Leeds city centre poor speed and options

Hi,
I'm about to rent a flat in the Victoria Quays region in Leeds.
It's the centre, with lots of new develpoments around. I never thought I would have broadband issues in this area.

It turns out I can only get ADSL2 with 3mbps!

Hyperoptic won't touch my building because it's old (they claim lack of raisers make installation too costly).

When I check the BT openreach checker it says FTTC is not even planned for my postcode. Some other checkers (like sam knows) claim it is FTTC enabled.

The Zoopla speed checker for hte rental property also claimed I should have 40mbps FTTC.

What's going on in this area?
Should I lose any hope of decent broadband while I live in this property?

thanks.

What does this checker say for the address? Use the Address option, not the postcode option.

For BT FTTC and ADSLx the postcode checker is highly unreliable. The reason being that many postcodes cam be served by more than one cabinet, but it only reports the first in the database.

it doesn't look good

https://postimg.org/image/gvw6kfuxd/

Could be far worse, but a pity there is no FTTC.

That is generally the most reliable checker.

On the line above the table, did it give a cabinet number? If so there are links (that I don't know offhand) for checking if anything is scheduled for it. In time they show up on this one but I think others are earlier.

If there is no cabinet number that normally means the line comes direct from the exchange. (An EO line). That is often bad news. However a lot of such lines are slowly having a cabinet placed just outside the exchange to enable FTTC.

Again, there may be some other information around. With luck once you establish cabinet or EO someone else may be able to help. Post which it is, and the cabinet number if it has one .

no all it says is address and "on Exchange LEEDS"

That could be really bad news. "Things can only get better". We need someone to pop in who knows how to look into "fill-in areas".

I'm really shocked that in such a new and vibrant area, BT hasn't even bothered with street cabinets.

I also called Hyperoptic and they said they had surveyed my buillding but since it had no risers, installing fibre wasn't viable.

The PCP (phone cabinet) layout is very much years old, from long before FTTC existed. ADSLx is not affected by being via cabinet or EO.

Although my posts since we discovered the address is almost certainly EO have been discouraging, there definitely are a lot of conversions of EO lines to near-exchange cabinets going on. It's just I don't know the places to look to see if that address has any current plans for this.

In reply to a post by jmmo20:

I'm really shocked that in such a new and vibrant area, BT hasn't even bothered with street cabinets.

That's nothing unusual for BT, BT has installed FTTP in my area and also down my road including our chamber and phone pole, which was done back in 2011 - 2012.

The FTTP hardware is live in our chamber and up our phone pole due to just one home can get it and has in fact got it.

Yet BT / Openreach both basically says that there is still work to do and until that work has completed no fibre for us.

And when we provide information and proof that its live and complete and that there is absolutely no reason why we shouldn't be able to get it and then both BT and Openreach stops responding and then ignore all emails and phone calls.

Paul

Edited by PaulKirby (Thu 23-Jun-16 23:55:17)

what the name of your building -- and your postcode -- is their a managing agent for the building

In reply to a post by RobertoS:

Although my posts since we discovered the address is almost certainly EO have been discouraging, there definitely are a lot of conversions of EO lines to near-exchange cabinets going on.

All of the work to convert EO lines into something capable of fibre broadband is being done either as part of the BDUK subsidy projects, or as part of BT's self-funded improvements for cities.

Unfortunately, anything in the centre of Leeds isn't likely to be seen favourably by Superfast West Yorkshire, so you are dependent on the other fund. However, while BT announced it as funding for 30 cities, it hasn't gone anywhere beyond London. Indeed, it looks to have spent everything in London.

Looking at the statistics for the Leeds exchange, it seems there are 140 cabinets, but only 33 have FTTC available, and 2 are being worked on. Only 4 have been touched by BDUK in phase 1, and just 1 in phase 2.

That is a *dire* proportion of upgraded cabinets, even just thinking commercially. BDUK involvement can be curtailed by VM deployment, which is hard to gauge, but it seems pretty low too.

On top of that, there are 80 different EO bundles, where no PCP exists. And no sign that any of these are being converted into PCPs.

The best source of information about the potential for future upgrades is the Superfast West Yorkshire group. But I wouldn't expect much joy from their answer.

In reply to a post by jmmo20:

I also called Hyperoptic and they said they had surveyed my buillding but since it had no risers, installing fibre wasn't viable.

Surprised they haven't asked the landlord to make risers for them, what's the name of the building and how many apartments are there?

In reply to a post by vit0:

In reply to a post by jmmo20:

I also called Hyperoptic and they said they had surveyed my buillding but since it had no risers, installing fibre wasn't viable.

Surprised they haven't asked the landlord to make risers for them, what's the name of the building and how many apartments are there?

the development is Victoria Quays .. there are 4 or 5 buildings with a total of 120 flats I believe, ranging from 1 to 3 bedroom.

To be honest I've seen a lot more complicated FTTP installations in Spain.
In a city the size of Cambridge my aunt got FTTP to a detached house in the middle of nowhere.. They are just not installing copper anymore.

well I finally got sky DSL installed and it isn't as bad as a I was expecting. Considering I'm about 1.2 miles from the exchange, my EO line is syncing at 12mbps.

Not bad, fast enough for most stuff.

I was really concerned because 5 years ago I moved to Milton Keynes for a year and my EO line in a new development was 1.5 mbps !!!

Want to post stats so we can see if more speed can be squezed from the line?

In reply to a post by WWWombat:

Looking at the statistics for the Leeds exchange, it seems there are 140 cabinets, but only 33 have FTTC available, and 2 are being worked on. Only 4 have been touched by BDUK in phase 1, and just 1 in phase 2.

That is a *dire* proportion of upgraded cabinets, even just thinking commercially. BDUK involvement can be curtailed by VM deployment, which is hard to gauge, but it seems pretty low too.

On top of that, there are 80 different EO bundles, where no PCP exists. And no sign that any of these are being converted into PCPs.

The best source of information about the potential for future upgrades is the Superfast West Yorkshire group. But I wouldn't expect much joy from their answer.

Just wondered where do you get the "33 cabinets from 140" information from?

Edited by M100 (Mon 11-Jul-16 17:42:02)

Codelook.