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UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

wired.co.uk

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Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#71

Post by walshemj »

oldcynic wrote: post #30
signal11 wrote: post #6

> The UK’s fibre to the home infrastructure is so poor it’s out-performed by almost every other country in Europe (Latvia, with 50.6 per cent fibre coverage, ranks first in terms of market penetration). The reason the UK is on a mix of copper and fiber is because the entrenched monopoly, BT, didn't think fiber to the home (FTTH) was worth investing in. To protect their investment in their existing copper network, the…

If only that were true. The Thatcher Government stopped BT's already running rollout of FTTH in 1990. That gave us cable competition from Blueyonder who did bugger all and a BT regulated against playing in that space any more. Hell Hastings and around Martlesham Heath (OK that doesn't really count) had FTTH in the mid 80s. If BT had been allowed their way it'd be all FTTH by now. Regulation pushed a lot of the subseq…

Ad at one point it was all set to go just needed the signature I know some one who saw all the paper work laid out ready for signing.

A lot of the slagging off comes from hobbyist "entrepreneurs" who think either that they can run an office on home adsl products and or/that all the consumer customers should subsidize their business

Oh and that nice Mr Murdoc whos upset that BT is competing with him for sport don't see the tabloids complaints about the Murdoch tax to watch football.

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#72

Post by merinowool »

simonbarker87 wrote: post #19
signal11 wrote: post #6

> The UK’s fibre to the home infrastructure is so poor it’s out-performed by almost every other country in Europe (Latvia, with 50.6 per cent fibre coverage, ranks first in terms of market penetration). The reason the UK is on a mix of copper and fiber is because the entrenched monopoly, BT, didn't think fiber to the home (FTTH) was worth investing in. To protect their investment in their existing copper network, the…

Every home I have lived in for the past 10 years or so has had Virgin fibre to the home. BT don't have the monopoly at all, they just have poor infrastructure and are the defacto that most people choose. Our unit didn't have a direct fibre connection when we took the lease, we rang Virgin and they used infill money to lay a fibre cable to all the units on the trading estate at no cost to us other than the initial £20…

Virgin is very poor experience and they de facto have monopoly on fiber in some areas and that enables them to piss on customers who cannot get any alternative. Recently I had a fault and I was 3 weeks without the internet. I am sure that could have been resolved quicker, but their staff was completely incompetent. Cherry on the cake - I am also nowhere near the advertised speed.

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#73

Post by Rjevski »

antihero wrote: post #55
Rjevski wrote: post #3

Not sure if that's going to change something. The main problem was never peak-time congestion (I've never experienced it personally), it's just the fact that 1) the infrastructure is shit and 2) everyone sells DSL as "fibre". The infrastructure is a mess. Unless you've got actual fibre to the home, you're stuck with DSL, aka rust. The problem is that it's impossible to tell just how rusty it is without subscribing to…

Does DOCSIS3 count as DSL?

Nope, that’s HFC, and while it’s radio-frequencies just like DSL, it’s a shared medium across the entire neighbourhood while DSL is dedicated.

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#74

Post by signal11 »

Lio wrote: post #60
oldcynic wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If only that were true. The Thatcher Government stopped BT's already running rollout of FTTH in 1990. That gave us cable competition from Blueyonder who did bugger all and a BT regulated against playing in that space any more. Hell Hastings and around Martlesham Heath (OK that doesn't really count) had FTTH in the mid 80s. If BT had been allowed their way it'd be all FTTH by now. Regulation pushed a lot of the subseq…

This. BT didn't ignore FTTH because they thought it was a bad technology. BT invented _alot_ of technology that makes fibre deployments world wide cheap enough to be feasible, including fibre jetting. They didn't role it out because first of all they were barred from selling TV over fibre in the late 80s early 90s in favour of foreign cable companies. Those cable companies eventually merged to form Virgin Media. Late…

Gigaclear is deploying fiber to rural communities, for example: https://www.gigaclear.com/fibre-optic-gigaclear-network-for-...

CityFibre is deploying fiber to a bunch of cities like Milton Keynes and Peterborough.

I do agree that there are a number of ISPs, like Sky and Talktalk, who are content to ride on OpenReach's coattails and build no last-mile infrastructure of their own. Virgin Media do have their own last-mile infrastructure but it's very, very limited geographically afaik.

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#75

Post by pricechild »

matthewmacleod wrote: post #42
Rjevski wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you sure it's actually fibre? Or is it their bullshit coax cable (HFC) they mis-sell as "fibre"?

It's a bit weird that there hasn't been a decision about the mis-selling of "fibre" connections in the UK. Virgin's network is pretty great if you're not in an oversubscribed area, but it just seems weird to bill it as "fiber". To be fair though, DOCSIS 3.1 can push 10GB through coax so it's not all bad.

The ASA has made the decision to allow it.

It's annoying that we defer to them...

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#76

Post by tialaramex »

pjc50 wrote: post #16
signal11 wrote: post #6

> The UK’s fibre to the home infrastructure is so poor it’s out-performed by almost every other country in Europe (Latvia, with 50.6 per cent fibre coverage, ranks first in terms of market penetration). The reason the UK is on a mix of copper and fiber is because the entrenched monopoly, BT, didn't think fiber to the home (FTTH) was worth investing in. To protect their investment in their existing copper network, the…

I'm fairly sure there have been repeated initiatives, over decades, to improve speeds where the government has thrown money at Openreach and they've achieved next to nothing. e.g. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-40481561

I guess it could be a weird coincidence? Money goes to BT. BT upgrades loads of cabinets to enable VDSL, people get faster speeds. Could all be unrelated.

Doesn't seem like it though. Also there's a deal where if BT says "This upgrade makes no commercial sense" (so they won't do it without government money) but then they make money off the upgrade, there's a "claw back" which gets back the extra money. Several of those clawbacks have now triggered in fact, and the money was used to fund yet more broadband.

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#77

Post by tobylane »

wjoe wrote: post #23
oldcynic wrote: post #8

The UK could have had world leading broadband were it not for Mrs T. She decided BT's late 1980s decision to rollout fibre was anti-competitive and killed it in 1990 when we were pretty much leading the world [0]. So the grindingly slow reality of ADSL isn't especially surprising sadly. [0] https://www.techradar.com/news/world-of-tech/how-the-uk-lost...

And yet BT is pretty much the definition of anti-competitive now anyway, and it's that monopoly which is killing progress today.

Which BT are you talking about? BT the end user ISP or BT Openreach, the owner of the phone lines? Both have large oversight from Ofcom, the most visible of all the regulators.

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#78

Post by simonbarker87 »

Rjevski wrote: post #38
simonbarker87 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every home I have lived in for the past 10 years or so has had Virgin fibre to the home. BT don't have the monopoly at all, they just have poor infrastructure and are the defacto that most people choose. Our unit didn't have a direct fibre connection when we took the lease, we rang Virgin and they used infill money to lay a fibre cable to all the units on the trading estate at no cost to us other than the initial £20…

Are you sure it's actually fibre? Or is it their bullshit coax cable (HFC) they mis-sell as "fibre"?

It’s definitley fibre and we get a stable 100Mbit connection all the time.

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#79

Post by simonbarker87 »

fauigerzigerk wrote: post #51
simonbarker87 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every home I have lived in for the past 10 years or so has had Virgin fibre to the home. BT don't have the monopoly at all, they just have poor infrastructure and are the defacto that most people choose. Our unit didn't have a direct fibre connection when we took the lease, we rang Virgin and they used infill money to lay a fibre cable to all the units on the trading estate at no cost to us other than the initial £20…

We don't have Virgin on this premises here in London and the mobile phone signal is so bad it's barely usable at all. But I have to say that BT has been a very reliable ISP and the speeds are OK (in spite of being copper) with the exception of Sunday evenings.

It might be worth contacting Virgin and see if you can get a free installation under the infill funding, it’s specifically for urban areas that have been missed out.

Re: UK ISPs have to stop lying about broadband speeds

#80

Post by simonbarker87 »

merinowool wrote: post #72
simonbarker87 wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every home I have lived in for the past 10 years or so has had Virgin fibre to the home. BT don't have the monopoly at all, they just have poor infrastructure and are the defacto that most people choose. Our unit didn't have a direct fibre connection when we took the lease, we rang Virgin and they used infill money to lay a fibre cable to all the units on the trading estate at no cost to us other than the initial £20…

Virgin is very poor experience and they de facto have monopoly on fiber in some areas and that enables them to piss on customers who cannot get any alternative. Recently I had a fault and I was 3 weeks without the internet. I am sure that could have been resolved quicker, but their staff was completely incompetent. Cherry on the cake - I am also nowhere near the advertised speed.

Funny how we all have different experiences, I have been with them for 10 years (and longer before that in a shared student house) and can’t praise them enough. Much better than the experience we had with BT in the early days of starting the business.
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