This might be the lowest figure that has to be registered while the work is still being carried out to bring the cab into service.

I keep losing track. I know they were both Mar '11 together, and both slipped back. Then, with the new format of exchange documents, Guildford went into the "coming-soon" list, and Woking into the "coming later" list.

I think someone else pointed out that it that Trefor's only showed the postcode locations, and the pop-up info box told you cabinet number.

When I used that map, I didn't know where my cab was; just that it wasn't the obvious one. I had to do some extra analysis to get a rough idea, using BT's DSL speed estimates for different postcodes. That told me where the cabinet would be (it had to be close to the postcodes with 40Mb predictions, right?)

The strange one is that we have a cab that has around 400 lines at present, and this one is also not being upgraded, but a load of other cabs serving between 100 and 400 lines are. So who knows what Openreach's strategy is. In fact, they have to pass the cab they are not upgrading with the fibre optic cables on the way to 4 other cabs further away - work that one out!

I know of a cabinet like this, which had been scheduled for upgrade, and even some groundwork done, but is no-longer on the list, I think it was going to make the pavement too narrow.
another that was in a conservation area has been re-sited just outside that area, (100 metres to the pcp though)

In reply to a post by Adsl24:

Yes, we have the same map for every FTTC location in the UK minus the actual cabinet locations, because BT won't give us this data. The map that was on the trefor site was the same, it was showing postcodes rather than actual cabinets I believe?

I was going to ask about mapping cabinet locations too. Do you only graph the cabinet location for your local area because you know it some other way? For non-local areas, do you just pick a random/central spot? Or pick some postcode with a 40Mb speed estimate?

In reply to a post by Adsl24:

The strange one is that we have a cab that has around 400 lines at present, and this one is also not being upgraded, but a load of other cabs serving between 100 and 400 lines are. So who knows what Openreach's strategy is. In fact, they have to pass the cab they are not upgrading with the fibre optic cables on the way to 4 other cabs further away - work that one out!

Is this an area with a lot of business/office space, or an industrial estate?

If so, I wonder if it is because they will aim to do FTTP there. Or they are protecting revenue from people swapping out of leased-lines.

Nope, just normal residential houses etc

All sounds logical. Will track doen the exact placement of the cab at the weekend.

This estate is 25years old and all the cabling is underground I seem to remember the grumblings in the past from BT engineeers on the cabling and wiring. So long ago I cant rememder the details though.

Maybe the duct sharing scheme would allow Virgin to use BT duct to connect to me when the rental cost is resolved?

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

- Higher than average number of sub-standard (narrow gauge, aliminimum etc) lines from that cab (we're also 2.5km from the exchange and can't get 2Mbps despite the line length being 3.6km) meaning the fibre service will struggle;

Well, they'll still be worse than copper lines of the same length. However, FTTC is still viable if the E-side is a significant proportion of the total length.

There are people who have had a fibre installation, where the D-side is over aluminimum. IIRC it was around 1km.

If your overall line length is 3.6km, how far is the cabinet?

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

- Having been promised additional revenue by New Labour (the telephone tax) which the coalition then dropped, the strategy is to skip businesses as they will have a louder voice later on in terms of the taxpayer begging bowl

I'd have thought that "chasing subsidies" was an argument for whole rural exchanges, or for cabinets that supply remote villages. I don't think it works well for "suburb cabinets that also supply offices".

But who knows. I guess the councils for those areas will be desperate to make sure their local businesses are supplied well.

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

- Leaving that cab/location open for FTTP later on (though as far as I know, apart from where there has been subsidy e.g. the South West there's no real plan for FTTP anyway - took long enough for FTTC, FTTP will probably be another 25 years)

BT have a large-scale pilot going on at Ebbsfleet for "greenfield" fibre - ie fibre where there is no existing copper loop. That's been going on for a while now. They also have "brownfield" FTTP trials going on at one of the Milton Keynes exchanges, which has been going a while, and a new one starting at an exchange in London.

The openreach coming soon list has 10 exchanges where there will be a mix of FTTC and FTTP. The "coming later" list on the same page has 7 exchanges getting just FTTP (all sound pretty dense/affluent areas of London), and 42 exchanges getting a mix of FTTC and FTTP (mostly out of London).

It sounds like BT are indeed ramping up the FTTP rollout, but I'm convinced it is going to be mainly business areas. So I also believe that some of the existing cabinets that have been left out will eventually get FTTP too - it was just that BT couldn't really announce it.

However, the longer-term issue remains. How long until BT introduce plans to get FTTP everywhere, and get rid of most of the FTTC being deployed today?

We can't know the answer to this - but I suspect they will start to push FTTP out in more city locations as the current plans continue. Perhaps in 6 or 7 years time. Perhaps the suburbs will start to get it in 8-10 years.

Remember that BT rolled-out the first version of ADSL in 2000-2004. They then did a new rollout of ADSLmax in 2005-2006. After that, they were rolling out their internal/core 21CN network so they could cope with further expansion, and then 2008 onwards, were rolling out ADSL2+. FTTC started it's rollout in 2010, and FTTP will become a proper rollout either later this year, or in 2012.

With all those going on in the last decade+ (and everyone accuses BT of being slow), it still seems unlikely that we'll be waiting 25 years for FTTP. Heck, 25 years ago, my modem went at 1200/75 bits per second, and the online experience was akin to glorified Ceefax.

In reply to a post by Anonymous:

- One of the objectives of FTTC is to gain market share, kill LLU, and push BT up the speed rankings where it has struggled for a long time especially versus cable. Hence Infinity is >15Mbps only. If the cab isn't going to result in speeds above 15Mbps all BT will accomplish is to install a network where other ISPs will get the business, which directly contradicts the strategy

When you go to the expense of a national rollout, you certainly hope to crush the competition - so sure, all of those objectives are true.

One reason "Infinity" (as a brand within BT Retail's operation) is >15Mbps only, is to keep the purity of the "infinity" brand. It lets them market that brand as being 3x faster etc.

BT do have fibre products available for <15Mbps, but they're not "infinity" branded, even if they cost the same.

The other ISPs will take the business at speeds down to 5Mbps because they haven't got a self-imposed marketing limit.

Right now, Openreach will allow down to 5Mbps, but they seem to be upgrading their core systems to allow fibre down to 2Mbps. I guess that means they will start installing in areas where the D-side cable is pretty long, but it isn't obvious (technically) whether that will still be VDSL2, or ADSL2+ from the cabinet.

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

If your overall line length is 3.6km, how far is the cabinet?

Making the assumption that the (only) cabinet is actually used - it looks a bit ancient and unloved - then it's easy to work this one out.

The duct comes from the exchange in a near straight line down the only road that comes to here. You can see the manhole cover on the edge of the village where it pops out fairly near to that cab.

That run is about 1.7km, so if the D side were dead straight then it would be circa 800m perhaps (that's how far the cab is), but it isn't a straight line, so the D side is about 1.9km. But we've very near that box, far nearer than almost everyone else. How it's routed is a mystery - you can see the overhead bits but not the underground ones, but I can hazard a guess. There are only so many ways it could go.

The problem here would be the length of the D sides and the quality of the lines. While we might see maybe 20Mbps downstream we'd be in a minority of people getting those sorts of speeds; probably 2 more cabinets would be needed to reach the whole area with something close to the headline speeds (not clustered) and there's no way anyone round here is going to have one of those massive cabinets on their land let alone another two. It's not the right solution for this area because it isn't clustered even if the lines were good quality copper.

One other thing I thought about reference not doing specific cabs is: too many DACS lines. Which I imagine is more prevalent in edge of town locations where the town has grown outwards, DACS was used to supply lines meaning that BT would have to go back to basics and re-establish a straight through network first before getting to broadband.

Except that perhaps a DACS line - while being unable to get ADSL - could perhaps get VDSL?

An interesting document. Putting in a few postcodes I know seems to make sense. NN136JA says an uplift of 4.69 which makes sense. The checker reckons 11.5Mb/s at present and that postcode is prolly within 500 metres as the cable lies from the cabinet. I also think that mine is cabinet 15.

Another postcode is more intriguing though: NN137NJ. That's my mate's on the other side of town. The uplift seems logical - he's closer to the exchange and the estimator reckons 20Mb/s so a 2.15 uplift is fair. I also guess that the line percentage is because some properties in that post code are direct exchange lines. Pity it doesn't given an indication of where the cab is though - there's not many on that side of town and none near them.

What does it mean if an exchange/post code is not on the list? BT don't even consider it worth discussing?

:-/

Edited by Andrue (Fri 06-May-11 17:02:32)