosstalk/congestion your speeds will drop. After 2 years sycing at 80/20 I'm no longer syncing at 80/20 last 5 months with TalkTalk. It's now 76.3/19.8Mbps and there seems to have been no recovery to this, though I have not tried rebooting the router.

Not to mention in the event of a power cut or faulty router, DLM may trigger interleaving thinking your line is unstable and drop your speeds down until it interprets your connection as stable again. Connecting and reconnecting telephone wire into the faceplate socket may also cause drop outs and speed drops.

At least we don't have this headache to worry about with FTTP. I can't wait for CommunityFibre to soon go live and end FTTC for good!

I must be lucky then, because the only time the speed drops is due to congestion and that is few and far between. I am a fair distance away from the cabinet and I get around 36Mb/s according to the TB speed tests and that is going through a VPN, it is normally around that even without the VPN.

I did have some problems around 5 years ago, just had a check on my emails, and it is scary that it was that long ago. But that was something to do with Open reach network and the only thing that would sync was a Huawei Modem for some strange reason, even confused Openreach engineers. But apart from that, it has been fine and even last week when we had a large thunderstorm, and it knocked the power out a couple of times, it made no difference whatsoever with the speed or if it did, it was not noticeable.

As i have said before, i am not paying more for something I don't need, I don't need 150Mb/s and i don't want the hassle of someone digging up my garden.

But if it is for you then great, I still have a way to go before FTTP comes here, i may change my mind by then, but I can't see it unless circumstances change.

Well you're not lucky in a sense that your cabinet is so far away from where you live! I'd certainly prefer to suffer from cross talk but have a cabinet that is closer. 76Mbps is certainly better than the 36Mbps that you're receiving.

That's the complaint I'm expressing, not everyone is receiving the speeds they deserve. You're probably paying pretty much the same money to get 36Mbps for FTTC as someone else who can get 80Mbps.

You might say you are happy with that and that's all you need. For me, I know 36Mbps won't be enough. I have several PC Games digital download that take 80GB download like NBA 2K21, Grand Theft Auto 5 (103GB). These will take 5-6 hours of download to complete wiith a 36Mbps connection.

Long are the days of Retail DVD games, they are very few. Everything is now digital download and games are becoming bigger and bigger in size. Some go to a whopping 200GB like Quantum Break and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, which will take 12 hours to download.

This can be very frustrating, especially if you have to reformat Windows and reinstall the Operating System again along with Windows update, games, etc. I can disable automatic windows update on Windows 10 at least using Group Policy Editor or Windows Update Blocker tool. But I can't avoid downloading the games or the updates.

Now maybe you're not a gamer, so it doesn't affect you. Latency is also going to be an issue. Cabinet being far away from your property means you'll get higher latency, again maybe irrelevant for you, but certainly for me this is important.

You have to check router stats by logging into your router settings to see the connection sync speed. Speedtests aren't always accurate, sometimes they show inflated speeds even if your router speed stats show as slightly lower.

You're probably right that you don't need 150Mbps especially if it costs more. Certainly on the Openreach FTTP network the packages are quite a bit more expensive right now. But here in London Community Fibre and Hyperoptic are offering speeds and packages that are lower than FTTC!

150Mbps symmetrical costs £17.99 with Hyperoptic on a 24 month contract. While 150Mbps symmetrical costs £20 a month with £90 amazon voucher for Community Fibre. This is the equivalent of £16.25 per month!!

I'm lucky I live in an MDU so I don't have to worry about the need for digging up the garden. I watched a Youtube video of TalkTalk UFO digging up the garden from a few years ago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnB36IKSlHo Nevertheless, it doesn't seem too bad after all. They've done a great job removing the bricks carefully and putting them back on. If it is the grass you are worried about, I'm sure this will regrow back. The hassle will be worth it as it's once and for all.

In reply to a post by dect:

In reply to a post by Grimers:

surely you'd want to be on G.fast?

Lots of the regulars here will be wishing you didn't ask that question

LOL.

In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

Well you're not lucky in a sense that your cabinet is so far away from where you live! I'd certainly prefer to suffer from cross talk but have a cabinet that is closer. 76Mbps is certainly better than the 36Mbps that you're receiving.

That's the complaint I'm expressing, not everyone is receiving the speeds they deserve. You're probably paying pretty much the same money to get 36Mbps for FTTC as someone else who can get 80Mbps.

You might say you are happy with that and that's all you need. For me, I know 36Mbps won't be enough. I have several PC Games digital download that take 80GB download like NBA 2K21, Grand Theft Auto 5 (103GB). These will take 5-6 hours of download to complete wiith a 36Mbps connection.

Long are the days of Retail DVD games, they are very few. Everything is now digital download and games are becoming bigger and bigger in size. Some go to a whopping 200GB like Quantum Break and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, which will take 12 hours to download.

This can be very frustrating, especially if you have to reformat Windows and reinstall the Operating System again along with Windows update, games, etc. I can disable automatic windows update on Windows 10 at least using Group Policy Editor or Windows Update Blocker tool. But I can't avoid downloading the games or the updates.

Now maybe you're not a gamer, so it doesn't affect you. Latency is also going to be an issue. Cabinet being far away from your property means you'll get higher latency, again maybe irrelevant for you, but certainly for me this is important.

You have to check router stats by logging into your router settings to see the connection sync speed. Speedtests aren't always accurate, sometimes they show inflated speeds even if your router speed stats show as slightly lower.

You're probably right that you don't need 150Mbps especially if it costs more. Certainly on the Openreach FTTP network the packages are quite a bit more expensive right now. But here in London Community Fibre and Hyperoptic are offering speeds and packages that are lower than FTTC!

150Mbps symmetrical costs £17.99 with Hyperoptic on a 24 month contract. While 150Mbps symmetrical costs £20 a month with £90 amazon voucher for Community Fibre. This is the equivalent of £16.25 per month!!

I'm lucky I live in an MDU so I don't have to worry about the need for digging up the garden. I watched a Youtube video of TalkTalk UFO digging up the garden from a few years ago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnB36IKSlHo Nevertheless, it doesn't seem too bad after all. They've done a great job removing the bricks carefully and putting them back on. If it is the grass you are worried about, I'm sure this will regrow back. The hassle will be worth it as it's once and for all.

i know the prices between the two different speed ranges on FTTC is getting less, I pay £23 a month for 36Mb/s, the higher speed, which planet says is 66Mb/s average is a couple of quid more on offer than what I am paying, but I think it is another £8 more at normal prices, so looking into the £47 a month mark.
So I doubt if I would go for a faster speed even if the cabinet was closer. Some people do need a faster speed, certainly if they have a family. The router says I am synced at Downstream: 39.95 Mbps, Upstream: 9.997 Mbps.

I am not a games player, i do play some but they are pretty old, but I do download a fair bit and I muck around with Linux distros, so I have to download them, also updates for different software. I have to download Windows updates as well, but I do block them until am ready.

I watch 4K content from different streaming services.


Oh yeah if Hyperoptic was here and at that price I would certainly think about it, but not sure about the 24 month contract. Zzoomm who are doing our city at the moment have a 150Mbps symmetrical service for £33, but they are doing the first 6 months for free, but that is a 24 month contract.

I have seen the way zzoomm are digging the pavement and how they leave it after, I am pretty sure i would not want them to touch my garden and driveway to be honest.

We will wait and see, still got months yet before I am out of contract and then the speed Zzoomm is going, they may still not be up here. Maybe openreach will bring FTTH here before zzoomm reaches me, at least their fibre is done via over head