It looks like I'll be getting connected to Arrowebrook not Irby exchange just down the road, not sure what signal I will get frown but hope its what is advertised.

The distance to the headend exchange is immaterial. Speeds are dictated by the distance from the end user to the FTTC cabinet and the "quality" of that line.

In reply to a post by XboxAsap:

Icaras - thank you for clarification regarding Irby FTTC's being connected to Arrowebrook exchange, therefore the situation regarding ducting is worse than I thought, god knows were the blockage is - I was told some months ago by an engineer that some digging would have to be done in Whaley Lane over blockage of Fibre cable to Irby Exchange. It looks like I'll be getting connected to Arrowebrook not Irby exchange just down the road, not sure what signal I will get but hope its what is advertised.
I appreciate that you sound/feel exasperated over this discussion , we do believe you but all contributors to this thread or do not have Fibre are equally exasperated & frustrated over how long it is taking, we have no way of making direct contact to Openreach, if we contact our ISP's all we can show is interest in having Fibre broadband and thats it.

To be honest a lot of engineers don't understand the situation about fibre headends. The majority would genuinely think that the fibre cabinets are connected to the exchange in Irby itself. They aren't told any different as they don't need to know.

But if you think about it a blockage on Whaley Lane WOULD be relevant to this particular cabinet anyway. The fibre was brought into the area along Pensby Rd from Upton so to get to the cabinet it would make sense to send it down Whaley Lane anyway.

Edited by deleted (Thu 30-Oct-14 07:53:59)

In reply to a post by Icaras:

In reply to a post by XboxAsap:

I have had letter from our MP Esther McVey and she has been advised by BT that with regard to FTTC 9 in Whaley Lane there appears to be ducting problems and therefore it cannot be connected to Fibre network, as result new ducting will be required along footway, presumably towards phone exchange further along Whaley Lane.
I may be wrong but until this is done, connection of other FTTC's in the Irby Village etc , will not be able to connect to Irby phone exchange, if they use a daisy chain connection, unless there is another route for or Fibre BB ?

Please re-read the thread. I can confirm 100% that the fibre cabinets in Irby ARE connected to Arrowebrook, not the exchange in Whaley Lane. Also, cabinets are NOT daisy chained.

In reply to a post by Irby:

From what I've been told on here, Irby fibre is being delivered from the Arrowbrook exchange. Also, the few fibre enabled (and taking orders) cabinets are all on the south east side (check map in my signature), which suggest that they might be being fed from Heswall.

Just a hunch.

How many times do we have to go through this? I'm telling you they are not fed from Heswall! They are all fed from Arrowebrook. Heswall cabinets are all
Connected to Arrowebrook also, as are the Caldy ones.

I'm pretty sure MrSaffron used to have a database that told which fibre headends are used for certain areas. Maybe if he could post here and also confirm they are connected to Arrowebrook you might believe me?

Calm down fella, it was obvious from my post that I wasn't stating I was some kind of authority on the matter. Look at the language I used.

Besides, some time back you said this:

"Yea but you're still thinking in terms of exchanges rather than headends. The Heswall exchange building has no NGA fibre going through it at all, and has no equipment in it relating to the fibre cabinets.

Your point is interesting though, they might be feeding the Irby cabinets from a fibre aggregation point somewhere in Heswall yes, it's certainly possible as the trunk cable from the headend in Arrowebrook will have several individual fibres in it so they can just use a spare. They won't have actually run whole new cable just for Irby (this is confirmed by us not seeing any work on Arrowe Park Rd. They've just used a spare fibre in the existing cable feeding Heswall."

Is it any wonder there's confusion by lay people like me!

I reckon the spine cable from Arrowbrook routes along Pensby road into Whaley lane, then north into Thingwall road. Probably 4 nodes covering the area, roughly covering cabinets to west, central and north Irby, east/south east and southern cabs.
I reckon one of those nodes will be close to the exchange

That makes sense. I'm getting a bit tired of obsessing over this, just wish it was all done!

There should be more than 4 nodes though. Usually there's a node per cabinet or if theres a couple really close they can run from one.

But yes it would make perfect sense to bring it up Whaley Lane.

@Irby I don't understand where you've quoted me talking about no NGA equipment in the Heswall exchange. What did you mean by that?

About your point re. spare fibres. Yes you're absolutely right there will be loads of spares in the main cable they brought up Arrowe Park Rd. A duct blockage on Whaley Lane would certainly explain why they haven't been able to enable certain other cabinets wouldn't it? If it then feeds up Thingwall Rd. I still don't get why cabinets such as P12 aren't live. What could be holding that up?

Edited by deleted (Fri 31-Oct-14 17:16:31)

Now that the new P7 cabinet is in place and all of the digging has been filled in and the road/footpaths mended presumably the cabinet has to be connected up/commissioned in some way. How long would this take normally before we can get access? Any chance of getting fibre before Christmas do you think? The Sky site still indicates fibre unavailable.

Another thing also occurs to me: I currently get about 10Mbps adsl speed anyway, but, due to contention I suspect, the "real" speed drops massively during the evenings (when everyone starts streaming video etc).

If a significant number of people move to fibre, will this contention actually decrease and make the move less attractive? Or will the move to fibre simply keep the evening bottleneck for all? After all, if I could get a reliable 10Mbps "real" speed all day, I probably would not need fibre.

For context, P3 was put in place on June 9th and is still not offering FTTC services. I believe this is due to a duct blockage somewhere near Whaley Lane that has to be cleared.

I am extremely doubtful that we'll see anything by Christmas, but we live in hope (I work from home, this is a big deal to me).

Some progress at Whaley Lane FTTC P9 this morning - two Openreach chaps making connection between FTTC and phone cabinet, they have no idea when Fibre BB will be ready in area , but its some progress

In reply to a post by tonka99:

Now that the new P7 cabinet is in place and all of the digging has been filled in and the road/footpaths mended presumably the cabinet has to be connected up/commissioned in some way. How long would this take normally before we can get access? Any chance of getting fibre before Christmas do you think? The Sky site still indicates fibre unavailable.

Another thing also occurs to me: I currently get about 10Mbps adsl speed anyway, but, due to contention I suspect, the "real" speed drops massively during the evenings (when everyone starts streaming video etc).

If a significant number of people move to fibre, will this contention actually decrease and make the move less attractive? Or will the move to fibre simply keep the evening bottleneck for all? After all, if I could get a reliable 10Mbps "real" speed all day, I probably would not need fibre.

No it won't make a difference as you're currently getting your broadband from the exchange in Irby whereas the fibre comes from the exchange in Arrowebrook (Upton). If you're on BT's network you shouldn't be seeing congestion at peak times, if that's occuring then you should report that as a fault. It is not normal nowadays.