Cabinet full - splitters?

So I currently have FTTC 80/20 but I only get 32 down and 6 up.

I spoke to an engineer and they say this shouldn't be the case as the cabinet is only 700m away.

But anyhow my main question is...they have built 10 new houses next door but one. Openreach are all over the place. The same engineer told me they arent putting a new cabinet in for these houses, nor are they upgrading the cabinet, but the cabinets around where I live are all full. They didn't say what they are doing but looking at the telegraph poles where the fibre comes up from ducting it looks like they have put splitters on all the connections.

Is this going to affect my speed?

How do I complain?

Also our next door neighbour is a convicted peadophile. 4th time convicted all internet crimes. I don't want to share a connection with him if that is how splitting works?

MY isp is Zen if that helps.

Thanks

You won't be sharing a connection at a data level with anyone. All Internet connections are shared at various points but from an actual logical data layer you aren't sharing your neighbours connection any more than I am.

Splitters as in those 10 new homes are getting FTTP?

In which case nothing to do with your existing VDSL2 connection and for FTTP no upgrades are needed for the cabinets.

Also at no time is your data shared with a neighbour, even on FTTP where the same fibre is used by multiple people your data is transported as your data and not another persons. The same principles apply once you reach the core network fibres where you are sharing with all sorts of people, i.e. your data is your data.

dependant on the cab run 32 meg at circa 700 metres is reasonably consistemt with speed

700 Metres is actually very lengthy for FTTC-VDSL.

Take a look at the graph on this site; and your Down Stream Speed ties in very well with the 700 Metres.

http://www.increasebroadbandspeed.co.uk/2013/chart-b...

Take a look on your modem for the Downstream Attenuation, probably around 25 db.

My Downstream Attenuation for 300 Metres is 13.4 db, with a 40/10 contract.

Downstream Speed is typically about 37 Mbps, 92%; and 9 Mbps Upstream, 90%, for a guestimated 95% of the TBB Speed Tests, of which I do 3 to 5 a day(!).

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Also take a look at the TBB Broadband Map (top-left) at whatever records there are for your area - can be very enlightening.

There is that too

In reply to a post by thesmileyone:

but looking at the telegraph poles where the fibre comes up from ducting it looks like they have put splitters on all the connections.

It really depends on what you are really seeing, and where, when you describe the situation "the fibre comes up from ducting" and "have put splitters on all the connections".

You currently have FTTC, which means the fibre only goes as far as the cabinet 700m away. The final 700m to your house uses the copper pair that always used to be there.

That copper connection, from cabinet to house, cannot be shared between houses, and no "splitter" can be added that will allow your FTTC connection to continue to work (nor any old ADSL connection either).

There used to be a digital technology that worked as a splitter, known as DACS. It would only work by separating voice calls, and was incompatible with broadband. BT would not be adding these to lines that already have broadband.

There also used to be a more basic concept - the use of party lines - to share copper. It too would only work with voice calls, and I doubt BT would attempt to install those nowadays, or convert existing lines.

Splitters do exist in purely optical cabling, but they tend to be rather hidden away, and can be hard to identify. If you have an FTTP connection, you are likely sharing it through a splitter, but the datastreams are kept logically separate.

Where are the changes you describe happening? Between the existing cabinet and your home? Between the exchange and the cabinet? On new poles for the new properties?

What does the equipment look like, that you describe as a "splitter", and where is it placed? At the top of a pole? Head height? In a footpath chamber? Does it look like a small black bottle? A green box? A large black cylinder?

The cable that you mention coming up from the ducting... Is it black? Or black with a thick yellow stripe? It is the yellow stripe that usually denotes the presence of fibre.

In reply to a post by thesmileyone:

but the cabinets around where I live are all full.

Is that the PCP wiring cab that is full? Or the FTTC addition?

BT have the ability to enlarge an old PCP cabinet (by putting a new, larger shell over the old innards) or to add an extension on the side to allow new copper pair terminations.

If the FTTC cabinet is full, then a second one can be added. BT also seem to have figured out how to give the existing cabinets more capacity, using linecards with higher port counts.

The new additions are on the top of the wiring on the telegraph poles around our property not the new development. They were neat and tidy and now there is a mass bundle on each top going to these little black blocks, they seem to run into the blocks then there is nothing going out of them. Look a right mess.

These cables seem to be for internet vs phone as they come from the fibre box mounted on the main telegraph pole where it then leads down to the ground, which is where the engineer I spoke to was working.

He said that the green cabinet 750m away was saturated, no more slots, but BT aren't prepared to put in a new cabinet so they are "splitting" our connections to make room for the new houses.

He also said the cabinet is 750m away and so we should get full speed.

FWIW at my old address the cabinet was 1.3km away and I got almost twice the upload speed.

Maybe unrelated but I noticed today an engineer called round a neighbours who was not in. Then he got his ladders out and was fiddling around with the wire that goes from telegraph pole to neighbours house at house-end. It seems like they are modifying our wires somehow.

I'm completely lost, to be honest.

One minute you're talking about FTTC then you seem to be talking about fibre on poles. If you have FTTP on your telephone pole that operates independently of any cabinets. Are you sure they're not just adding another copper DP to the top of the telephone pole? Maybe the current 20 pair cable is full and they're adding another 20 pair cable, to serve the new houses?

There's no way of "splitting" and FTTC connection either. You have your own copper pair back to the cabinet.

Edited by deleted (Thu 19-Jan-17 13:52:42)

He said that the green cabinet 750m away was saturated, no more slots, but BT aren't prepared to put in a new cabinet so they are "splitting" our connections to make room for the new houses.

if there are new houses (and depending who the developer is and when they registered

there are 2 things that will have happened

A the developer asked for FTTP and a new fibre feed is was deployed (not using the fibre in the cabinet)

B the developer asked for voice only and will get what that cab provides / or not
(voice is cab is connected to either nearest PCP (regardless of whether ihe enabled or nor) or new pcp (which wont be enabled)


and there is fibre on the pole that wont use any of the fibre that goes into the cab --

to be clear the speed you are getting is consistent with the distance