In reply to a post by AndrewUK:

It is very thick copper. Commonly installed during the 70s/early 80s according to the chap which is around when the house was built.

I wouldn't bank on that.

The 'figure of eight' dropwire that was installed on our previous house in 1973 was copper coated steel. We were in the house for thirty years and our drop wire, which must have been the shortest on the pole was still going when we sold in 2003, yet most of the other houses had had these replaced due to the wire work hardening and breaking.

That said, I have seen some black insulated 2-core PO cable which did look more like copper. Our drop wire was grey in colour.

Cheers!

That's exactly the drop cable that recently borked on our line - incredibly tough figure of eight cable with gunmetal grey insulation. It failed almost at the pole. A complete short circuit. There's still some of it left tacked down the exterior wall. It would be interesting to see how well it matches the impedance of CW1308 and the binder. The good fellows from Openreach had an unenviable task sorting out the mess - it must be the tallest pole for miles! Must have been a Californian Redwood in another life!

cheers, a

Edited by asbokid (Sat 10-Nov-12 23:05:26)

Well 11 days in and so far so good!
No line drops yet (touching wood) and still at the full 80/20 speed.

when the open reach modem is set up for the first time by the engineer does he use a username and password for it? (getting bt infinity option 2 installed wednesday they done the box on the wall outside the house last week and i think its FTTH) i want to use my own fibre router after he has gone. im in a rented place so the bt account is my landlords.

That sounds like FTTH. What was the speed estimate? That should tell us.

option 2 up to 76 Mb

Was that the package you clicked on the website, or a speed estimate given you during the order process? It sounds like FTTC, and there is nothing needed on the wall outside.

Please can you tell us the exchange. Preferably your postcode. A picture of what they have just installed outside, uploaded somewhere, would be useful.

its a square grey box
photo
thats what the landlord said im in milton keynes MK10 9QR coming off bradwell abbey exchange

The DSL checker indicates FTTP is available at that postcode

WBC FTTP Up to 330 Up to 30 -- Available

thanks getting back to my question does the modem require a username and password? what the engineer installs