SLT want faster broadband

[Simcfc73]

We had Openreach on our school street over the lockdown. I spoke to one of them and he said they were putting in FTTP capability.

 

Just been on the Cerberus site and it says we can get 300mb on FTTP... wooohooo

[EXA_Mark]

Out of curiosity, what is the rough pricing nowadays for 1Gbps lines?

 

My new place I've taken over has a locked in contract till March, but currently they're paying a staggering amount for 300mb (over 10k... yep seriously)

 

Many thanks,

Steve

 

Unfortunately, it is the old adage, Steve, it depends where you are. For instance, if you are in one of our DarkLight areas we install 10Gbps bearers on our Dark Fibre and these come in under £6K a year with only £500 install, with 300Mbps on 10Gbps coming in at £3,500.

 

For 1Gbps on 1Gbps, at the moment though you are generally seeing this in the region of £6k-£9K per year.

 

I'm not surprised on the current pricing you have on your 300Mbps line (I assume it was a three-year contract signed in 2018) as the wholesale tail on Gigabit circuits (especially those provided into ISPs directly through Openreach has come down massively in the past three years. The price being added on for the actual internet bandwidth (not included from Openreach) has remained fairly constant for the last few years though, and whilst it has come down, it is the tails that have made the biggest impact.

 

If you'd like me to send you over a quote just PM me your details, and don't worry, we are not a pushy sales type company, we send you a quote and then are there if you have questions or want to proceed.

[EXA_Mark]

We had Openreach on our school street over the lockdown. I spoke to one of them and he said they were putting in FTTP capability.

 

Just been on the Cerberus site and it says we can get 300mb on FTTP... wooohooo

 

Just a quick word of warning to all about Openreach FTTP, although I am sure many of you are aware of this.

 

From a technical perspective, all fibre to the premises (Leased Lines, Dark Fibre and such) are FTTP. However FTTP as talked about a product replacement for DSL/EoFTTC/FTTC/Gfast from Openreach uses GPON technology, and is an asymmetrical service, meaning the download is faster than the upload (how Openreach DSL type products have worked since 2000, not using GPON mind, but asymmetrical).

 

Dark Fibre services, such as DarkLight or Leased Lines are symmetrical, meaning you have the same speed up and down.

 

Also, FTTP (Openreach) is not a guaranteed speed service, it is subject to peak time congestion and slow down, (when Peak time actually is now that half the people are working from home all the time I am not sure though). It is in the terms and conditions of OR and others such as Virgin broadband services.

 

The biggest thing to take out of this though is the limits of the upload on OR FTTP services, on 300Mbps FTTP you reference the upload is only 50Mbps. If you can get the 1Gbps one it is just over 200Mbps. Now you might say that is more than sufficient, but remember the quote at the start of this thread, more teachers and students are using cloud service than ever before, and that means sending data back out to the web MUCH more than when you are simply web browsing or streaming. In the past few years, we have seen upload speeds increase on our networks four times faster than downloads speed. Now do not get me wrong, people use the download element much more, but a few years ago it was a ratio of about 10:1, so if you had a 100Mbps pipe we would see peak uploads of around 10Mbps. It is now closers to 45% at peak. Meaning if you had a 100Mbps line we would see peak uploads of around 45Mbps. Bear than in mind. That is now. It will continue to increase. So if you are thinking an upload speed 50Mbps will be ample for us for years to come, it probably won't it almost isn't now.

 

And just to finish, please don't misunderstand me, FTTP is a huge jump compared to current mass available technologies such as DSL and FTTC, and it is a service we provide ourselves too, but if you are on a 1Gbps leased line and seriously considering this as an option then do get your upload stats checked first. And this is not us trying to push more expensive or lucrative products, the actual margins on most connectivity services are very similar, it is about having something that works.

[mavhc]

Should at least push symmetric prices down a lot though. 1000/115 is £375/year, vs the £4000 per year we're paying for 100/100

[EXA_Mark]

It already has pushed them down consistently for the past twenty years since DSL was first introduced. The very first leased line i was involved within installing for ourselves as a business in the 90's (not Exa) was a 256Kbps line at £18500 a year!

 

You have to bear in mind in comparing FTTP (OR) to Leased Lines or DarkLight that those services are congested and do have contention and speeds do vary (sometimes massively), and sometimes to specific connections (such as MS, Google or Apple) on update or patch days. Leased Lines or DarkLight (Dark Fibre) should not, as long as your ISP has enough capacity in their core.

[Simcfc73]

Just a quick word of warning to all about Openreach FTTP, although I am sure many of you are aware of this.

 

From a technical perspective, all fibre to the premises (Leased Lines, Dark Fibre and such) are FTTP. However FTTP as talked about a product replacement for DSL/EoFTTC/FTTC/Gfast from Openreach uses GPON technology, and is an asymmetrical service, meaning the download is faster than the upload (how Openreach DSL type products have worked since 2000, not using GPON mind, but asymmetrical).

 

Dark Fibre services, such as DarkLight or Leased Lines are symmetrical, meaning you have the same speed up and down.

 

Also, FTTP (Openreach) is not a guaranteed speed service, it is subject to peak time congestion and slow down, (when Peak time actually is now that half the people are working from home all the time I am not sure though). It is in the terms and conditions of OR and others such as Virgin broadband services.

 

The biggest thing to take out of this though is the limits of the upload on OR FTTP services, on 300Mbps FTTP you reference the upload is only 50Mbps. If you can get the 1Gbps one it is just over 200Mbps. Now you might say that is more than sufficient, but remember the quote at the start of this thread, more teachers and students are using cloud service than ever before, and that means sending data back out to the web MUCH more than when you are simply web browsing or streaming. In the past few years, we have seen upload speeds increase on our networks four times faster than downloads speed. Now do not get me wrong, people use the download element much more, but a few years ago it was a ratio of about 10:1, so if you had a 100Mbps pipe we would see peak uploads of around 10Mbps. It is now closers to 45% at peak. Meaning if you had a 100Mbps line we would see peak uploads of around 45Mbps. Bear than in mind. That is now. It will continue to increase. So if you are thinking an upload speed 50Mbps will be ample for us for years to come, it probably won't it almost isn't now.

 

And just to finish, please don't misunderstand me, FTTP is a huge jump compared to current mass available technologies such as DSL and FTTC, and it is a service we provide ourselves too, but if you are on a 1Gbps leased line and seriously considering this as an option then do get your upload stats checked first. And this is not us trying to push more expensive or lucrative products, the actual margins on most connectivity services are very similar, it is about having something that works.

 

Party pooper

[SchoolsBroadband]

Party pooper

 

 

 

Just to add on to Mark's and others comments but another thought you may or may not be aware of is that in January 2021 BT Openreach are launching a symmetrical FTTP service. i.e up to 1Gbps down and 1Gbps upload.

 

Furthermore, we have started to deliver EoFTTP (Ethernet over FTTP) services via BT (we've done over 1,000 EoFTTC in the past).

 

EoFTTP gives a certain guaranteed bandwidth on FTTP based circuits. They are delivered over different cablelinks at the BT Exchange so your bandwidth isn't mixed with normal residential backhaul traffic (i.e. a normal FTTP circuit). It runs over the same BT Ethernet network (i.e. leased line network) so speeds can be guaranteed.

 

In January, you can buy for example 200Mbps guaranteed with 1Gbps burst. You can even go the full hog and buy a full 1Gbps guaranteed bandwidth.

 

Although there's some small technical differences between that and a BT Openreach EAD based leased line these circuits are perfect for primary schools in particular where available. A full 1Gbps EoFTTP circuit will be less than the equivalent 1Gbps EAD circuit which is good news for everyone.

 

As of today the maximum speed on BT Openreach based FTTP is 1Gbps download and 220Mbps upload but come January that's all going to change.

 

Looking into my crystal ball I also see significant reductions in 10Gbps bearers on EAD based circuits, the death of 100Mbps circuits and 1Gbps bearers being the norm for all. BT Openreach have for the past couple of years installed 1Gbps capable kit whether you take a 100Mbps bearer or 1Gbps bearer. To upgrade the carrier asks Openreach to perform a software upgrade and wahey the link goes from 100Mbps to 1Gbps.

 

Feel free to comment or PM me if you've any questions. Boom enjoy

 

Dave

[Sonic007]

Thought I'd give a quick update: We went for Schools Broadband in the end.

[SchoolsBroadband]

@Sonic007 thanks very much for your support and welcome to our service