In reply to a post by pluralist:

My original post was about being 11 miles from Manchester. Even if I survived a strike there, my social life revolves mainly around the classical music and theatre venues there. Also the BBC Philharmonic based in the Media Centre in Salford would go, as that Centre would not exist and the Lowry Theatre and Art Gallery next to it with the largest collection of Lowry paintings in the world would be devastated.

That would be a disaster but to be fair I wouldn't be upset to see Man Utd go 😎🤣

In reply to a post by dect:

In reply to a post by pluralist:

My original post was about being 11 miles from Manchester. Even if I survived a strike there, my social life revolves mainly around the classical music and theatre venues there. Also the BBC Philharmonic based in the Media Centre in Salford would go, as that Centre would not exist and the Lowry Theatre and Art Gallery next to it with the largest collection of Lowry paintings in the world would be devastated.

That would be a disaster but to be fair I wouldn't be upset to see Man Utd go 😎🤣

Although the majority of their fan-base would not be physically affected.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Thought you were imminently getting Openreach FTTP?

Good news, as of today, I got a call from a project manager at Openreach, the fibre is live for areas passed from my Aggregation node, they are sorting my street out between today and the 27th for finalising checks before going live. They advised of a few days to weeks of delays for database updates.

Can't lie I am ecstatic best news all day, especially after non stop calls about exchange not working (because Microsoft services were down) (DNS related on the statement our Microsoft account manager gave)

Hey that's good news about the FTTP. Sounds like not long now and you will have an alternative to VM02

In reply to a post by FibreBubble:

A few years ago they were running all the exchange engines around here 4 til 7 every night selling back to the grid.

Was mentioned in results call.

Lowth also said that BT has held talks with the government over potentially using the thousands of back-up generators it has at its exchanges across the UK, which are designed to kick-in if there are power disruptions, for wider use to help cope with potential nationwide rolling black outs this winter.

“We have had conversations about whether we can help the government over peak energy demand [this winter] by pro-actively using [our] back up power to help cope with demand at peaks,” he said. “We will do what we can to manage the overall UK energy position.”

BT operates 6,000 exchanges across the UK, each of which has a backup generator in case of disruption to power supplies.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/nov/03/bt-...

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Hey that's good news about the FTTP. Sounds like not long now and you will have an alternative to VM02

\\\\\\\\\\\\guess what I saw on wholesale checker this morning!!
You guessed it, its here

Happy days. 👍 It’s great to have an alternative.

In reply to a post by Pheasant:

Happy days. 👍 It’s great to have an alternative.

It is, especially since I work at a company that can wholesale at cost price to Openreach and currently they are asking about company benefits so might try ang get them to do a broadband at cost price scheme.

When my cabinet lost mains power the batteries tended to last about a 3rd of the day before needing to be swapped.

We're on FTTC at a rural exchange in Somerset which has survived short power cuts in the past (to our battery-backed modem). During yesterday morning's planned power cut (tree works) though the cabinet failed after just two minutes! This FTTC cabinet happens to be just outside the local exchange which continued to deliver analogue telephony on generator power for the duration. Assuming batteries are still there in the cabinet it is clear they are not necessarily checked and maintained... Interestingly, our ISP (a good one) said this sort of problem doesn't fit any of the categories they can use to contact Openreach other than as a line fault which could take a couple of weeks to action. They said they assumed or at least hoped Opnreach have processes in place to notice and act on this sort of problem. I fear Openreach may not be ready to manage this when analogue telephony comes to an end.
For me all was not lost - I spent the morning (in a warm coat) in our local village hall with a battery and inverter enjoying their broadband from Truespeed.