Will i ever get fibre ?

Hi,

This is my first post so go easy on me but I have lurked this forum for quite some time.

I live in the heart of London, Westminster to be exact, and I am still suffering from slow broadband despite being next to one of the busiest and touristy locations in the whole of the UK. I have been trying to sign up with Hyperoptic for some time now and tried to get other people to register but nothing has come out of it.

In my household, we have over 8 devices connected to the internet and we all frequently use bandwidth heavy applications ( eg, Steam and Skype). When one person starts downloading or is having a call on skype we all suffer from buffering and latency goes up dramatically.

I have tried all the options. Virgin probably won't cable my street since the block of flats that I live in is on a busy and main road. Even though they provide broadband with houses 100m away. I have also tried Relish which went okay. During the time we don't use the internet that much the speed is great going up to 60mbps one time but when hop on it goes down to less than 2 Mbps. I considered using a MiFi router but the low data caps and how expensive it is is just not working.

I don't understand why Openreach won't provide fiber as I have checked postcodes for 4 buildings around me which also suffer from the poor infrastructure.

If anyone has some kind of info that would be extreamy helpful.

Information if anyone is wondering: SW1V 2RP (Post code)
Pimlico Exchange
Zen Standard ADSL (Up to 17mbps)
Speeds tend to hover around 10-11 Mbps.
I am using a wired connection.

Thanks

London is left to the commercial decisions of the operators, so the same reasons why Hyperoptic have not turned up may also be why Openreach have not.

So no new information.

NOTE: Steam can be configured to be more friendly on shared connections, so set a bandwidth limit so that others can still use Skype, streaming etc. Also on Skype the impact on others is probably down to saturating the upload size and delaying download ACK packets, so if you upload speed if 600 Kbps limit the camera broadcast to 400 Kbps to help improve performance for others.

In short term a second phone line might be best thing, e.g. dedicate one to the Steam/gaming side of life.

Games these days seem to get bigger and bigger and when even my top speed can take 8 hours or so to download a decent game. I have before limited the speed but still, notice some latency issues.

If I were to take out a sperate line will I need to have an engineer come and fit in another socket? Also, do ISP's provide bonded ADSL these days.

Really unfortunate and disappointing.

Yes another socket as its another physical line, most properties have two pairs, but in flats there is more variation.

Bonding is more expensive, but load balancing which should help with steam which is lots and lots of multiple sources and that needs nothing from your provider just you controlling the balancing hardware

http://amzn.to/2BnFR2F £54 for something that will load balance four connections

If upload is important then ADSL2+ Annex M may be worth a look, but if your sync speed now is 10 to 11 Mbps it is not going to do much, but people with 18-19 download speeds can see upload boosted to 2 Mbps, but they do end up giving up a meg or two of download speed.

You might qualify for USO upgrade by 2020 if your upload speed is below 1Mbps. In your case this would mean much more than 10Mbps download, as there is no way they can squeeze USO speed out of your current exchange only line.

Inner London is one of the most expensive and complicated areas to upgrade, and there is a lot to do in Westminster, E14 and SE16, and as long as gap funding is not available, very little will probably happen. I live in SE16 where ADSL lines only provide 2-4Mbps, and BT/OR do not have any upgrade works ongoing. Especially now when promises about money have been made, it would be unwise for OR to start upgrading lines now if they can get money for doing so in 2019-2020.

I would double my efforts in getting people signing up for Hyperoptic. It does not cost them anything. It will still be a long process, but not dependent on any gap funding or USO funding that may or may not be there one day. Of course you could start a "community project" and pay OR as well, but if your neighbours are not interested in signing up for free, they probably would not be too keen on paying £1k-£2k per flat either.

Hyperoptic seems to be the only option. I might just make some flyers and hand them out. Only need 13 more residents to sign up. I just don't know whether they would bother serving a block of 30 flats or so.

Of course you could start a "community project" and pay OR as well, but if your neighbours are not interested in signing up for free, they probably would not be too keen on paying £1k-£2k per flat either.

Our community funded network rearrangement that gave us our own AIO cab outside our development of 75 properties near the Oval SW9 cost somewhat less than that coming in at around £250 per property. The problem though isn't so much the cost but more getting everyone on board so that the costs are shared by all that will benefit rather than having some that will the benefit but are unwilling to contribute.

What does annoy me is that my whole street Vauxhall Bridge Road is all EO Lines. Surely if Openreach sorted out the problem they would get a good amount of renvenue. I am talking possibly over 100 flats not too sure.

Revenue is good, but how much of the revenue is attributed to paying back the capex spent so that you could order.

We were likewise all EO lines however we do need to remember that BT is company answerable to its shareholders who expect it to make a profit on its transactions. BT needs to be able to earn sufficient income from any network expansion/changes such as is involved in rearranging EO lines to cover the not inconsiderable capital expenditure. This is where BDUK has helped in areas outside the major urban areas such as London and Manchester leaving many of us in the cities on EO lines with relatively poor connections. At least you are seeing 10-11Mbps which is double what most were seeing here until we gap funded our AIO.