Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[renluop]

I came across the  title subject in a Digital Spy thread, and then to a link]http://bt.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/47740/~/what-is-unlimited-faster-broadband%3F] a link. It seems to concern some method of speeding up slow connections where FTTC is not available

Code: [Select]

If you live a long way from the cabinet you're likely to receive slower speeds. To make sure you get the right product for you, if you receive a speed estimate of 2-15Mb, we’ll offer you Unlimited Faster Broadband instead of BT Infinity.".

It may be my elderly sight, but I cannot recall the subject's being raised here. Thought you might be interested, though.

[burakkucat]

b*cat fixes the mangled link for you. 

Yes, that goes back to when BT Retail first launched their Infinity product. So as not to "degrade" the Infinity name, a FTTC product (using VDSL2 over the D-side metallic pathway) was sold as "Unlimited Faster Broadband" if the synchronisation speed was sub 15 Mbps.

What is Unlimited Faster Broadband?

BT Infinity uses the latest fibre optic technology to provide an internet connection which is much faster and more powerful than standard broadband (which is delivered completely over copper wires).

In most cases, the fibre optic cable will run from your local telephone exchange as far as the cabinet next to your home. You'll then have copper wires from the street cabinet to your home.

If you live a long way from the cabinet you're likely to receive slower speeds. To make sure you get the right product for you, if you receive a speed estimate of 2-15Mb, we’ll offer you Unlimited Faster Broadband instead of BT Infinity.

Unlimited Faster Broadband is likely to give you faster speeds than standard broadband. Our availability checker will provide a speed estimate for both to show the difference.

If you don’t already have one, you'll be sent a new BT Home Hub 5 which will be installed by an engineer who will activate your Unlimited Faster Broadband service.

Unlimited Faster Broadband comes with Totally Unlimited usage, 50GB BT Cloud online storage and BT NetProtect Plus as well as unlimited BT Wi-Fi, BT Family Protection and free access to the BT Sport app and online player.

[kitz]

To further expand on what bcat has already said, this clarifies it a bit further.

A BT Spokesperson told ISPreview:

"In response to customer demand, BT has decided to add a variant to its Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC) service which has a minimum assured downstream speed of 5Mb/s. This is in addition to the mainstream version of the service which has a minimum assured downstream speed of 15Mb/s.

This means that consumers and businesses that have previously been unable to order fibre broadband over BT's network because their line was unable to support the minimum speed of 15Mb/s will now able to do so via their ISP.

While these customer's lines will be unable to support the super-fast speeds of up to 40Mb/s offered by BT's FTTC service, the option of a lower minimum assured speed for FTTC means that some customers may see an improvement in their broadband speeds compared with the current speed they receive over the copper network."

Source ISPreview

[waltergmw]

Gentlefolk,

This might confuse matters further but I'd like to report an unsatisfactory happening at PCP 20 as part of our Ewhurst debacle.

The ECI 128 cabinet became unavailable for further VDSL orders (for the third time) for well over 6 months. During this time an E U decided to order a service and was told that additional capacity was still being planned. Once the expansion had been completed the EU was then told his line was too long.
We then told BT Retail that the other pair in the same BT16A box was carrying a VDSL service at around 15 Mbps, but they still refused to budge until major pressure was applied via head office. When they eventually relented the EU was further confused when offered "Faster Broadband" when it was actually slower VDSL ! After two failed contractor installs (as they had failed to note the actual NTE5 had filtered out the VDSL signal from the back-fed internal cable), a real BT Openreach engineer attended and installed the service without difficulty. That service is now running at a sync speed of 16.44 Mbps.

However BT Wholesale has had the last laugh as they've just reduced all VDSL estimates on lines already with VDSL down to 1 Mbps and those on ADSL no longer see any VDSL service as being available at all. This is probably due to some services on very long ongoing spurs from DP 1040 having speeds  as low as 2.85 Mbps; whilst others directly connected achieve 18.26 Mbps. "Oh what tangled webs we weave when first we practice to deceive" How we unscramble that for any closer ones is a matter of some concern !

Kind reagrds,
Walter

[Chrysalis]

yep BT's way of fixing is to reduce estimates :p

Reducing estimates does stop possible misleading so I am not entirely against it, but I think existing customers should have estimates that existed at point of sale adhered to.

[NewtronStar]

If you can get the so called faster Broadband then it's better than an ADSL running at 2.5 Megs but here is the crunch, when running https://www.dslchecker.bt.com/ will it show up as FTTC or something different as it's not an FTTC Infinity product 

[Ducky]

I have BT's UFB service, albeit it's not delivering what they said it would (currently get 7Mb, promised 15Mb) but it is quicker than the old ADSL option (not so keen on the £21p/m charge though ).

It shows up as FTTC on the checker you mention, the engineer who installed it basically said it's Infinity.

I need to post some stats (got an unlocked 612 monitoring the line), as I think it's a noisy line I have and quite far from the exchange.

cheers
Chris

[Ronski]

Welcome to the forums Ducky.

It is FTTC but because of the estimated speeds being so low BT didn't want to advertise it as an fibre service.

Your speeds are estimated so low  because of a combination of the quality of your line and the distance from the cabinet, the exchange distance is irrelevant.  I'm certain they  won't of promised any speeds, as they can't,  no one knows what your line will support until it's up and running.

There may be wiring issues affecting the speed your line runs it, which others will be best suited to advise on.

Do you know if you had a BT engineer do the install or a subcontractor?

Do you also know how long the likely route your line takes back to the cab, this will help give an idea of what speeds you could expect.

[Ducky]

Hi Ronski,

Thanks for the welcome.

I think I had a subcontractor do the installation, pretty much all he did was change the BT faceplate for a Mk2 one and install the BT HH5.

I had Infinity2 at my old place, so still had the ECI and 612 modems and my old BT HH3, hence I unlocked the 612 and installed that with the HH3 for now, as the HH5 was constantly rebooting since taking an update to the 1.6 firmware.

I'm not sure of my line distance, but it's probably at least 2 miles to the cab (I live in a rural area now).

Originally I had a lot of noise on the line for the first couple of days, I traced this to some naff extension leads so removed them.  The modem now shows max DL speed possible around the 12-14Mb mark (that'll be nice), but only connects about 7Mb at the moment (it used to be 5 pre-removal of the extensions).  So I think perhaps DLM has throttled back the connection because of the earlier noise...

I should probably start a new thread for this and stick in some screen shots of my dskstats, as I'd be interested to hear what people think about the results.

[Ronski]

You're very lucky if you are getting those speeds at 2 miles. As you say start a new thread and post some stats. One thing you need to make sure is that there are no bridge taps, which are basically extensions before the master socket. To do that you will need to power off the modem, then remove the lower section of the master socket. Then with a corded phone test every phone socket in the house, they should all be dead, except for the test socket revealed on the front of the master.