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[waltergmw]

As there are impending events I shall rest my case with this picture which is quite clearly existing ? under the No Universal Service Obligation.

Kind regards,
Walter



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[GunJack]

interesting thread   some observations....

1. blacksheep - I agree with your points re: over-fast broadband. I got shot down in flames on another forum for suggesting that some broadband services were just too fast, and it seemed like it was the mega-download/torrent/etc type users who were doing so, some of whom were claiming to be d/loading in excess of 150GB a MONTH!! Maybe these are the sort of people who we need to be asking why they need such services, surely it's just pure greed ??

2. b*cat - a minimum 2meg is indeed a joke...I run my line at 3dB to squeeze a 7Meg sync out of it (on LLU), as with 2 Mini-Guns hammering away on xbox live and facebook, I need to get every little bit I can out of my line, just to have some bandwidth left for me As you rightly say, could I exist on 2Meg? Not really, NO.

3. HOWEVER, whilst there is a case that even 40Meg may be too fast for some, surely FTT* at a minimum of 20Meg should be looked at as a minimum requirement for all but the most remote dwellings and businesses in this civilised Western economy - so many aspects of life are now conducted online that trying to satisfy these demands for bandwidth on a paltry <10Meg are becoming increasingly difficult.

4. And yes, if a line should capable of 10Meg, it's not acceptable for the EU to only get half or less of that, be it by physical means or other(DLM, traffic management, congestion, etc.) 

semi-rant over 8)

[coolsnakeman]

Well just to add to this convo do we really see the difference in opening a webpage on half a meg than opening a webpage on 40 meg? The only benifits we really get out of faster speeds is to download or stream more data of the internet at a fast pace. Majority of people in the UK don't even know or realise they have a speed fault when it happens as they are not clued up to all this modern day technology its only really the more advanced users that know the benifits of a faster speed which makes them all the more greedy to get the movie faster, there games faster if they are into piracy or there music faster. I personally do not see any sense in having a 400 meg connection speed as i don't really know what i would do with all that speed so it would be a waste of money to me. 10 or 20 meg i think is suitable enough. Now when we say businesses need the faster speeds that i would have to disagree with. Cooperations that run a server that serves about 300 computers i would say yes they would need a stable and faster speed but a majority of them all have private circuits which they pay about 20 grand a year for so they have there own pipeline. Small to medium sized businesses would use a standard ADSL or FTTC service to run there business as they maybe perhaps have a network switch,server or patch panel serving maybe 20 PC's in total i don't think i have come across a small to medium sized business running anymore than 20 PC's of a server so FTTC at 40 meg is perfect for them. It all boils down to greed and people in the UK seem to want something to happen yesterday. So they want faster speeds but do they really need it?

Gary

[AdrianH]

What would you do with the Cisco system that was demonstrated in Sweden ? That ran at 40Gbps  8)  (http://techcrunch.com/2007/07/12/old-swedish-lady-gets-worlds-fastest-internet-connection/)

[Black Sheep]

Same ...... come on here, E-Bay and Facebook. 

[jeffbb]

Hi
quote
It all boils down to greed and people in the UK seem to want something to happen yesterday. So they want faster speeds but do they really need it?

I think this is not really fair  to the UK . You seem to be suggesting that the UK are the only ones  that want to download faster or indeed are pirating .Many other parts of the world previously envious of British technology are now way ahead of us . I know that there are historical reasons for this. Its a lot easier to build a new fast smart system(any system) from scratch  not having to replace earlier now past its  sell by  date system . Its natural for most users to want to be up there with the best .

One point that is missed when looking at the benefits of increased speed is that the majority of people will be using their internet connection for whatever purpose suites them .
quote  do we really see the difference in opening a webpage on half a meg than opening a webpage on 40 meg?

The answer is not really , BUT if a million users are opening web pages then with a slower download  there is more likely to be congestion . If your download speed is 80 times faster then your time using bandwidth is reduced by that same figure .

Regards Jeff

[coolsnakeman]

Fair and valid points jeff. I wasn't taking a pop at the UK but you have to admit we always want something done yesterday cause we don't have the patience to wait for it. That to be is just something that has been built into the UK over many years cause we are use to getting what we want. As i say that statement is not a dig at the UK cause i am sure there are other countries out there that may very well be similiar. Money and time is being spent on increasing speeds of broadband that people do not really need. Surely this money and time should be spent on sorting out the crime, NHS and schools things to me that matter and are more important than how quick you can open facebook or download the latest music track. I feel that not just the UK but the world has lost track of what is really important and has gotten itself stuck to far into technology it clouds there judgement. I am just stating what i believe to be a fact not trying to save the world or anything lol

Gary

[jeffbb]

Hi
quote Money and time is being spent on increasing speeds of broadband that people do not really need

Unfortunately its  natural progress . You could say the same about almost everything .
Even the most modest modern car is capable of doing over 80MPH , do we really need that ? ,many cars go way beyond that .
Do we need to have HD quality TV? and enormous screens .
These all cost and use up resources .

The one thing that I would say is that before devoting lots of resources to benefit the few ,more should be done to improve the average users  .

Regards Jeff

[AdrianH]

But people DO need more speed, it isn't just greed.
More and more services are being streamed, more people need to work from home. The fact is that BT and the other main players love to crow about their superfast services when there are huge areas that can still not get anything above half  meg. iPlayer, IPTV, games etc. simply don't work for millions of folk.
I have LLU here but the majority of the Purbeck area has only BT and the speeds acheived are appalling , worse the connection very often just drops out altogether in the small villages and rural habitations.

[Ottersnose]

Dorset is generally a poor relation for Broadband. With the exception of areas covered by Virgin and central Bournemouth if you get above 7-8 meg you're flying. There are certain areas here with large amounts of Aluminium cable (denied by the upper levels of BT but well known by the engineers on the ground). I'm sure that this is the same for many regions in the UK but the funding seems to have been hijacked by the County Council to upgrade their own infrastructure. The FTTC rollout is going ahead in certain areas but purely for residential users for commercial reasons.
Not too sure where I'm going with this so will stop now...

[waltergmw]

To reinforce Adrian H's statements:-

Speaking as one who remembers watching the funeral ceremony of King George VI on a tiny screen monochrome TV for the first time in a neighbours house, our uses of public services change as technology provides new facilities.

I would not describe my requirements as greed in that I wish to educate myself with some content from the Louvre. Consequently this morning I have just downloaded over 1 Gbyte of upgrades to the applications I have purchased. My house is within the Guildford Borough Council area - not out in the wilds of our beloved Surrey Hills. I am very fortunate in having a good broadband connection running at a nominal 100 Mbps **, but my neighbours across the road might as well be living in a different world as the then NTL did not install their ducts. Likewise our "Proud Guardians ..." (See below) have decided that it is not economic for them to provide their Fibre To The Cabinet services for our PCP.

** The reason I have such a service is that I intervened personally with Thames Water and NTL informing the latter that they had a golden opportunity to install their ducts far more cost-effectively by sharing the same water main trench.

EDIT

The fact is that the unshielded twisted pair public switched telephone network was never designed to carry signals even at a fraction of the frequencies now attempted. Moreover that network is in dire need of replacement, despite the investment-starved valiant and expensive efforts of the network maintenance staff. Current engineering practice dictates that the entire network should be replaced with noise-immune, and corrosion-immune, fibre optic cables but this is largely being ignored by the incumbent in collaboration with Public Servants and several Governments.

Kind regards,
Walter



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[Black Sheep]

"There are certain areas here with large amounts of Aluminium cable (denied by the upper levels of BT but well known by the engineers on the ground)".

Urban myth, and untrue. Only recently we have had a communique from our Chief Engineers Department regarding this untruth, and giving 'Actuals and Factuals' about the differences between Cu and Ali, from 'Insertion Loss', AC Balances through to dB resistance and more.

As an old sparky myself, I'm well aware of the ohms resistance difference between the two, but our Martlesham bods have conducted full tests and put the results to us. Nobody's saying there isn't a difference, but it's not the 'Devil in disguise' that a lot of folk hark on about when the figures are presented in the way they have.

As Walter moots above, the infrastructure was not designed for these high frequency carrier systems. Adrian H, you quote there are still huge areas only getting 0.5Meg. Can you back this statement up ?? Are you aware of the roll-out dates of FTTC/FTTP and that it's exactly these types of places that will be the ones to benefit ??

There's a lot more I could add, but no time to type it as I'm off out for the day with my missus and a few friends. 

[waltergmw]

@ BS,

I suspect that the myth includes the often hinted anxieties of the staff manipulating age-hardened aluminium alloy pairs often in disimilar metal joints sometimes forming high-resistance semi-conductor bonds.

Given the only way (I believe) an engineer can discover the pair he or she is looking for is by poking a tone tracer into the joint bundle**, and with the best will in the world, there must be a good chance of disturbing another entirely unknown circuit ? Might I suggest it is these reliability issues which should be of significant concern to operators and users alike ?

** Enlarged picture of an overhead (copper) cable joint:-  http://www.scribd.com/doc/85586088

Kind regards,
Walter

[AdrianH]

Can you back this statement up ?? Are you aware of the roll-out dates of FTTC/FTTP and that it's exactly these types of places that will be the ones to benefit ??

I personally know and visit people that live physically closer to our exchange that cannot get a decent connection, they are listed as a Broadband Not Spot. Much of Purbeck has very long line lengths and have a very unstable service. I have spent hours with them and their neighbours trying different routers and getting stat etc.

My exchange was supposed to be upgraded to ADSL2+ in 2009, that never happened. There are no FTTC/FTTP services here and no roll out dates either. I am lucky that I was able to get an ADSL2+ LLU connection via Tiscali/CPW and Xilo and have a very stable throughput, the  only other option here is Sky    but again only for this exchange, the rest of the area is stuck with ADSL Max.

2 years ago there was several days of BT bods and managers with clipboards checking poles/connection boxes etc. this went on for a few days and they said" it is for your upgrade" when asked what upgrade they told me FTTP ...... BT themselves totally deny this and tell you to ask your ISP.



The biggest issue and gripe with BT is their management style, they leave paying customers frustrated and angry with all the misinformation and half truths.
 
I had a line issue that raised its head at least twice a year for 5 years, despite 3 different iSP's seeing the fault, BT telling them yes we see it, me having Router Stats running for weeks on end, providing 100's of graphs and speed tests, engineers arived and just stood gaping at the screen and deny there is anything wrong.

One even kept insisting it was an ISP fault despite the fact that he spoke to the exchange on his mobile ( using handsfree) as he worked on my Master Socket and was talking to them about the fault he and they could see, he still turned round and stated "there is nothing wrong, it's your ISP at fault." I heard the entire conversation yet thats what you get ..... lies.

(The same enginneer had been here twice previously, he insisted that it was impossible to get the synch and speed I quoted was the norm, even when I gave him the BT Speedtest results he denied it. He rewired my Master Socket twice(different visits), the second time he did this he asked what idiot had made such a mess of fitting the box .... it doesn't exactly inspire much confidence.)

So he leaves and 10 minutes later the line goes dead. 30 minutes after that it all comes back on and the non existent fault is cured.  Basically denial is it appears always the stock in trade answer.

Fast forward to last December and similar issues started again, I phone Xilo, give them all my stats and router info. They go to their LLU supplier and I am called to be told that BT/OR? will attend the house next day. These guys were obviously dedicated  Broadband techs as they really knew their stuff, 5 minutes here with test kit that no other engineer has used and they are off to the cabinet and exchange. Within an hour they are back to recheck the line  which is now perfect. They have switched me at cab and exchange to a new cable and said that the connection was shot and should have been changed years ago, "there have been problems on that cabinet for years."

If BT were more honest, customers would not be so disenchanted and their staff wouldn't get the flak.

This may explain some of the issues around here.

http://purbeckbroadband.co.uk/



I must say that having been at the mercy of the BT Broadband profiling system and the major issues in getting anything done with faults, now having LLU ADSL2+ at a constant 762 / 15633 kbps.  24/7/365 I would be very wary of using FTTC/FTTP through your employer.Why do I have to move to an LLU supplier to get a longstanding BT problem fixed?

[Ottersnose]

"There are certain areas here with large amounts of Aluminium cable (denied by the upper levels of BT but well known by the engineers on the ground)".

Urban myth, and untrue.

I was stating the fact that there are known areas with Ali cable within our region backed up by speaking to Openreach engineers. Poole is believed to be a good area to check and also parts of Christchurch if you want to check with any sources based down here. If I'm incorrect then why would OpenReach engineers lie to me?
Have I missed your point? It wouldn't be the first time