IIRC, it was @Ignitionnet that broke the details about vectoring - that BT would consider it only for tactical purposes for BDUK; if the increased range of "superfast" speeds on select cabinets pulled more properties into the "passed" column.

However, I haven't seen a specific comment on that from BT themselves.

There's a bit of me that wonders if the fact that BT are now starting to squeeze higher port-count cards into the DSLAMs rules out vectoring there. Can the same sized card cope with both a 33% increase in lines and the extra processing power for vectoring?

The only really official statement I recall from BT is that vectoring is an integral part of the LR-VDSL offering. As detailed in the STIN:
http://www.btplc.com/sinet/sins/pdf/STIN522v1p0.pdf

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

There's a bit of me that wonders if the fact that BT are now starting to squeeze higher port-count cards into the DSLAMs rules out vectoring there. Can the same sized card cope with both a 33% increase in lines and the extra processing power for vectoring?

Vectoring is done on a separate service board, at least in the case of Huawei kit, WWW.

I should mention use of it for BDUK did not mean just BDUK cabinets, but to hit coverage targets per BDUK and, indeed USC it seems.

In reply to a post by Ignitionnet:

Vectoring is done on a separate service board, at least in the case of Huawei kit, WWW.

I've still not seen a picture of one in use in either a 5603 or 5616... Does it use up one of the 4 or 6 linecard slots? Or does it get placed in one of the other "generic" slots that seem to be used for central control, power and backhaul?

In reply to a post by Ignitionnet:

I should mention use of it for BDUK did not mean just BDUK cabinets, but to hit coverage targets per BDUK and, indeed USC it seems.

I worded my post to specifically not call it a "BDUK cabinet", but your explicit point is well-made. However, I guess the extra premises reached would have to have been labelled as part of the intervention area ... so it depends whether the LA chose to include "out of reach on commercial cab" premises in the IA (At which point I have to kick myself to remember that there are two IA's, one for USC-level too)

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

I've still not seen a picture of one in use in either a 5603 or 5616... Does it use up one of the 4 or 6 linecard slots? Or does it get placed in one of the other "generic" slots that seem to be used for central control, power and backhaul?

In the case of the 5616 it's a team effort. You need a combination of a compatible control board, an H831CCUE in the case of the 5616, VCLF or VCMM service boards, the H831MABB backplane, and a PDNA/A or PVNA/A power supply board.

In the case of the 5603T you need the H802MABO 2Tb backplane, H80BVCMM service boards, these are 48 ports, unsure about the 64 port variety, an H802SCUN Super Control Unit is adequate, and the H806VPEA or H806VPGA Vector Processing Engine.

I think the VPE goes into the Universal interface board slot. It certainly doesn't take one of the service boards or SCU control board slots, and the remaining slots on the chassis are 2 for upstream interface and 2 for power interface - there are 13 slots, not all full-height, on the MA5603T.