the latter, I couldnt really hear the noise on the phone.
The engineer came back 10 mins ago this morning to check if everything is ok with his boss since I am the first customer on the cabinet, and apparently I was connected before fully ready
I asked them about the interference and according to them there is a known source in the city centre near the exchange of noise ingress and the copper cable that carries the voice is filtered at the cabinet now so any interference E side doesnt affect VDSL. ADSL services still affected but not VDSL.
Cross-purposes it would appear.
To make it clear, if there is a fault on the E-side cable, such as a HR causing a loud crackling noise on the phone, or a Battery/Earth contact, partial short circuit, blah-de-blah, this will still be introduced to the VDSL part of the circuit, causing disruption.
The interference you are talking about (REIN/RFI etc) would not be introduced to the VDSL part of the circuit, as it would be filtered out.
My apologies for assuming the interference was 'audible noise'.