Please excuse me Edwin, I had supposed, wrongly it would seem, that you were after informed opinion.

Maybe taking into account possible different e side cables between exchange and PCP

In reply to a post by edwincluck:

Just surprised this forum is still discussing the GEA Cablelink, and what it actually is, more than four years after FTTC was first rolled-out.

I guess things keep being discussed while misunderstandings persist.

On MrSaffron's page of photos from Cornwall, we can see some pictures of a couple of ECI OLT-L2S (F152-HB) shelves.

Here is the overview:
http://www.coolwebhome.co.uk/fibre-cornwall/images/f...

Here is a close-up of the main in-use shelf:
http://www.coolwebhome.co.uk/fibre-cornwall/images/f...

As best as I understand it, the 6 right-most, GPLT8, cards terminate GPON. Each card terminates 8 GPON fibres - one fibre per PON.

The two central cards that jut forward, HBNI-SF, are the switching fabric - the heart of the layer 2 switch.

The two cards either side of this, TENI-18U, terminate the PtP fibre to each FTTC cabinet. There is capacity for 18 connections, but the pictures suggest BT only want to use 12 of them

Each of the 18 connections looks like an SFP module, into which a single strand is plugged - perhaps 1000base-BX, bidirectional on different frequencies.

I guess a switch in an FTTC-oriented environment will have more of the TENI-18U cards populated.

On the far left hand side is a TENI-18N card, which provides the upstream connection from the switch. This is where the cablelink products come in.

Like the 18U cards, there is room for 18 connections. There appear to be SFP modules in places, but this time there are two fibres to each - suggesting a pair of unidirectional fibres (1Gb each way), 1000base-LX.

I'd say that is good confirmation that Cablelink has 1Gbps available each way, full duplex.

It also gives a good picture of what else the £2,000 might be buying: an SFP, a portion of the 18N card, and a portion of the capacity of the switching fabric.

If more CP's choose to connect a cablelink, a more complex solution would be needed.

In reply to a post by edwincluck:

Nice bluff but no cigar. Of course the Cablelink throughput is 1Gbps aggregate. It's gigabit ethernet. The clue is in the name. Let's remember how ethernet works. It's a time-based protocol with a fixed number of ethernet frames of fixed size per second across the whole network. Hence the 1Gbps total throughput limitation on any segment of the network. Since you're familiar with the ethernet specification, you presumably knew that too, Panda?

Oops. Two separate fibres, two separate ethernets. Two separate gigabits.

Or, in the case of 1000base-bx, two separate frequencies, two separate ethernets. ...

Hi WWWombat. Thanks for going to the trouble of researching that. My own investigations drew a blank. Except for a solitary and obsolete ECI Manual which somehow floated onto the public internet.

From those photographs you could well be right that the GEA CableLink has 1Gbps bandwidth in each direction. If so I stand corrected and apologies to Panda in particular.

The £2000 bill still sounds prohibitively expensive. Even if that charge, as you say, may be subsidising related equipment. The prohibitive cost was the reason given by TalkTalk for not immediately deploying FTTC services of its own in our Market 2 exchange; even though TalkTalk already had a co-loc presence as an LLU provider.

Any way, apologies for underestimating the GEA Cablelink's combined bandwidth, if that's the case.

edit: just to add as an on-topic cautionary note to others - that our switchover to BTw from TalkTalk also incurred a charge for "connection of a new line". Even though we were told by Plusnet, our new FTTC provider, that such a charge would not be applied. Despite requests, the charge never was refunded.

All of these troubles- the prohibitive cost of that GEA Cablelink which caused us to leave TalkTalk in the first place; the convoluted migration path from ADSL2+ LLU to BTW FTTC; the loss of our cherished number; the infuriating if temporary downgrade of our line from ADSL2+ to ADSL1; that unanticipated connection charge; and even a charge for an ADSL modem which we would only use only temporarily -- left a bad taste from the whole process. It was painful. In hindsight we should have stuck with TalkTalk who did eventually launch FTTC in this area. That the migration process still hasn't been formalised and refined, all these years after LLU providers came into being is frankly pathetic.

Edited by deleted (Tue 10-Nov-15 01:33:12)

For someone else to find costs as cannot say, but in data centres similar cable links between rooms carry an install cost and an annual fee maybe research the cost of that

In reply to a post by andyhurley:

Interesting discussion guys. Meanwhile we are now 11 days in and still no broadband. We weren't even given an update on Saturday as promised.

I am waiting to see what the Live Assistance guys and gals can come up with today. It's like some kind of torture having to explain the whole story over and over but it beats trying to converse with the Indian helpdesk.

I've got my Infinity Install Thursday. This thread fills me with dread :/

There are a few million that have gone through with no problem whatsoever . You may as well worry every day as to whether somebody else on your cabinet is getting FTTC that day and your line gets messed up in the process, as per the other user the OP's calls are going to.

Edited by RobertoS (Tue 10-Nov-15 10:35:35)

In reply to a post by edwincluck:

Hi WWWombat. Thanks for going to the trouble of researching that. My own investigations drew a blank. Except for a solitary and obsolete ECI Manual which somehow floated onto the public internet.

They are extraordinarily difficult to find online, aren't they? Discovering the manufacturers (obscure) names for the cards normally leads to a wealth of background information, but not in this case.

The prices are equally difficult to find.

From those photographs you could well be right that the GEA CableLink has 1Gbps bandwidth in each direction. If so I stand corrected and apologies to Panda in particular.

I also found a description of various ethernet products, BT SIN 476, that mention a product named "Etherway Exchange Connect" for use within the BT exchange building, and that it is provisioned using Cablelink products ... but unfortunately notes that a SIN for cablelink doesn't exist.

It mentions that there are 1Gbps and 10Gbps options, which gives a hint that faster cablelinks exist.

Finally, the SIN for the G.fast trials, STIN 518, also mentions 10Gbps cablelinks, and talks of 1000base-LX and 10Gbase-LR as the connection options, with a further reference to SIN 360.

SIN 360, in turn, describes the connectors (which may be dual SC, dual LC, or FC). The ones in the photo look like dual LC type.

The £2000 bill still sounds prohibitively expensive. Even if that charge, as you say, may be subsidising related equipment.

Perhaps you are used to the cost, and capability, of consumer grade equipment, rather than serious telco kit. Dual power supplies, dual switching fabric, etc - none of it comes cheap.

I can't find prices of the ECI F152 hardware, but I do have something comparable ...

I've recently been playing with some Cisco Catalyst 6500 hardware, which is of a similar kind of size and specification to the ECI. It was high-end datacentre kit 10 years ago, and is still supported, but is now being cycled out.

- The ECI blurb reckons it has backplane capacity for 1.2Tbps (20Gbps from each line card, into each switch module).
- The Cisco 6500 started life around 2000 with basic capability of 32Gbps, but with switch fabric modules became capable of 256 Gbps. In the mid-2000's, an upgrade allowed 720Gbps switching.

At some point in its life, the 6500 would have had pricing from this undated document:
http://www.andovercg.com/datasheets/cisco%20price%20...

Making something close to an "empty" L2S, 256Gbps capability, with redundant power, redundant switching fabric, and a slot for something akin to cablelink connections, would cost:

- 6513 (13 slot) empty chassis: $16k (list)
- Redundant 2500W power supplies: $5k each
- Redundant switch fabric modules: $11k each
- Supervisor card: $24k
- Line card with 16 slots for 1000baseLX modules: $25k
- Each 1000baseLX module: $500

When you see prices of over $75k to build a virtually empty switch, with discounts down to around $60k, or £40k, suddenly the cost of £2k as a one-off payment for access to a portion of that capability isn't an instant absurdity.

It starts to make a little more sense if you think you are connecting to £40,000 worth of hardware, rather than thinking of a £4 cable, right?

Those are undoubtedly old prices for the 6500, and capabilities have come on since then, so it isn't a perfect comparison ... but it certainly gives you an idea of the scale of the cost, for a less capable piece of hardware. The ECI we are looking at right now will have been specified back in 2009-2010, so won't be too far away.

For up-to-date hardware, there are some figures on here for recent Cisco Nexus stuff:
http://www.networkworld.com/article/2459441/cisco-su...

A decent Nexus 9516 chassis, equipped ready for decent switching capacity, for $125k. Plus a decent linecard that would give access to plenty of cablelinks for an extra $15k. After discounts, that'd be £70k ... but you get serious switching performance there - tens of terrabits.

The prohibitive cost was the reason given by TalkTalk for not immediately deploying FTTC services of its own in our Market 2 exchange;

Of course it makes sense for TT to present it to you as a prohibitive cost, even if it is entirely reasonable - when the alternative would be to tell you "Sorry, we're penny-pinching ^&%**"

In reply to a post by MrSaffron:

For someone else to find costs as cannot say, but in data centres similar cable links between rooms carry an install cost and an annual fee maybe research the cost of that

I recently ordered 70 Hadoop nodes which is totally unrelated but we had to order six Cisco Nexus 5000 series switches and they were £30,000 a pop plus the cabling which was another £15,000 on top of that.

So I can see why BT would be looking to charge £2,000 for a share of the equipment, cables and paying staff etc.

Finally got some movement on my Infinity yesterday. There was supposed to be an update on Friday which never happened so I called yesterday and the robot told me that it had been fixed yesterday morning. Later I got an email to say Infinity had been installed.

When I got home it seemed to be working - link speed of 39mbps, speed checker showed 15mbps but I haven't had time to check on a PC via a direct connection yet so some of that will be down to the wifi. Not too bothered as it beats the 2.5-3mbps I was getting on TalkTalk ADSL.

Part of the reason for the lack of time is I was dealing with a plumbing emergency (seriously yuck, I won't go into details) during which the BT complaints guy rang up to check it was all working and to close off the complaint. After a bit of too and fro he credited my account with all the cost of the line (including rental) from the original install date (28th) to yesterday and then a couple of extra months service (not including line rental) for 'goodwill'. This just about covers my commuting costs when I had to travel in to the big smoke as I couldn't work from home.

Let's just hope I don't have further problems.