Kitz Forum
Broadband Related => Broadband Technology => Topic started by: niemand on May 11, 2016, 04:48:40 PM
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Was just thinking to myself, what kind of criteria do you guys think BT will be using to decide where to deploy G.fast and how soon?
This is interesting as it has the extra influence within it, alongside the usual cost, premises addressable without pushing fibre deeper, access to power, that there's existing FTTC in many areas.
Will BT be tempted to leave areas such as this one with very high FTTC take up on that FTTC for longer to sweat the assets and make the money some more, or would they push on with G.fast more rapidly?
Likewise would they prioritise areas where FTTC has been relatively weakly taken up, take the hit on obsoleting the nodes, and push on with G.fast to try and increase NGA uptake? I say that though, of course, there's the non-trivial chance that those nodes will be involved in NGA 2 either through access boards with G.fast chips on them, or even being used as OLTs to deliver FTTP. There are ways to sweat those assets some more.
I suspect they'll be way more inclined to set about areas passed by Virgin Media and other competitors as a priority, with areas where FTTC has seen weak sales at the top of that list.
I fully imagine that they would be tempted to leave areas where FTTC is selling well alone for now unless additional competitive pressures arise.
Of course I shouldn't forget that we won't be dealing with cabinets anymore but smaller sub-divisions down to DP area. Would Openreach perhaps deploy to the extremes of distance from FTTC cabinets where feasible to improve experience of those further away?
Pretty much cold, cynical deployment decisions focused on spending as little as possible, as would be expected. Whether my speculation is accurate or not I've no idea, so what are you guys' thoughts?
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As I understand it, G.fast will initially be deployed from a new cabinet alongside the current FTTC cabinet - so no new fiber going to the DP. Logically it will be existing FTTC areas that get G.Fast first.
This will only benefit those with very short lines, I imagine 300M or less.
Those like I with 600-1000M will simply not be able to order.
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Hard to say. Bean counters will be involved and theres lots of factors that could sway the decision.
I'd think they'd look at take up in area. If those on cabs using 40/10 even if the line is capable of higher speeds, would be less likely to up g.fast services.
Virgin will be factored, but its never put them off entering VM areas in the past - again it will depend on what service speeds VM are offering... but as you say, that could sway things the other way and realise ROI could be better where there is no competition.
But based on historic form and how denser areas are usually where they do first, I wouldn't be too surprised if they focused on fairly affluent estates, probably with multi-users more likely to utilise more bandwidth.. and of course easy access to a node. But other than that I don't have a clue about Openreach logic.
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An interesting post and question.
I noticed in the thread (http://forum.kitz.co.uk/index.php/topic,16721.0.html) on the forum about ordering FTTP from BT it was in an area where FTTC was available.
I'm not sure how BT / OR decide which telephone exchanges get FTTP and which don't. My exchange as more customers and businesses, yet another down the road, nearly in to the countryside area with less people and less businesses get an FTTP option.
You make a good point about the competative nature in some areas. I know in my area Virgin Media are going 'hell for leather' building their network in the town. Nearly every phone symbol on roadworks website is VM.
I can understand BT first doing the G.fast from the cabinet.. then expanding out.
On an aside node, if that does happen would their be less cross talk in the cabinet for those remaining on FTTC?
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depends if there is political driving behind it, I am convinced their fttc rollout was influenced by political needs with it been mainly rural early rollout.
If its purely commercial reasons then VM areas will likely be prioritised. Alongside areas with highest number of lines close to cabinet.
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According to the following the bean counters won't let them roll out to DP :(
http://gfastnews.com/index.php/90-r/217-british-telecom-economics-of-g-fast-distribution-points-are-untenable
Hopefully they will see sense.
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This seems like a bad decision to me. They're again not investing now but they will have to do so again in the future. Just seems like really bad foresight to me.
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Well what did you guys expect? the pressure is off from ofcom, so BT revert to type.
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Man, you ask the difficult questions!
This really requires a multi-faceted answer ... so I might have to do this in multiple parts.
Here goes part 1.
A) Politics
I don't think politics plays much of a part here, with 3 aspects.
i) Current "operational" politics (ie MP complaints) cares about where superfast speeds aren't happening. They don't care about where ultrafast is happening
ii) Current "strategic" politics cares that ultrafast is happening, but only cares that there are many millions being targetted.
iii) BT state that G.Fast is "at the core" of their ultrafast strategy. Meanwhile, fibre should be at the core of UK strategy as far as the regulator is concerned.
I think BT will need to keep credibility at a strategic level, delivering suitable speeds to be available at enough homes by 2020. I think they hope to quieten the regulator by showing the results with copper in the loop.
In fact, I can see copper evading the "fibre end-game" for a couple of decades. If that is true, politicians will need to face up to that prospect.
B) What does BT say about this?
GFastNews has a "realistically cynical" editor, who probably gets to see more of what BT is telling the telco insiders than we regularly get to see ourselves. If (as per @Ronski's post) he thinks BT are only going to work from the cabinets, then there's a good chance this reflects BT's thinking at the time.
I agree with the start of the story: The gist of Peter Bell's statement is that deploying to 4 million DP's is untenable. We won't be seeing it.
But Peter Bell doesn't quite go as far as saying that they will only deploy from the PCP either. He talks about how the capability of G.Fast is better than expected, and how a couple of amendments will make things more viable.
We've all heard of the talk about speeds of 300Mbps in early phases, and 500Mbps in later phases. I think the amendments they have in mind are ones that bring those speeds to distances around 300m - ie first 300Mbps at 300m, and later 500Mbps at 300m. Approximately.
Peter Bell, on lightreading, 8 months ago: http://www.lightreading.com/gigabit/dsl-vectoring-gfast/bt-gets-gfast-confidence-boost-from-trials/d/d-id/718456
Peter Bell, being interviewed 8 months ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJyCkRSIsYY
C) What are the amendments to G.Fast?
A Sckipio video, from 3 months ago: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6T8Iuejy9Jo
Right now, G.Fast is better than the ITU targets. The trials probably use this equipment; this "base" level of G.Fast is (I think) labelled "amendment 1". The pilot is likely to use this level of equipment too.
The first amendments wanted by BT target G.Fast nodes (called DPUs) to be further away from homes. This requires higher power, and higher bits/tone. The chipset manufacturers have this running (and call this the current level of performance); in standardisation, this will be labelled "amendment 2" - perhaps due towards the end of 2016. This improves performance in the 150m-400m range, boosting speeds at 250m by 200Mbps (see that video from Sckipio).
The next set of amendments (perhaps pushed by non-BT telcos) target the 212MHz spectrum. This "amendment 3" is further away in standardisation, but it seems to give improvements up to 200m - resulting in 2Gbps (total) at 0m down to 1Gbps (total) at 200m.
I reckon we could see BT relying on "amendment 2" performance to meet their "300Mbps" targets, then relying on "amendment 3" to meet the 500Mbps targets. But I could see a further strategy where they target nearer gigabit (more later).
.... more tomorrow ....
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And here's the rest.
It is a complicated picture of network optimisation, so you'd think @Ignition would have a good handle on this ;)
C2) Future amendments to G.Fast
Is 500Mbps the end of G.Fast? I don't think so - it can offer more, but will do so only at shorter ranges.
If BT want to keep G.Fast at the core of a hyperfast strategy, not just an ultrafast one (and I think they do), they will need to gradually shorten those lines.
D) Driven by Bean Counters
Yes, the money will drive this.
Income
The "superfast" (largely FTTC) rollout ended up being a "just in time" rollout that rode the wave of HD IPTV, which has led to quite high takeup relative to BT's original expectations. But I don't think there is a similar "mass wave" willing to jump onto real ultrafast speeds. There might be demand from 5% of properties (reasonable), and it might be as high as 40% (I doubt it). The bean counters will have to figure out where this market is, to get the biggest step in takeup.
If BT targets a DPU at the PCP, and the 300m circle around it, then they will only be addressing people who can already achieve 80Mbps. What percentage will crave a jump to 300Mbps? 5%? 10%
If BT targets a DPU 400m away from the DPU, then they will be addressing people who can achieve 50Mbps-ish. Maybe you'll target more. Put your DPU further away, and you're likely to attract more custom.
A PCP-only strategy might hit the "homes passed" counter quickly, but may fail on the "takeup" counter.
Expenditure
The fibre runs will be much shorter this time, so will be less of the cost. Stepping 300-500m away from the cabinet might not be the hurdle that many people fear. However, power will be a primary issue - even when it is already on-site at the PCP.
If BT can power a DPU with a 240V supply, then this might be all they end up doing: one node at the PCP, on an extension lead ;)
However, if BT have to go to the trouble of installing a power pillar, with 240V->50V conversion, then a single DPU at the PCP might not be a worthwhile return on that expenditure. If so, expect more DPUs inserted (say) 300-500m out from the PCP.
But that will only happen if power from the pillar can reach that 300-500m distance. I'm not sure.
On balance, from an income and expenditure perspective, I can see it being better to deploy more nodes than "just" at the PCP.
E) How big a market?
Actual speeds at VM tells us there is a market for top tier of only around 10%. And a "barely ultrafast" market for the next 30%, though some of these might be "reluctant ultrafast", having received a "free" upgrade from the speed they originally chose the middle tier for.
But, these comparisons pre-supposes that VM is a direct competitor to BT, and I'm not sure it is entirely. When you bring TV into consideration, there's a good chunk of VM - half perhaps - that get labelled as "premium TV" (and a bigger chunk of Sky). The premium bundles tend to include faster broadband as a matter of course. BT's TV offering isn't going to convert these people, so it isn't worth considering what they might do about broadband choices.
Back in the "BT-based DSL" market, less than 25% have even bothered to jump to superfast speeds. That doesn't suggest there's an ultrafast market anywhere close to that size.
I could be persuaded that the ultrafast market is as big as 10%, I think.
F) Driven by Competition?
There is certainly a prospect for VM to dominate speeds - through Docsis 3.0 and 3.1, but only if VM become serious with their (hidden) network upgrades to increase the number of channels shared through segments. @Ignition believes they are indeed serious. Past behaviour leaves many doubters.
That might be enough to say that BT will have to respond - and concentrate on defending market share in VM areas.
On the other hand, the commercial FTTC rollout seems to have covered just as much non-VM area as VM area, and didn't bother with a significant chunk of VM coverage (more than one-fifth). Maybe they're not too worried.
Of course, VM are expanding, so there will be another chunk of territory to defend. I could see BT targetting places that VM are trying to expand into, for sure.
G) Income Again
There's likely more incremental income (ie an extra £10 per month) from people further away from FTTC cabs
There's likely more old custom to retain by focussing on "project lightning" areas, to prevent loss of all income (~ £40pm)
There's likely some new custom to be gained by focussing on old VM areas.
H) Forget "up to". What about the minimum speeds?
In the FTTC rollout, there have been few anomolies where ADSL gives higher speeds than VDSL2. You'd imagine that, with G.Fast, they wouldn't want too many anomolies showing there either.
If you deploy to the PCP, there is little point in offering service to actual speeds below 100Mbps. You might argue a higher level to that too, for marketing reasons.
That limits the range you would ever want to allow G.Fast deployments. 400m? 500m maximum?
I) Phased Deployments
BT's current plans allow for commercial deployment to run for 8 years - twice as long as the FTTC deployment. That gives them plenty of time to deploy with a phased approach - especially as the hardware continues to be developed in phases.
It might well be true that the initial phases make use of G.Fast's abilities at 300-400m, but future phases might then target higher speeds at shorter range.
How do you achieve that shorter range, while still using the nodes built previously? By placing new nodes at (say) the halfway point, and reducing the maximum range for everyone.
I could therefore see a plan that chooses to deploy DPU nodes at PCP and at 500m. Offering 100-300 with "amendment 2" technology, 200-500 with "amendment 3" technology. Much later, infill could occur at 250m and 750m, turning everyone's lines into something capable of 500-1000.
J) The cost of FTTP
The longevity of G.Fast, and future technical advances into multi-gigabit territory, all depends on the relative cost of FTTP - itself a moving target.
You would imagine that whatever steps are taken with G.Fast deployment, it will always include an element that makes future deployment of FTTP (either native or FoD) cheaper.
There is one line of thought that, eventually, G.Fast will kill itself off by making FTTP cheap enough to be guaranteed to be the next step. There is also a line of thought that, for brownfield, there will never be a reason to force copper out.
I don't know where the end-game will be any more.
K) Overall Thoughts
I think it is far too simplistic to say that "PCP-only" is the deployment style. It has the possibility to be cheapest, but it won't bring in the best income.
If BT are going to attempt "deeper fibre", then the best places to try it are a) Project Lightning areas, and b) VM areas, but they might need to develop their TV offering to make worthwhile inroads.
I don't automatically preclude BDUK areas, as I don't think they will cost more to upgrade (especially in a PCP-only model).
I think G.Fast has longevity beyond the next 8 years, so I think BT will deploy /this time around/ with a view to what they might do /next time around/. I can see them having rough plans to deploy at 0m (ie at PCP), at 400m and at 800m. In the distant future, they can infill at 200m, 600m, 1km.
But between now and 2020, I'd say a fair degree of PCP-only (including some BDUK locations), with 400m deployments in VM areas.
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Let's hope BT make an effort and if they go for several manufacturers for rollout they put a decent legally binding agreement that all cabs must be able to run (not only compatible) the proposed amendment 3. if not the manufacturer sorts it out within 6m or pay for a replacement cab that does work.
I am probably 550m away from the cab and get 60Mbs and believe to be hit quite significantly by crosstalk is there any hope of using gfast if it only gets installed at first at the cab?
Extra upload speed would be useful but I usually try and support new technology so as long as it isn't ultra expensive I will upgrade. Thanks
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Great write up WWWombat, I too feel they will eventually install G.Fast further out into the network, as it seems logically the next step in building out the fibre network, and thus gradually extending it over time.
I'm about 450 meters, but I don't hold out much hope for G.Fast for me as my line performs like it's much longer.
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In terms of the G.Fast Cab location will they try to put it right next to the regular PCPs as if they put it next to the FTTC cabinet it will knock anywhere up to 50m off the range.
Wish we could see a extended view of the Skipio graph as 160/30 looks possible at 450m perhaps.
As my Line is 300m from the PCP or closer to 350m from the FTTC cab the placement could be crucial.
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What they doing is managing expectations and the cheapest strategy as thats the lowest risk.
From BT's point of view a cabinet only rollout with low sales is better than a DP rollout with moderate sales, as deploying to DP's has a significantly higher cost.
I agree that what's happening now will not be the end of it, when that cabinet based rollout is done they will either extend to DP's or use a newer technology after, but this cabinet only rollout now is what makes sense given BT's history.
ADSL to FTTC was always going to have decent takeup as the average speed of ADSL was very low for the services available, its not so clear cut with FTTC vs G.FAST. Even a poor FTTC line with say 20mbit/sec is good enough speed for almost everything.
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Wouldn't have asked for thoughts if it were clear-cut :)
VM have made room in the spectrum for more channels than they are using right now. In theory they could go to 500Mb+ in some areas relatively quickly, potentially within days.
They have nothing to fear from G.fast in terms of headline data rates. By the time G.fast is in its 3rd incarnation they'll be happily ticking over on DOCSIS 3.1 with the 1.2-1.7GHz networks to match.
Kitz - I mentioned Virgin, however VM don't put Openreach off, quite the opposite. Openreach get lower take up, yes, however when they get a customer back from cable due to FTTC they are making both the FTTC charge and line rental where they weren't before so there's considerably more incremental revenue there than where they are a monopoly.
Openreach have no political axe to grind as far as getting ultrafast to match Virgin's coverage goes. Even if VM were to stop Project Lightning now Openreach still wouldn't have as many homes passed with, as the definition now seems, >=300Mb.
So we now know that Openreach are unlikely to deploy deeper fibre for now. They can hit their 10 million premises of G.fast quite happily without doing so.
The question now is which 10 million premises. Obviously these will be FTTC enabled premises, however how do they choose where to go and when? Are they encouraged to deploy G.fast or deterred from doing so in areas with high take up? What impact will Virgin Media have? Especially with regards to Project Lightning taking subscribers from FTTC rather than the reverse?
My own area should be interesting. Very high FTTC take up, Project Lightning just rolled in, going live soon, and, at least in the rest of the area, showing very high take up. On an exchange level Lightning has just enabled nearly half of all premises passed by the exchange, none of which have especially good ADSL speeds, some of which didn't have FTTC, Openreach will have seen their customer numbers take a hit.
The exchange is well connected to a 21CN metro node, has abundant fibre, plenty of space for any new equipment that might be needed there. It should be a good demonstration of whether Openreach intend to prioritise areas to defend their market share against Lightning or attempt to win share back.
If VM uptake in my local area specifically is very high Openreach may be left with an empty or almost empty DSLAM with little prospect of getting many customers back on it. All properties are also fully ducted so there could even be a question mark over whether the maths would 'work' with regards to FTTP, potentially even using the existing 2nd DSLAM. OLT cards, 10Gb backhaul, done.
Interesting times ahead.
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VM have made room in the spectrum for more channels than they are using right now. In theory they could go to 500Mb+ in some areas relatively quickly, potentially within days.
But would it be hard to market until the "some areas" turns into almost "all areas"?
They have nothing to fear from G.fast in terms of headline data rates. By the time G.fast is in its 3rd incarnation they'll be happily ticking over on DOCSIS 3.1 with the 1.2-1.7GHz networks to match.
Very true. If Openreach really feared VM, they'd have FTTP in much more of the pipeline.
Kitz - I mentioned Virgin, however VM don't put Openreach off, quite the opposite. Openreach get lower take up, yes, however when they get a customer back from cable due to FTTC they are making both the FTTC charge and line rental where they weren't before so there's considerably more incremental revenue there than where they are a monopoly.
This difference is one reason why I think, in terms of locations, why BT might choose to cover Lightning areas.
Openreach have no political axe to grind as far as getting ultrafast to match Virgin's coverage goes. Even if VM were to stop Project Lightning now Openreach still wouldn't have as many homes passed with, as the definition now seems, >=300Mb.
It is funny how the government continues to use 100Mb, while the supposedly non-political Ofcom have chosen 300Mb for what appears to be entirely political reasons.
My own area should be interesting. Very high FTTC take up, Project Lightning just rolled in, going live soon, and, at least in the rest of the area, showing very high take up. On an exchange level Lightning has just enabled nearly half of all premises passed by the exchange, none of which have especially good ADSL speeds, some of which didn't have FTTC, Openreach will have seen their customer numbers take a hit.
That's why I think that, if they choose to go deeper anywhere, it will be in Lightning areas.
That there is someone on the ground to observe progress is useful!
If VM uptake in my local area specifically is very high Openreach may be left with an empty or almost empty DSLAM with little prospect of getting many customers back on it. All properties are also fully ducted so there could even be a question mark over whether the maths would 'work' with regards to FTTP, potentially even using the existing 2nd DSLAM. OLT cards, 10Gb backhaul, done.
It would allow options, for sure.
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I'm just thinking from a different angle here, but I wondered...
What's the feel for how a G.Fast node will be backhauled?
- Its own GbE fibre, pretty much like an FTTC cabinet
- Its own 10GbE fibre - as above, but 10Gb optics
- Part of a GPON
- Part of a 10-GPON
- Backhauled into an FTTC cab, then sharing the backhaul from there?
- Backhauled into an FTTC cab, then overlaid on the backhaul from there with WDM?
- Something else?
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Why not just feed both the FTTC cab and the G.Fast cab off a single 10GbE link surely the could just swap the equipment at both ends and not even have to run new Fiber.
Then when they run nodes swap to a single 40/100GbE link.
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ignition the big question is for your area, is 40mbit speeds not good enough for the customers on the openreach cabinet?
The openreach cabinet filled up quickly because it served properties with poor adsl lines (As evidenced by your unstable 2mbit adsl), however it is now providing speeds in the 10s of mbits per second, which unless you are doing lots of heavy downloads, is enough for most use today. So the question here is how many people on your cabinet are like yourself who just want the highest headline speed (and dont care about anything else) or will only change if there is something they cannot do on their existing connection?
Part of BTs decision to ignore VM will be based on the fact only 10% of VM customers are on the top tier, and the vast majority of BT customers are on the lower tier FTTC product.
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Why not just feed both the FTTC cab and the G.Fast cab off a single 10GbE link surely the could just swap the equipment at both ends and not even have to run new Fiber.
Then when they run nodes swap to a single 40/100GbE link.
That assumes the two nodes are in the same location,and probably interlinked on the backplane - which suggests an alternative is to fit G.Fast boards to an existing DSLAM. Deeper G.Fast nodes will need a different solution.
In addition, it would also not work with the hardware as described in the pilot - because that uses a separate L2S/OLT to terminate the connections at the head-end. I have no idea why they want this restriction, nor any idea whether it will stay in place once livel.
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I'm just thinking from a different angle here, but I wondered...
What's the feel for how a G.Fast node will be backhauled?
- Its own GbE fibre, pretty much like an FTTC cabinet
- Backhauled into an FTTC cab, then overlaid on the backhaul from there with WDM?
Edited to reflect the two methods as of right now, depending on availability of fibre. There are some FTTC cabinets that are 'parented' from others via WDM already.
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Hi
If G.fast isn't bringing fibre any closer to premises it seems a waste of effort and money. G.fast mainly improves on speed by using higher frequencies, but that also brings issues with interference to FM radio stations, so these higher frequencies will have chunks taken out of them to mitigate interference limiting the potential increases in speed. They could just turn up VDSL2 now to use 30MHz and boost speeds, although as vectoring has been a failure and the higher the frequencies get, the more cross talk on decades old telephone cable, speeds aren't going to be that much improved unless you are just metres from the cab.
G.fast was going to bring higher speeds to more people, by bringing the nodes closer to peoples homes in addition to using higher frequencies, but that is not seemingly going to happen now. People already on 80/20 are going to be less inclined to see the need to upgrade, but these are the people that G.fast will only significantly provide faster speeds to. Those on slower speeds due to distance from the cab, will still be on the slowest speeds on G.fast, might be faster than they are now if they are lucky, but still they are suffering the effects of distance.
So we are now to see yet more street furniture, and the benefits of faster headline speeds falling in an even tighter radius to fewer people than VDSL.
I wonder if anyone has ever done a cost breakdown to see how all these hacks in order to push data through cables only ever designed for voice, compares to what it would have cost just to have gone full FTTP at the start of "broadband" as we know it.
A small fortune must have been spent upgrading exchanges to ADSL1, then upgrading them again to ADSL2+, then installing VDSL cabinets, and now G.fast cabinets, all of which are running concurrently now needing electricity and maintenance. It has to be false economy, of course I suspect it is us the consumer paying for it.
Regards
Phil
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G.fast was going to bring higher speeds to more people, by bringing the nodes closer to peoples homes in addition to using higher frequencies, but that is not seemingly going to happen now. People already on 80/20 are going to be less inclined to see the need to upgrade, but these are the people that G.fast will only significantly provide faster speeds to. Those on slower speeds due to distance from the cab, will still be on the slowest speeds on G.fast, might be faster than they are now if they are lucky, but still they are suffering the effects of distance.
G.fast was originally supposed to operate from the DP but BT and AT&T have secured changes in the standard so it works at much further distances than previously. Deeper deployment will come but it was always going to take longer than enabling it near the existing FTTC cabinets.
I wonder if anyone has ever done a cost breakdown to see how all these hacks in order to push data through cables only ever designed for voice, compares to what it would have cost just to have gone full FTTP at the start of "broadband" as we know it.
A small fortune must have been spent upgrading exchanges to ADSL1, then upgrading them again to ADSL2+, then installing VDSL cabinets, and now G.fast cabinets, all of which are running concurrently now needing electricity and maintenance. It has to be false economy, of course I suspect it is us the consumer paying for it.
You are wrong - installing FTTP immediately would have been much more expensive than installing/upgrading ADSL/FTTC/g.fast and so on. It would also have taken much longer to cover the same number of customers + at least some of the cost of upgrading to intermediate technologies makes eventual FTTP cheaper.
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its another adsl2+ situation really, a upgrade for those who have it now but not to those who dont have it. Due to ofcom effectively letting BT off the hook, it is what it is sadly, we just have to wait some years for the fibre to get another push nearer homes, those who are desperate for more then they have on vdsl (which seems more then I realised), will have to cheer on VM and hope they start taking chunks out of BT's userbase, then the accountants will have to rethink if that happens.
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Hi
You are wrong - installing FTTP immediately would have been much more expensive than installing/upgrading ADSL/FTTC/g.fast and so on. It would also have taken much longer to cover the same number of customers + at least some of the cost of upgrading to intermediate technologies makes eventual FTTP cheaper.
I don't see how it could be more expensive. We are going to end up with fibre to our properties, or at least a copper cable designed for data at some point. Virgin media was able to install a complete new network in my city in relatively little time with co-ax to the door (that could have just as easily been fibre, but we don't need fibre, some decent copper cable designed for the job is just as good), not sure of the costs for Virgins deployment, but it would be higher than BT as BT already have ducting and the infrastructure in place, but Virgin managed it. Granted Virgin have cherry-picked their areas for the best return and don't cover large parts of the country, but that's no different to BT cherry picking where they deploy to, then getting government help for unprofitable areas.
I can't believe the total costs will end up working out cheaper when a real physical data connection arrives at our front doors from BT, if it ever does, as opposed to hacks that ADSL/VDSL and G.fast are, when to achieve they use several intermediate technologies which all have to be designed, procured, installed, powered and maintained. I wonder what the total electricity bill is for VDSL a year? A huge amount of power is wasted with VDSL (and ADSL) as you have to use a lot more power just so some signal remains after most of it drifts off into space, or worse, interferes with someone else's connection, fibre or real data cable needs much less power.
At least with VDSL, the money invested has returns in later years even if VDSL becomes obsolete, because it's laid the way to bringing fibre much closer to us, so it isn't money down the drain. With G.fast just being another unsightly bit of street furniture to get graffiti on next to the existing boxes, with it doing nothing to extend the fibre network, investment in that technology is money down the drain, to only benefit those who don't really need it, and has a very short lifetime.
These hacks just delay, and make more expensive, the long overdue upgrade to POTs.
Regards
Phil