Community Fibre gbps now CGNAT

I was ecsatic to find CF now live in my street, no more PPPoE limiting my router choice, symmetrical service and for less money than my Zen service.

I'd spent time researching when they started putting infrastructure in around my area and was happy to find the 1gbps service avoids cgnat.

Service has gone live and I see the dreaded 100. IP on my WAN interface. Turns out they changed the terms a few days ago to specify CGNAT for 1gbps services.

I don't need 3gbps, nor can I really make use of it with the equipment I have and it seems a bit silly to pay double for a dynamic IP.

Figured it was worth a post warning other potential subscribers

This change happened around the end of June according to this on ispreview and has been mentioned in this forum.

In reply to a post by mikehiow:

Turns out they changed the terms a few days ago to specify CGNAT for 1gbps services.

Its going to be the normal situation for pretty much all the alt-nets given the global lack of IPv4.

Is there anything specific that you need a public IP for? It can probably be worked around.

In reply to a post by jpm:

Is there anything specific that you need a public IP for? It can probably be worked around.

Yes, I have a few home automation and security applications that require a routable IP. I can work around it, but it’s not ideal.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

Its going to be the normal situation for pretty much all the alt-nets given the global lack of IPv4.

I wouldn’t mind if ipv6 support was better. Still many isps that don’t support it and sites that aren’t accessible via v6.

I also seem to be seeing a bit of packet loss over ipv6 which is frustrating

If only there were another IP protocol with a bigger address space we could use!

In reply to a post by bsdnazz:

If only there were another IP protocol with a bigger address space we could use!

That had universal adoption... ! (I'm with Virgin Media whom have been muttering but done nothing about v6 for over 10 years)

I know that Hyperoptic is the same however they charge you £5.00 for a IPv4 Static IP - Do you know if that is the same with Community Fibre also?

CGNAT is also common on mobile networks like EE who totally blocked all incoming ports and share the same public IP with 300 people or something like that number.

I feel sorry for the people who are not tech minded and before signing up, Have a option to say "do you own a game console, IP Camera system e,g NVR/DVR, VPN) if yes give them a Static IP and leave the ones who just browse and watch netflix a CGNAT IP.

Edited by francisuk25 (Sat 19-Aug-23 18:04:48)

In reply to a post by francisuk25:

Do you know if that is the same with Community Fibre also?

CommunityFibre’s help page says Static IP available to business customers.
https://help.communityfibre.co.uk/troubleshooting/wi...

Toob (rolling out in Hampshire and Surrey) charge £8/month for a static IPv4, but also have IPv6 support.

https://noone.co.uk/
https://www.leetline.co.uk/

You get a free static IP address with above.

In reply to a post by APTMAN:

You get a free static IP address with above.

Only if you're in their cities.

Do you know what are the implications of this for port forwarding?

I haven't joined Community Fibre yet. I'm a PC Gamer and I remember when I needed to open ports for FIFA on PC including Games for Windows Live for older titles like Shadowrun, Gears of War I could not host games or host servers, I could only join servers.

Also back in the old days of Pro Evolution Soccer 6 and 2008 I would get disconnected online a few seconds later due to blocked ports.

When I discovered that I needed port forwarding and learned how to open ports from my router by setting a static IP address on my PC rather than Dynamic then all necessary ports were opened and I was able to host without issues. Also no further disconnections from in game in PES were occurring since.

I'm also reading Does CGNAT affect gaming? https://www.purevpn.com/blog/cgnat-gaming/

"Yes, CGNAT can affect gaming because it can introduce latency and cause jitter. When you are gaming, you are sending packets of data back and forth between your computer and the game server. This article will cover everything you need to know about CGNAT gaming."

I wonder whether this will be a problem for Community Fibre? I know Community Fibre offer a 60 Day Satisfaction Guarantee where you could quit penalty free. Surely if this affects a lot of people then you could quit the ISP penalty free. Surely that wouldn't be very good for them, if it causes significant loss of customers.

In reply to a post by jchamier:

In reply to a post by francisuk25:

Do you know if that is the same with Community Fibre also?

CommunityFibre’s help page says Static IP available to business customers.
https://help.communityfibre.co.uk/troubleshooting/wi...

Toob (rolling out in Hampshire and Surrey) charge £8/month for a static IPv4, but also have IPv6 support.

I asked becouse Barnet Council is getting Community Fibre https://www.barnet.gov.uk/regeneration/broadband/our...

In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

Do you know what are the implications of this for port forwarding?

Far as i know, Its the same as mobile broadband (4G, 5G) as they also use CGNAT however If your game runs on a dedicated server, you will be fine but anything P2P connections will just Drop incoming connections (to you) unless community fibre opens the ports you need from there end what i dout.

About speeds? i have no idea if thats shared as CGNAT is one IP with other users.

Most newer games runs on dedicated server with either Amazon or Microsoft Azure theses days so you be fine, FIFA 23 runs on Dedicated Servers, see EA.
https://help.ea.com/en-gb/help/fifa/fifa-game-data-c...

Edited by francisuk25 (Sun 20-Aug-23 00:35:01)

In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

Do you know what are the implications of this for port forwarding?

You can't port forward as you have no way for unsolicited inbound traffic to reach you.

In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

I'm also reading Does CGNAT affect gaming? https://www.purevpn.com/blog/cgnat-gaming/

"Yes, CGNAT can affect gaming because it can introduce latency and cause jitter. When you are gaming, you are sending packets of data back and forth between your computer and the game server. This article will cover everything you need to know about CGNAT gaming."

I wonder whether this will be a problem for Community Fibre? I know Community Fibre offer a 60 Day Satisfaction Guarantee where you could quit penalty free. Surely if this affects a lot of people then you could quit the ISP penalty free. Surely that wouldn't be very good for them, if it causes significant loss of customers.

It won't be a problem on any modern platform - you're not going to get open NAT any time soon but matchmaking services and game servers all understand that CGNAT is a reality now and they can work around it. I wouldn't read too much into what somebody trying to sell you a VPN service thinks about it.

Well that was an easy solve.

I submitted a support ticket explaining my expectations when ordering and my requirement for an internet routable IP address and I was switched to one today.

Only downside is, I seem to have lost IPv6, hopefully that can be resolved via a support ticket.

So, that explains why there were problems in the past with PES as it was P2P as identified in this post. https://www.reddit.com/r/eFootball/comments/q9r24z/e...
In the past PES games were P2P and now following its rename to eFootball Konami now uses dedicated servers.

Even though as you say FIFA 23 uses dedicated EA servers, it still makes me wonder why it requires ports being opened? https://portforward.com/fifa-23/

These are the exact same ports as FIFA 17 on all platforms and I always believed port forwarding was necessary as from my experience and experience from fellow FIFA gamers from the EA FIFA forums, some have claimed that opening ports fixed their lag/disconnection issues.

I also believed I had problems in the past finding online opponents in season mode. We used to have lobbies in FIFA 05-09 PC. This has been replaced with online seasons match making servers, same for FIFA Ultimate Team.

I believe that contacting Community Fibre they might agree to open those ports from their end! Obviously they won't be happy if customers decide to leave their service due to this reason.

It's a shame that they implemented this policy on all package's except 3Gbps. Removing it from their 500Mbps package and only giving 3Gbps users this privilege is not fair as many of us who have not yet joined Community Fibre will lose out on this experience. Other older customers will remain at least 1-2 years until they see out the contract.

In reply to a post by mikehiow:

Well that was an easy solve.

I submitted a support ticket explaining my expectations when ordering and my requirement for an internet routable IP address and I was switched to one today.

Only downside is, I seem to have lost IPv6, hopefully that can be resolved via a support ticket.

So, can I ask did they remove CGNAT at their discretion or is this just a separate routable IP address that you got following your request?

One can imagine that sending a support ticket, Community Fibre may remove CGNAT at their discretion and if they refuse that then at least if they can be convinced to open the necessary ports for those certain games/applications that are needed otherwise customers will surely be able to exit the service penalty free. Especially with their "60 Day Satisfaction Guarantee".