G.fast pods and BDUK

I noticed recently that G.fast pods where appearing on cabinets for the Prudhoe exchange (my mothers). Anyway I was visiting at Easter so took the opportunity this time to visit all the cabinets after mapping them out using CodeLook and Streetview though to be honest I knew all but one of the locations anyway from growing up there.

Anyway interestingly it shows up that cabinet 12 in the neighbouring village of Ovington which according to CodeLook, was enabled BDUK Northumberland Phase 13a in June 2015 has spouted a Nokia G.fast pod. Interesting that a cabinet that BT/Openreach claimed previously was commercially unviable for VDSL now gets a commercial G.fast pod. My view it is more evidence that BT/Openreach are full of it when it comes to anything to do with any broadband technology being commercially viable. Note I would have said cabinet 12 was a classic case of one where uptake was going to be high. Wealthy area with poor ADSL speeds due to distance from exchange equaling high VDSL take up. I hope Northumberland demand a full refund of money on that cabinet.

My search has also thrown up some errors in the Openreach checker. Properties at the bottom end of Moor Road right next to cabinet 2 at 409751E,562604N are allegedly connected to cabinet 7 which is located at the exchange (which I am almost certain is an EO breakout because it never used to exist) at 409598E,563100N, Using the address checker 1 Moor Road NE42 5LH allegedly gets a 80/79,20/19 on both clean and impacted from cabinet 7, not a cat in hell's chance of that, but if it was cabinet 2 then entirely believable. Anyone know how you report such errors?

Where someone is trying to order a service happy to prod Openreach, otherwise don't feedback the various errors, i.e. will help people while not being an unpaid member of the Openreach team. We have the postcode you mention split between two cabinets 2 and 15. In this example it looks like the estimates may be OK but cab number wrong

On the BDUK GFAST quandary, it is likely that the VDSL2 cabinet while deemed not commercial at the time of the BDUK roll-out would have eventually got done, and the BDUK process shortened how long that eventually period was. NOTE: If there is high take-up the cost to the BDUK project reduces and can potentially get to the point where it cost the project almost nothing.

In reply to a post by jabuzzard:

Interesting that a cabinet that BT/Openreach claimed previously was commercially unviable for VDSL now gets a commercial G.fast pod.

I think you'll find it costs far more to bring VDSL to a non-VDSL cabinet - especially if there's no fibre aggregation node close by - than it does to bring g.fast to a VDSL enabled cabinet. So the criteria used for commercial VDSL deployment will be more strict than for commercial g.fast deployment.

In reply to a post by jabuzzard:

My view it is more evidence that BT/Openreach are full of it when it comes to anything to do with any broadband technology being commercially viable.

I'm not trying to be funny but since you are able to predict the future, have you ever thought about working in Openreach's Planning Dept? They would just love to employ someone like you who can see which areas will be profitable and which won't be.

ps
Obliged if you could pm me this week's lottery numbers as well

In reply to a post by jabuzzard:

Interesting that a cabinet that BT/Openreach claimed previously was commercially unviable for VDSL now gets a commercial G.fast pod

G.fast is cheap to install if there's already a VDSL cabinet nearby to power it from. You probably only need a couple of subscribers to make it worthwhile strapping on a pod with a handful of line cards.

G.fast is more about commercial bragging rights ("1.7 million properties have ultrafast available!") than actual service. Only about 1% of properties supposedly passed by G.fast take it. In practice, if you're ~200m from the cabinet you'll get a more reliable service from VDSL, with faster upload speeds, for less money.

jabuzzard

Forecasting is a mugs game, in that hindsight always wins.

I used to do forecasting for BT and I actually agree in this case (and many others) that Openreach got it wrong. I had the debate (argument) when FTTC/FTTP was being planned for rollout, that villages( cabinets) remote from the exchange would have high take-up as their existing DSL was poor. The opposing argument was based on facts around bandwidth usage and places with low usage were deemed to be unlikely to have high take-up. I ( and others) were the wrong side of the regulatory divide to push the fact that this was biased by existing speed and you know the outcome.

My old 'top' boss now runs Openreach and appears to have significantly changed the Fibre direction towards where many of us would have liked to see it move 11 years ago, but constant regulatory upheaval slowed it down dramatically.

Forecasting might be a mugs game but through out the entire history of computing there have always been three givens. Firstly you can always use more processing power, secondly you can always use more storage, and since the moment computers where networked, you can always use more bandwidth and lower latency.

Consequently anyone basing take up around the idea that people with rubbish broadband speeds would not upgrade to FTTC/FTTP and take up would be low is a grossly incompetent moron. They should IMHO be sacked as being entirely unqualified for the job. It is mind blowingly obvious to anyone with common sense that they where wrong. I note that my check UPRN for cabinet 12 gets 2-3Mbps ADSL but a full 80MBps VDSL. I suspect the whole village Ovington will get good G.fast speeds given it's small size.

I would add that some of the cabinet's on the Prudhoe exchange that have had a G.fast pod fitted beggar belief. Do they bother to use Acorn profile or similar consumer classification data when working out what to do. Knowing the area I find it hard to believe take up on cabinet 6 for G.fast is going to be anything other than very low.

Then again these where the bozo's that in the late 90's enabled the deprived Meadow Well council estate in north Tyneside for ADSL back when internet access required a ~£1k PC and access was £50 a month. Then declared due to low take up a nationwide ADSL rollout was not viable.

Edited by jabuzzard (Wed 24-Apr-19 13:39:09)

Correct the north end of Moor Road (as would be called the bottom as it's on a hill by locals) is cabinet 2. Cabinet 15 is 200m up the road just outside the High school at 409790E,562411N. I walked past them both every school day for five years (Northumberland is a middle school system). I have the full six figure OSGB36 grid references for all the cabinets on the Prudhoe and Tayport exchanges if your interested.

My gut feeling is that enabling an BDUK cabinet for G.fast should trigger a full refund of the any BDUK monies paid to enable the cabinet as clearly BT/Openreach where pulling a fast one on commercial viability of doing upgrades and are getting an unfair subsidy for their "hyperfast" rollout. At the very least the monies spent getting the power and fibre to the VDSL cabinet should be returned otherwise there is illegal state aid going on.

In reply to a post by jabuzzard:

My gut feeling is that enabling an BDUK cabinet for G.fast should trigger a full refund of the any BDUK monies paid to enable the cabinet as clearly BT/Openreach where pulling a fast one on commercial viability of doing upgrades and are getting an unfair subsidy for their "hyperfast" rollout.

1) G.fast upgrades on bduk funded cabs are NOT done using public funds, ie BT/Openreach fund g.fast upgrades 100% themselves irrespective of how the vdsl cabinet was funded in the first place.

2) Openreach planners don't have someone with the psychic powers of Mystic Meg like you seem to have.

Late 90's and ADSL on an exchange...you sure as the roll-out only started in 2000

In reply to a post by baby_frogmella:

1) G.fast upgrades on bduk funded cabs are NOT done using public funds, ie BT/Openreach fund g.fast upgrades 100% themselves irrespective of how the vdsl cabinet was funded in the first place.

Sure the pod itself is all private money, but they are making use of power and fibre from the VDSL twin to add it, and there in lies the problem. These are a significant proportion of the cost of a VDSL twin and by piggy backing off them they are receiving an indirect subsidy that is very likely illegal under EU state aid rules.

As such adding a G.fast pod to a BDUK enabled cabinet should require the full return of any public subsidies of any public money used to provide the power and fibre.

2) Openreach planners don't have someone with the psychic powers of Mystic Meg like you seem to have.

As has been pointed out elsewhere in this thread by someone inside BT at the time, a bunch of imbeciles used the flawed logic that because people with rubbish broadband speeds didn't use it much they would not bother upgrading to FTTC. The common sense approach would tell you that the exact opposite is more likely to be true and does not require one to have any psychic powers.

The fact remains that history has demonstrated that BT/Openreach have got predictions of the usage of broadband technologies spectacularly wrong on every conceivable occasion up till now. Only a fool would have any reason to believe they have it right this time.