In reply to a post by kitcat:

They won't have to 'enter' every house.

I was talking about PSTN-only users: those who don't currently have a broadband connection, some of whom don't even have a master socket, and certainly don't have any broadband service or any relationship with an ISP. Most likely it's BT they buy the phone service from.

To turn these people into VOIP (without going the MSAN approach), you would have to:

1. Make them become BT broadband customers (even if they don't want Internet)
2. Give them a modem/router/ATA device
3. Possibly either install a new master socket, or move the existing master socket (*)
4. Even if they already have a master socket, they will likely have to disconnect their existing extension wiring from it and reconnect to the ATA

(*) Many older houses have PSTN entering at the hallway, but with no mains socket nearby.

candlerb

1. No
2 Yes
3. Maybe
4. Yes

That is why it will take till 2025 to do. But OR will have the best view on BB penetration and it is surprising how few homes don't have a master socket. Likely to be done an area at a time so that teams can work through the tail of PSTN only people. I will have to dig out the OFCM data for an estimate of how many (%) that exist.

But is there really a business case for doing this while broadband is still being delivered on copper, which leaves the MSAN option on the table?

What MSAN option? They are NOT going to rip up the E-Side and run all voice lines from the FTTC MSANs.

Removing the E-Side (and therefore ADSL) would dramatically increase the number of cabinets needed.
Running voice from the cabinets reduces the port density available, again dramatically increasing the number of cabinets needed.

Unless they plan on busy PCP's having half a dozen fibre cabinets it's not going to happen anytime soon.

If you think the LLU providers will allow this you're dreaming. OFCOM won't either, as they are toothless.

The future is FTTP, with voice being run over the fibre from the home.
You DO NOT need broadband for this.

Completely agree with your last paragraph.

In reply to a post by j0hn83:

What MSAN option? They are NOT going to rip up the E-Side and run all voice lines from the FTTC MSANs.

Removing the E-Side (and therefore ADSL) would dramatically increase the number of cabinets needed.

Non-FTTC lines can get their voice service from an MSAN in the exchange. Sure, you'd need more MSAN ports in the exchange, but the option of putting ATAs in every home would in any case need some sort of data service provided to every home.

The future is FTTP, with voice being run over the fibre from the home.
You DO NOT need broadband for this.

Being pedantic, FTTP is (one form of) broadband.

I fully agree that *if* you've decided to replace the copper line up to the home with FTTP, then you need an ATA on there to do voice. In fact it's the only option.

But unless I've misunderstood, what's being proposed is that *before* we get to that point, existing analogue voice services should be replaced by an ATA in the home connected to broadband-over-copper.

I really don't see why you'd want to do that, when you could easily serve the voice component from an MSAN, and avoid all the issues of in-home phone wiring.

Candlerb

You missed the part where I said the cards in the FTTCs are NOT combo cards but are BB only. All the cards would need changing out which would cost billions. Also there is no Call server to control the FTTC cards which would be more 100s of Millions. Etc.

VOIP is available cheaply and BT doesn't get enough revenue from a voice service to do anything other than a cheap service. The existing PSTN is starting to creak and some parts will struggle to reach 2025, I think it will be 'unpicked' by then to remove the worst equipment. BT has been cannibalising it for over 5 years already for spares and the costs of supporting it must be increasing whilst the OFCOM allowed revenue is decreasing.

OFCOM models for PSTN pricing have worked on cheapest replacement cost for at least 8 years and these have always been VOIP costs, so that is all that BT is allowed to recover.

Candlerb

We must both have been typing at the same time.

The cost of providing an exchange based MSAN then doing the transfer costs this out as there is no way of BT recovering that cost. An ATA is cheaper than the MSAN cards and needs no core network to connect it to nor an ( expensive) call server to control the call.. 64Kbit baseband voice is now too expensive to ever be provided and could never compete with Skype type voice.

Running all the voice over a BB network designed for data needs negligible bandwidth. ( At its peak total Voice for the UK was only about 20Gb in total). The Call controls for VOIP are basically the same as a Mobile network call control and can be run on the same equipment which is 'Off the shelf.' An MSAN call control would need to be developed and may be a one off worldwide which equals expensive.

In home wiring is not OR ( BTs) responsibility and therefore won't feature in their costs, apart from the minimal few without Master sockets which are meant to be changed out whenever OR come across them. Zarjaz or other OR people can confirm if this is still being done.

Edited by kitcat (Tue 08-May-18 16:25:15)

Can confirm that is still being done, yes.

Do they replace old non-NTE master sockets when they come across them? We still have an old LJU5/1A dual socket.