Which Fibre Route? ...

Hi everyone,

I am moving in January to Stafford where FTTC will be available. I have run my new postcode ST16 3PE through the availability checker which has returned the following disappointing results.

ST16 3PE on Exchange STAFFORD

Your exchange is ADSL enabled, and our initial check on your address indicates that your line should be able to have an ADSL broadband service that provides a fixed line speed up to 2Mbps.

Our check also indicates that your line currently supports an estimated ADSL Max broadband line speed of 6Mbps; typically the line speed would range between 5Mbps and 8Mbps.

Our check also indicates that your line should be able to have an ADSL2+ broadband service that provides a fixed line speed up to 2Mbps.

Our check also indicates that your line currently supports an estimated ADSL2+ broadband line speed of 11Mbps; typically the line speed would range between 6.5Mbps and 15Mbps. Our test also indicates that your line could support an estimated ADSL 2+ Annex-M broadband upstream line speed of 1Mbps and downstream line speed of 11Mbps; typically the downstream speed would range between 6.5Mbps and 15Mbps.

Our test also indicates that your line currently supports a fibre technology with an estimated WBC FTTC Broadband where consumers have received downstream line speed of 28.3 Mbps and upstream line speed of 5.7 Mbps.


Am I very likely to receive 28.3 or could it be lower or higher? People say that the checker's estimates are quite conservative but I have read alot of posts from people across various forums reporting that they achieved higher than what they were estimated, and some lower. I haven't had much chance to scout the area for fibre cabs but I do recall seeing one or two, although not too close to my street. If I could at least achieve 34/35mbps I would be happy, I sync at 24mbps at my current address on adsl2+. If 28.3 was in fact the stable speed after the 10 day training period, I guess I am right in thinking that to go for a package like infinity 2 or sky's unlimited fibre pro would be pointless? The other option available to me is VM, not sure what they're like in recent days but we had 50mb broadband with them a year ago and suffered from terrible jitter and latency issues, the download speed was always spot on however so no complaints there.

Sorry if I sound ungrateful. I know there are those people in the UK that can barely receive 2mbps connections. So in that respect I have nothing to complain about, and am very lucky in fact in comparison. I just thought that the point of subscribing to a fibre service (if available) was for some considerable speed difference when compared to what you currently receive.

Thanks in advance for any help you can give

In reply to a post by LoWLatencY:

Our check also indicates that your line currently supports an estimated ADSL2+ broadband line speed of 11Mbps; typically the line speed would range between 6.5Mbps and 15Mbps. Our test also indicates that your line could support an estimated ADSL 2+ Annex-M broadband upstream line speed of 1Mbps and downstream line speed of 11Mbps; typically the downstream speed would range between 6.5Mbps and 15Mbps.

Our test also indicates that your line currently supports a fibre technology with an estimated WBC FTTC Broadband where consumers have received downstream line speed of 28.3 Mbps and upstream line speed of 5.7 Mbps.

Am I very likely to receive 28.3 or could it be lower or higher? People say that the checker's estimates are quite conservative but I have read alot of posts from people across various forums reporting that they achieved higher than what they were estimated, and some lower. I haven't had much chance to scout the area for fibre cabs but I do recall seeing one or two, although not too close to my street. If I could at least achieve 34/35mbps I would be happy, I sync at 24mbps at my current address on adsl2+. If 28.3 was in fact the stable speed after the 10 day training period, I guess I am right in thinking that to go for a package like infinity 2 or sky's unlimited fibre pro would be pointless?
... I just thought that the point of subscribing to a fibre service (if available) was for some considerable speed difference when compared to what you currently receive.

Most people would think 28.3/5.7 was a considerable speed difference compared to, say, 14/0.8.

As you say, it's very hard to predict much from the estimates, and it can degrade over time due to crosstalk as FTTC users are added to the cabinet. The consensus seems to be that the estimates are based on the end point, not the start point.

There's little point in looking for the cabinet as it won't alter anything if you find it. Asking the neighbours what connection speed they get on fibre, (if they have it), is probably a better idea.

There is no 10-day training period, though getting that into any ISP's support staff heads is difficult. The first two days are important, and things should normally be fairly stable after that.

Thanks RobertoS.

I think i'll do as you suggested, and ask the neighbours what sort of speeds they achieve if they have fibre. There is already an active line to the property apparently, or so i'm told when I run the address through the availability checker on the different providers websites, sky, Plusnet etc.. I noticed that there was a BTOR master socket which looked as though it may have actually been recently installed. It's a gamble no less I think, but if I never take it up i'll never know?!

Any recommendations? I am considering Sky's Fibre Unlimited but does anyone know of any other fibre providers that don't throttle and traffic manage too excessively?

BT do throttle P2P quite a lot when they get busy, apparently a lot of the time by doing it to the upload. There's been a couple of trheads recently.

Plusnet throttle P2P between 8pm and 10pm, to as low as 2Mbps if necessary. 250GB peak allowance, unlimited off-peak. £19.99pm.

It seems that the Plusnet 80/20 product is going true unlimited from next Wednesday. Guardian article provided in this post by BatBoy.

Thanks RobertoS was just reading about that, i'll look into Plusnet! P2P throttling is only for 2 hours in the evening and now being unlimited definately makes it worth considering.

The throttling is removed at the same time. But you can't order the new products til Wednesday.