zzoomm is now faster

Zzoomm have updated their speed, for £29 a month people can now get 150Mb/s down and up, makes it better value. I still need to wait for a few months and I still have to decide what to do, but it is certainly going in the right direction. The one problem I do have is that they use a third party supplier.

anyway, link here for prices if anyone is around here

https://zzoomm.com/

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

The one problem I do have is that they use a third party supplier.

A third party supplier of what? (e.g. transit, backhaul, data centres, power, coffee??) And what problem does it cause you?

Did we establish whether they were a “proper” ISP in the last thread….? 😎

It was established that they have their own AS number; and you can check their peering arrangements here.

But why do you care? Either they have their own multiple transit connections and peering at public peering points; or they won't, but their upstream will. According to bgp.he.net, the latter is the case. They get all their connectivity through a company called Xifos Limited.

The only practical difference is whether it is managed by their own network team, or they pay another company to handle it on their behalf. In other words, this is just an administrative boundary; one approach is not obviously "better" than the other.

Suppose that Zzoomm have a small network team without a 24x7 NOC that knows how to manage BGP; then in my opinion it's better for their transit and peering to be managed by a larger company with better out-of-hours skills.

I was kidding!

In reply to a post by candlerb:

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

The one problem I do have is that they use a third party supplier.

A third party supplier of what? (e.g. transit, backhaul, data centres, power, coffee??) And what problem does it cause you?

Not sure, on ther facebook page someone said that the fibres was laid and they had to wait 2-3 weeks for the service.
when I asked with surprised why 2.3 weeks I got this reply

ok heads up we were the first road they put the cable in back in February, I know they were quoting 2 months to switch on but I guess they have had a few issues and some of it is probably down to their suppliers connecting them up.

Seems strange.

i prefer the provider I am using to provide their own service.

That sounds like ‘their subcontractors completing the work to connect up their fibre to me’.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

In reply to a post by candlerb:

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

The one problem I do have is that they use a third party supplier.

A third party supplier of what? (e.g. transit, backhaul, data centres, power, coffee??) And what problem does it cause you?

Not sure, on ther facebook page someone said that the fibres was laid and they had to wait 2-3 weeks for the service.
when I asked with surprised why 2.3 weeks I got this reply

ok heads up we were the first road they put the cable in back in February, I know they were quoting 2 months to switch on but I guess they have had a few issues and some of it is probably down to their suppliers connecting them up.

Seems strange.

i prefer the provider I am using to provide their own service.

That's a pretty vague comment posted on the FB page.

That could reflect a supplier on a backhaul connection or as per Zarjaz's comment, a subcontractor that is doing customer connections or indeed splicing or other work on their spine connections.

Its not uncommon to have delays like this for any fibre network builder. As JonRennie's signature comment on here says "Comms is hard"...well outside plant comms is a whole other nightmare level of hard.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

That's a pretty vague comment posted on the FB page.

That could reflect a supplier on a backhaul connection or as per Zarjaz's comment, a subcontractor that is doing customer connections or indeed splicing or other work on their spine connections.

Its not uncommon to have delays like this for any fibre network builder. As JonRennie's signature comment on here says "Comms is hard"...well outside plant comms is a whole other nightmare level of hard.

I have asked if anyone from Zzoomm can tell me what it means, but as yet, no one have.
I may need to send an email.

Everyone uses subcontractors. Cityfibre uses subcontractors. Even Openreach themselves use subcontractors for some of the work.

Patience is required for anything FTTP related. There's a lot of planning, scheduling, unexpected problems (e.g. blocked ducts), and unseen work around connecting up the headend and configuring provisioning systems.

If an engineer on the ground says "ready to order in 2 weeks" then take that with a pinch of salt, as they're not responsible for all the other ducks that have to be in a line.

I recommend you just wait for the service to become available, order it, then enjoy it

When Gigaclear was installed where I livie, there were two contractors. One laid the cables and the other did all the joints and installed the cabinet. The first company to lay cables did not do a very good job as some roads sank after trunking was laid, so a second company was hired to do the job.

In reply to a post by candlerb:

Everyone uses subcontractors. Cityfibre uses subcontractors. Even Openreach themselves use subcontractors for some of the work.

Patience is required for anything FTTP related. There's a lot of planning, scheduling, unexpected problems (e.g. blocked ducts), and unseen work around connecting up the headend and configuring provisioning systems.

If an engineer on the ground says "ready to order in 2 weeks" then take that with a pinch of salt, as they're not responsible for all the other ducks that have to be in a line.

I recommend you just wait for the service to become available, order it, then enjoy it

i know subcontractors are used by different companies, not sure if the people laying the cable are, they have bright yellow Zzoomm Hi-vis on and bright yellow Zzoomm vans,
It is who supplies the service itself I am more bothered about.

I have a long time to wait before it even gets to me, spring next by all accounts, and that is if they don't get delayed. People seem to be complaining already about work starting and then left for days before anything is done, we will see what happens.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

It is who supplies the service itself I am more bothered about.

What exactly bothers you?

There will be some layer 1/2 equipment (if it's GPON this will be OLTs) which in turn connects to some routing equipment which in turn connects to Internet transit and peering.

Some of this will be owned and managed by Zzoomm themselves via their own employees, and some will be managed by third parties (but paid for by Zzoomm). Certainly the rest of the Internet isn't owned or managed by Zzoomm.

I don't understand why you care which bits of equipment are owned and managed by whom, since they will ultimately be managed by *someone* who is paid to take responsibility for it.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

I have a long time to wait before it even gets to me, spring next by all accounts, and that is if they don't get delayed. People seem to be complaining already about work starting and then left for days before anything is done, we will see what happens.

That sounds like a completely different concern: that it's not arriving as fast as you would like (which is generally true of all FTTP deployments).

If it arrived tomorrow, would you take the service? And if not, why not?

In reply to a post by candlerb:

What exactly bothers you?

There will be some layer 1/2 equipment (if it's GPON this will be OLTs) which in turn connects to some routing equipment which in turn connects to Internet transit and peering.

Some of this will be owned and managed by Zzoomm themselves via their own employees, and some will be managed by third parties (but paid for by Zzoomm). Certainly the rest of the Internet isn't owned or managed by Zzoomm.

I don't understand why you care which bits of equipment are owned and managed by whom, since they will ultimately be managed by *someone* who is paid to take responsibility for it.

Not bothered about the bits of equipment, but I do worry who will supply the service, would not be happy if talk Talk had anything to do with it say, not that I think they will have.

That sounds like a completely different concern: that it's not arriving as fast as you would like (which is generally true of all FTTP deployments).

If it arrived tomorrow, would you take the service? And if not, why not?

I am in no rush to be honest, the provider I use is fine, the speed is fine and what I pay for it at the moment is fine. It was not that long ago that the idea of fibre happening here for most people was unthinkable, certainly for a few years anyway. Sure, openreach had the city on a list in the next couple of years or so, but that is all it is, on a list and most people I talked to had their doubts it would happen, certainly not in the time frame. So when Zzoomm said they were going to build a fibre network here it was a shock.

If it arrived tomorrow, no I would not take the service, for one reason is that I am still in contract until January, the other is, I am not sure if I really want to pay £30 a month for broadband, may be faster speed, but do I really need that speed?
As I have said before, I will wait and see what happens, what plusnet can offer me pricewise to renew the contract and how far away Zzoomm is

Oh yeah, Zzoomm gave this reply about the delay for people who have already had the fibre loads.

Right now we’re waiting on some final building work further down the line connecting our local full fibre broadband network to the wider UK internet network. Unfortunately this is out of our control but we believe this will be completed very shortly. We’re incredibly excited to be making Hereford the fastest city in the UK and bringing amazing Full fibre broadband to local homes and businesses.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

Not bothered about the bits of equipment, but I do worry who will supply the service

In that case, what do you mean by "the service", if it's not the carrying of traffic from your ONT to the Internet?

There are various auxiliary things apart from that, e.g. billing and customer service. But to me, it's the reliability and performance of the network connectivity which matters most. As long as the service works, and the bills are accurate, I have no need to dial their call centre.

In reply to a post by zyborg47:

Not bothered about the bits of equipment, but I do worry who will supply the service,

How do you define the service? The IP address you are provided and the first network, or the routing to transit providers? Do you know what the various transit and backhaul providers are for your current ISP ?

Are you thinking local network (e.g. Openreach from home to Exchange) or “tail” network from Exchange to ISP data centre, or the connectivity from the ISP to the rest of the internet?

I wouldn’t worry about the majority of that, it is not something you can control.