Kitz Forum
Broadband Related => Broadband Technology => Topic started by: bogof on April 24, 2021, 10:07:42 AM
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So, got my 900/115 FTTP link, which I am a little bit in love with.
Wife is having to work from home for the forseeable. COVID has made me put more priority on keeping a connection available.
Seems to be potentially just a small incremental cost to have an extra connection always available for failover. No need for load balancing as the FTTP is more than enough.
We currently have the old copper FTTC line which still has an EE internet connection and analogue phone number on it. Under contract until October, last renewal negotiated £23/pm all inc for 80/20.
The way I see it there are 3 options:
Maintain a copper service until they stop me being able to.
Pros:
- 80/20
- good latency
- contention only likely to decrease now in FTTP area?
- Probably connects to different equipment at exchange
- Different route into house through buried armoured
- robust to ISP failure, some electronics faults en route
Cons
- Electronics in street furniture
- Unclear what will happen if I try to migrate to another provider at contract term end... will I be allowed to keep copper?
- Shared route for fibre from cabinet to exchange
- Ageing copper infrastructure may be not so robust
Take an additional FTTP service:
Pros:
- As fast as you like
- very good latency
- robust to ISP failure if different ISP
Cons
- Shared route / cable from ONT to exchange (if swapped to multiport ONT) or CBT to exchange if additional single ONT)
- Will be on same PON, so connected to same gear at exchange, rogue ONT potential
- If multiport ONT, vulnerable to ONT electronics failure
4G mobile broadband:
Pros:
- robust to most failure modes, no shared infrastructure
- could be minimal cost if used a PAYG SIM with some preloaded data
Cons
- Speed variable
- Latency not great
- Issues getting economic service that isn't behind some kind of CGNAT
- VPN doesn't always seem to work well over 4G
- Hard to monitor connection because of above
No Virgin option (they've not been allowed to dig our courtyard previously) though Citifibre is coming to the area perhaps, and I understand they buy access to OR ducts, so they may be an option.
I'm probably coming down on the side of keeping the FTTC line going once contract ends, FTTP doesn't seem to offer that much robustness, and would seem to be more of a play for more bandwidth. Anyone know what will happen if I try to migrate it to another provider? Or am I stuck on EE forever with that?
I have some 4G routers (for a while I ran my office on 3 mobile broadband, it was OKish), so 4G based option is only going to cost a SIM / activation.
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You can still migrate your FTTC to any provider you like.
Only when your exchange hits 75% FTTP coverage do OpenReach start the ball rolling on gradually withdrawing copper services.
They will eventually enforce a "no go back" from fibre to copper, and then eventually withdrawal copper from sale.
Your FTTC and FTTP service probably connect to the exact same OLT in the exchange (if they are both Huawei) and probably take an identical route between your home and the exchange.
Take an additional FTTP service:
Pros:
robust to ISP failure if different ISP
If you want failover/backup then don't just pick another ISP.
You need to ensure you pick an ISP with a different backhaul.
Having 2 separate ISP's who both use BT Wholesale backhaul won't give much redundancy at all.
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You can still migrate your FTTC to any provider you like.
Only when your exchange hits 75% FTTP coverage do OpenReach start the ball rolling on gradually withdrawing copper services.
They will eventually enforce a "no go back" from fibre to copper, and then eventually withdrawal copper from sale.
Your FTTC and FTTP service probably connect to the exact same OLT in the exchange (if they are both Huawei) and probably take an identical route between your home and the exchange.
If you want failover/backup then don't just pick another ISP.
You need to ensure you pick an ISP with a different backhaul.
Having 2 separate ISP's who both use BT Wholesale backhaul won't give much redundancy at all.
My original VDSL modem from way-back when was ECI so I think my cab is too (I took VDSL when they were still matching these I believe), and my ONT is Nokia, so I don't think there is any Huawei gear in sight. I can sleep easy lol.
I guess for a fixed line, FTTC via Talktalk (who do have their own gear at our exchange) is perhaps the most robust. Zen are in the exchange too, but I can't be sure if I'm on Zen or OR backhaul for the FTTP line (any way to find out?)... Edit... I guess I could through some twist of fate be on Talktalk backhaul with Zen also...!
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Do we know how robust FTTP is ? I was planning to remove my redundancy when it arrives.
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In many areas they never matched modems with cabinets.
I took VDSL in 2011 and got a Huawei modem for my ECI cabinet.
It's usually a trivial task to check what vendor of cabinet you are on.
You can manually check (with your eyes), you can check codelook or you can use a command with some modems to see the DSLAM vendor.
The OLT is a tiny link in the chain and not often the cause of downtime.
Most outages I've seen on FTTP have been beyond the OLT (the PON light on the ONT remains lit meaning no issues between OLT/ONT).
By far the biggest factor is the backhaul across the country from exchange to your ISP.
Ideally redundancy is on a completely different network (an Alt-Net, Virgin, 4G etc) but if it has to be OpenReach based then a separate backhaul is the next best thing.