back to article Home fibre in the UK sucks so much it doesn't even rank in Euro study

The UK is performing so poorly in fibre internet penetration that it isn't even included in a European study. Latvia comes top, with 50.6 per cent household penetration, according to the fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) Ultrafast Broadband Country Ranking. Meanwhile, Blighty is estimated to have fibre penetration of between 2-3 per …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    *Shrug*

    We've had FTTC for 16 years here. Currently rocking the slowest VM can offer which is 100MBs (I did run a business line for a while at 250Mbs).

    I'll be honest, it does feature in the column we have "reasons not to move".

    What amuses me, is that our neighbourhood isn't even aspirational enough to be middle-class. Whereas some of the piles of bricks the executives I've worked for have been struggling at 5Mbs.

    WTH, just for lolz:

    90.5

    Mbps download

    6.06

    Mbps upload

    Latency: 28 ms

    Server: London

    Your Internet speed is very fast

    Your Internet connection should be able to handle multiple devices streaming HD videos, video conferencing and gaming at the same time

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: *Shrug*

      Ronan Kelly, president of the FTTH Council, said: "The findings of the Market Panorama are quite telling, we are now all looking towards the same goal of a fibre-rich Gigabit society."

      Well, he would say that, wouldn't he? Meanwhile, in real life, most households are perfectly happy with 10Mbps, or maybe 40Mbps for a family home. Heck, if you gave them 1Gbps they'd just sit there wondering why their WiFi-connected laptop wasn't any faster than it was with that other type of "fibre"!

      1. Lee D Silver badge

        Re: *Shrug*

        I think you underestimate people.

        A 10Mbps connection is no good for an average household... look at the numbers of phones, consoles, computers, laptops, tablets, etc. and it's quickly apparent you can kill someone's Netflix just by clicking a big web page.

        And along those lines, you have to think - those smartphones are probably on 4G, almost certainly get 25-30Mbps themselves, just as part of a data allowance. When the phone in your pocket can service wifi to the whole house quicker and cheaper than the actual broadband connection, you have a problem.

        And the phones have 25-30Mbps because they can utilise it easily. Multiply by, what, 8-10 devices in the average family household and you need 250-300Mbps to match the performance of a smartphone.

        As time goes by those numbers aren't going to get any better and what's going to happen is consoles, tablets, laptops and smartTV's coming with 5G SIMs in them by default. At that point, broadband is useless unless it can deliver Gbps to the house in order to compete.

        Fixed line broadband needs to buck its ideas up or people are just going to move to mobile telephony, and maybe in the most rural of regions too (two articles in the last week about 4G-to-the-sticks projects).

        I run my whole house from a 4G Wifi router including Chromecast, TV streaming (no TV, just TVPlayer.com, Netflix and Amazon Prime), console, tablet, laptop with Steam games, etc. I'm not the only one in my area as the Wifi network names show that everyone is doing it. Mainly because BT can only promise 3-5Mbps to the center of a large town inside the M25, and Virgin have no infrastructure nearby.

        They need to wake up and start competing (in the serviced areas, as well as the "why the hell is it not serviced" areas, not just the rural difficult places) or they are going to lose all their custom to people just using their smartphones. The younger generation are already wise to this - they YouTube and Netflix on their phones by choice (because then they can each watch something different in the same room, and individual 4G doesn't buffer anywhere near as bad as a home wifi with a load of people on it), they have "unlimited" data allowances, and they can take that wherever they go (even to a mate's house).

        Asking your mates for their Wifi password is a thing of the past now. People just whip out their own smartphone and Google away. Wifi is actually generally WORSE than whatever you'll get on 4G in London.

        For me to part with £50+ a month just for a broadband connection, you'd have to be offering me 200-300Mbps or more at minimum, with a generous data allowance and no bundled shite (I don't even have a TV, or a landline phone... why would I need one when I have a projector and a smartphone?)

        1. Commswonk

          Re: *Shrug*

          And the phones have 25-30Mbps because they can utilise it easily. Multiply by, what, 8-10 devices in the average family household and you need 250-300Mbps to match the performance of a smartphone.

          The above makes me wonder... how many people are there in the "average household"? 8 - 10? Seems a bit high that.

          4 - 5? Well pehaps, but WTF are they doing that each of them needs 2 devices each gobbling 25 Mb/s simultaneously?

          To my (cyncial) mind this looks like a case of deciding what you want your argument to conclude and then manipulating a few "facts" to make sure your conclusion is achieved.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: *Shrug*

            "More bandwidth" is easier than "managed bandwidth".

            The gaming pc needs half a meg, or whatever... but the netflix swamps the requests, and increases latency... however the stream with a few meg spare, could cope with massive latency spikes fine.

            A system to allow priority to the game and bandwidth to netflix? That's maths and hard... easier to just advertise "faster" to consumers.

            (many other examples are there, such as downloads/webpages etc)

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            "each gobbling 25 Mb/s simultaneously?"

            Most are obsessed with download speeds, but upload speeds matter as well. You can bring to knees other devices by saturating the upload bandwidth with one. Why? Because with TCP there could be too little available for ACK packets and other upload needs.

            On my actual connection, I can kill Skype on-demand video if I'm uploading photos, videos or backups.

            Anyway, in an household, it's no surprise to find three video streams concurrently, plus some downloads.

        2. Roland6 Silver badge

          Re: *Shrug*

          " it's quickly apparent you can kill someone's Netflix just by clicking a big web page.

          The issue here is the cheap router, I expect in the coming years for consumer grade routers to get better at traffic prioritisation and shaping.

          "Multiply by, what, 8-10 devices in the average family household and you need 250-300Mbps to match the performance of a smartphone."

          Your forgetting the device doesn't fully utilise the bandwidth, even when streaming. My household with 2 tech saavy adults and 2 growing-up digital teenagers, has yet to top out a 35Mbps FTTC connection - yes we do at times have to wait for the multi GB update, but for normal interactive usage not seen problems.

          "I run my whole house from a 4G Wifi router including Chromecast, TV streaming (no TV, just TVPlayer.com, Netflix and Amazon Prime), console, tablet, laptop with Steam games, etc.

          ...

          For me to part with £50+ a month just for a broadband connection, you'd have to be offering me 200-300Mbps or more at minimum, with a generous data allowance and no bundled shite"

          Given the performance of EE's 4G network and their top offer of 200GB for £60 pcm, I would have thought you would take the hand-off someone who could offer you an unlimited 38Mbps service for less than £50 pcm - I certainly did when FTTC finally arrived in my neighbourhood two years back...

        3. Kubla Cant
          Thumb Down

          Re: *Shrug*

          I run my whole house from a 4G Wifi router

          Great idea! Oh, wait, I have to stand in the garden to get any kind of phone reception*, and it sure as hell isn't 4G. How's that going to work?

          * According to the coverage maps, it will be the same with any mobile network.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: *Shrug*

            "I run my whole house from a 4G Wifi router

            Great idea! Oh, wait, I have to stand in the garden to get any kind of phone reception*, and it sure as hell isn't 4G. How's that going to work?

            "

            Two words - external antenna.

            I also run a 4g router as one of two points out my local subnet, and it has a external antenna which lives on the chimney stack, because whizzy as 4g is, its still fm line of sight transmission, and there's no signal inside the house otherwise.

            Its actually more stable and reliable than my crap copper connected dsl let alone aprox 60 times faster. Real irony is the 4g tower and the frame where my line terminates is in the same exchange building using the same links. Hurrah for unlimited 4g sim packages. We used 250Gb of data last month on the sim which lives only in the 4g router.

            1. psychonaut

              Re: *Shrug*

              spot on.

              phone up solwise and ask them about external antenna's and 4g routers. they are superbly helpful.

        4. Nifty Silver badge

          Re: *Shrug*

          Try this experiment then: Alight from Waterloo station at 5pm. See an excellent 4G signal on your phone. Then try to get some data, any data. Something ambitious like a Google map of your locality.

          No data - at all.

      2. Korev Silver badge

        Re: *Shrug*

        "Meanwhile, in real life, most households are perfectly happy with 10Mbps, or maybe 40Mbps for a family home."

        Netflix recommend 25Mb/s for 4K streaming. Imagine you're watching TV and your film stutters because your tablet or PC decides to update itself.

        Also don't forget that on a 10Mb connection you'd only get about 1Mb up, which in these days of every device dumping all your data into the cloud will get contended quickly.I'm considering upgrading my 250/25Mb connection to 500/50Mb as it takes ages to back my photos up.

        1. Lars Silver badge
          Happy

          Re: *Shrug*

          "because your tablet or PC decides to update itself."

          Yes, well sorry, but my PCs just politely suggest I update at my leisure, you know penguins.

          But more to the topic, my family of three seem to manage quite well with 12 down. Right now I feel my fingers are throttling my brain more than the internet.

          Some years ago there was some nice lady asking me if I wouldn't rather have 100, and I said, yes please if you insist. Some weeks later there was this guy who told me "fibre is in the street they had torn up and filled up" and now we only need to pull that 60m to your house and get rid of that old copper you have, and it will cost you only 1000e.

          So, you know, nice husbands, I asked my wife. And, you know, nice wives, told me she will let nobody into the house unless I first clean up my room.

          And thus I have saved 1000e and the family is doing quite well with 12 down.

      3. Tom 7

        Re: *Shrug*

        The thing about FTTP is that once the fibre is in it should be cheaper than copper to maintain and unless we have seriously gone backwards in the last 28 years that fibre should easily be capable of multiple gigabit service if the infrastructure can take it. When I worked at BTRL we could have fitted 2.4Gbit connection for a hardware cost of less than £100 back in 1990. We didnt know quite what to do with it then - and the government wouldnt let us - but what the fuck is going on now?

    2. JustAnotherFileServer

      Re: *Shrug*

      I doubt you've had FTTC for 16 years as it has not even been around for that long. The trials in the UK for FTTC were around 2009 to 2010 with a full rollout in 2012.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: *Shrug*

        >I doubt you've had FTTC for 16 years as it has not even been around for that long.

        In a sense he is right as that's what Virgin more or less run.

        1. Baldrickk

          Re: *Shrug*

          >I doubt you've had FTTC for 16 years as it has not even been around for that long.

          In a sense he is right as that's what Virgin more or less run.

          Well, he probably had cable for 16 years (I live in the inital roll-out zone for cable, and have had it for about 18 years now). At some point the connection to the cabinet was upgraded to fibre.

          Virgin's network is fine (unless you apparently live in an oversubscribed area, but as that doesn't apply to me, I can't really comment on that) in terms of downlink bandwidth and latency. As can be seen by the numbers in the OP though, the upload is limited. Very limited.

          What the numbers don't show is that there is a 1GB soft cap on the upload, at which point your upload speed is halved. Upload another 1GB in the next two hours, and it gets halved again.

          Now try playing competitive real-time online games while other members of your family are filming full HD videos of themselves and uploading them via WhatsApp to their friends...

          My biggest frustration with the Virgin Hub (we have a Hub2 so no Puma related problems, though my father hasn't run into those either, probably just lucky) is the lack of QoS built in.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: *Shrug*

        It's a VM (formerly Telewest) installation.

        I've seen inside the cabinet. It's fibre.

        You trust your reports, I'll trust the evidence in the ground.

        (Videotron were running FTTC in the 90s)

        1. jeffdyer

          Re: *Shrug*

          We've had fibre to the street cabinet 50m away and coax to the door for 15 years at least?

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: *Shrug*

      >We've had FTTC

      FTTC is crap and a half arsed solution using BT's clapped out network, I'm on my second lift and shift in two years. The old copper & aluminium lines laid decades ago are not fit for purpose and full fibre is the only solution to replace these rotten cables. Additionally EMI is not a problem for full fibre.

    4. jeffdyer

      Re: *Shrug*

      On the last speed test on my home WiFi I got 109.76Mbps downstream and 6.47Mbps upstream. Ping 12ms. Sweet. (VM)

    5. Steve Evans

      Re: *Shrug*

      The problem for the fibre companies is that FTTC is more than fast enough for most people, so there isn't the market there was a decade ago. Even back then fibre companies were collapsing, being bought out and slashing plans to run fibres to existing towns/estates, so you can imagine how keen they are now to try to sell into areas where BT already has FTTC up and running.

      I've got FTTC and I'm quite happy with 76Mbs down and 18Mbs up (why do household fibre connections always seem so strangled on the upload?).

    6. Oh Homer
      Joke

      Full penetration

      Seems like a pipe dream.

  2. Craigie

    FTTP

    I read that is 'FPTP' and expected a diatribe on the failures of the UK political system. I should probably spend less time on politics Twitter.

    1. Valeyard

      Re: FTTP

      I should probably spend less time on politics Twitter.

      words to live by, you'll feel a lot better

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Investment in fibre

    Whilst the plans by Vodafone, Talktalk and others sound good, there is a fundamental problem that under current rules only Openreach have unbundled local loops. In electricity or gas any licensed company can provide a connection to a property, but have to allow other companies to use it on request (for which the connection asset owner gets paid). That energy model should be applied to broadband.

    If the clowns at Ofcom don;t address this soon, then people getting new Talktalk, Vodafone or Cityfibre connections will be permanently locked into single ISPs providing high speed broadband at whatever price they like. Customers of Virgin Media will be familiar with the "benefits" of this lock in, such as appalling customer service, ineffective technical support, a monopoly mindset, and rampant price increases. And once an area has one high speed broadband network, who would invest to duplicate that? Nobody in their right mind.

    So far from encouraging competition, there is a danger that Ofcom's dithering and lack of foresight will result in millions of homes being offered no choice of high speed broadband in coming years.

    1. AndrueC Silver badge
      Meh

      Re: Investment in fibre

      I'm not so sure about that. TalkTalk do already have a wholesale service as does Cityfibre.

      Neither have to operate under Ofcom regulations like openreach does, though.

    2. Pen-y-gors

      Re: Investment in fibre

      One of the main reasons given by Openreach for not immediately running FTTP into every building in the country is the cost - they have a point, digging up roads, sending blokes up poles with reels of stuff all cost money. Billions.

      So how will the total cost to the country be less if we have two or three or four companies digging up the same roads and sending different blokes up poles? Just the same with water, gas, electricity - anything that needs a distribution network. Real, sensible, 'competition' for utility distribution is a silly idea, even if production isn't.

      Sometimes monopolies can be efficient - what is needed is the will to make them efficient.

      1. Roland6 Silver badge

        Re: Investment in fibre

        There is a difference between total cost and when that cost is incurred.

        BT are aware that, given the size of their network, a nationwide rollout of FTTP is going to be a very big project, so do you ramp up your capability to deliver the project in say 5 years (then make people redundant) or do you manage expectations and do it in 20 years (and manage manpower largely through normal joiners/leaver process) ?

        Ofcom will point to their desire to create a "competitive market" to justify why some areas will get multiple local loop providers and others none and why they didn't manage things to minimise duplication...

      2. AndrueC Silver badge
        Meh

        Re: Investment in fibre

        So how will the total cost to the country be less if we have two or three or four companies digging up the same roads and sending different blokes up poles?

        Agreed. The trick is reconciling the needs and desires of the multiple companies involved so that they don't overlap each other. The cost of major changes to infrastructure varies a lot around the country as does RoI.

        About the only way out of this is to force a monopoly onto the industry. But that provider still has to justify its existence so it will still target cities first to be seen getting the job done as quickly and efficiently as possible. But as it moves out from cities to smaller communities the cost will increase and the number of connections per £ will drop. Will its backers be prepared to continue putting in the same amount of money to provide connections to the last 2 million properties as they did for the first 30 million? Will they be prepared to increase their payments to keep the number of connections created per unit of time constant?

        No matter how you do it 100% FTTP coverage includes at least 10% that is going to be a loss at least within normal accounting time scales. In fact the hardest to upgrade 10% will probably require going on for half the total budget.

    3. Muscleguy

      Re: Investment in fibre

      1. I have always had very good customer service from VM. Perhaps it is where you live. A few years ago a tree fell down in the front garden overnight and took out the cable. Rang VM, we could have an engineer before 12noon. Had to put them off till about 16:00 so we had a chance to get the tree out of the way. Never had to wait more than 48hrs at the longest for an engineer, usually much sooner.

      2. When we had our V2 TV box installed with a new router (with phone plugs in it) I had lots of trouble with the router (didn't remember settings changes). Got upgraded to a more senior fellow who was fantastic. Came to conclusion new router fucked, old one much the same, still worked? reuse. Sorted. Sorted how to download recording settings from old box to new box too. Absolutely no complaints.

      Lost track of the speed bumps over time, been with since Telewest, BT a crap option round here.

      Again it perhaps depends where you live but here we have had excellent service. Dundee East if you are interested. Cabinet is about 150m away. Double job, in the parkland between the two sides of the estate. Semis and detached Betts (1960s). Nothing flash, perfectly adequate, decent school. Lots of elderly so no traffic problems most of the time. Wife games online with a PS4, no worries. I can surf, two phones wifi connected. I occasionally turn wifi on and off on this Macbook for decent service. I blame the wife's work PC laptop. It's fine when she's not here.

  4. fnusnu

    Latvia: probably helped by the fact that 1/3 of the population lives in the capital city.

    1. Chris Miller

      And many of those in giant blocks of flats - lay one fibre and you've connected 100 premises. While obstinate Brits insist on living in private houses.

    2. Keith Langmead

      "Latvia: probably helped by the fact that 1/3 of the population lives in the capital city."

      And also, before fibre what was the state of their DSL rollout, and after that what was the state of their FTTC rollout? Without those details it's hard to get a genuine idea of how why change has happened. If country A has only had 1MB DSL, and you suddenly make FTTP available then I imagine you'll get a massive take up... but if like the UK you've had decent DSL speeds available (more than enough speed for many users), followed by FTTC for more money, how many people would be bothered about FTTP? You'll only attract those who's needs aren't being met by what they have already. Unless you NEED those speeds is it worth the money? Even as a geek I was fine with DSL, the only reason I upgraded to FTTC was because I got a 4K TV and finally had a need for the extra speed.

  5. AndrueC Silver badge
    Meh

    People in the UK order primarily by price. Speed is of secondary interest and only has to be 'enough'. On FTTC only a minority sign up for the top tier, even amongst those close enough to the cab to get a benefit. VM see the same thing - only a minority bother with the 300Mb/s service. A lot of people only move to something higher when VM decides it's time to close their slowest package and upgrades them for free.

    So yes, FTTP take-up is likely to be lower than availability in the UK simply because most people can get all they want from more 'traditional' media.

    This isn't to say that FTTP is a bad idea or not needed. It's just that it's needed more for the future than for the now..for most people. It would also be the most sensible way to address the minority of people who don't currently have an adequate service of any kind. Unfortunately those people are in that situation because they are not cost effective to provision. But if we want to jump up the FTTP league table then start rolling it out in the areas that are currently struggling on ADSL. But that will be expensive :-/

  6. Alan J. Wylie

    It doesn't help

    Virgin advertising "fibre" when it's actually copper coax to the premises (even if it is DOCSIS 3).

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: It doesn't help

      Maybe they count the woven copper sheath of the coax as "copper fibres"? Don't forget 99% of Virgin Media employees are sales and marketing dweebs, and they wouldn't know.

    2. Baldrickk

      Re: It doesn't help

      Virgin advertise "Fibre" which is FTTC. They offer speeds of up to 300Mbs which is perfectly attainable by the coax running the last few of tens of metres to your property. You can get 1Gbs over Cat5e/Cat6 copper cables (Cat6 will do 10Gbs)

      Nowhere do Virgin claim they do FTTP, and I fail to see where the problem lies here.

      1. rh587

        Re: It doesn't help

        Nowhere do Virgin claim they do FTTP, and I fail to see where the problem lies here.

        Mostly because it's confusing and misleading. Although apparently it's not according to ASA.

        Nonetheless, a work colleague who is of a less technical inclination swears blind that he has fibre optic in his house. His "wifi box" plugs into the phone socket and BT never came and dug up his garden or drilled holes in his walls, but behind that socket fibre has somehow magically crystallised from naught and he will not be convinced otherwise.

        Were I trying to sell a legitimate full-fat FTTP product, I would find BT and VM's misleading advertising to be deeply problematic.

      2. Roland6 Silver badge

        Re: It doesn't help

        >Cat6 will do 10Gbs

        But only reliably over 50 metres, by the time you've allowed for drop cables, that is really only 30~40 metres wall-port-to-wall-port.

        Been having this problem with installers, who being used to the 100 metre/1Gbps constraint, haven't appreciated the difference between 1 and 10 - it's all Gigabit Ethernet to them...

      3. really_adf

        Re: It doesn't help

        > Nowhere do Virgin claim they do FTTP, and I fail to see where the problem lies here.

        I think the point is that if FTTC is sold as "fibre", how do you differentiate FTTP (for the lay person)?

        See also "HD ready".

        1. Paul Shirley

          Re: It doesn't help

          Start by observing vanishingly few ordinary users have any need for FTTP performance, won't have that need for years and stop trying to sell it hard. A lot of users have a need for a better connection than the wet string BT gives them. FTTP has a place renewing tired old infrastructure, quietly without the hype.

          1. psychonaut

            Re: It doesn't help

            rotten string??

            you were lucky.

            have to make do with twine in some places round here.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: It doesn't help

      >Virgin advertising "fibre" when it's actually copper coax to the premises (even if it is DOCSIS 3).

      Indeed but better than BT's FTTC which connect your house to the cabinet with rotten, wet string.

  7. StephenTompsett

    False advertising!

    Why is any company allowed to use the term Fibre if it doesn't actually connect to the end user. An inch of fibre followed by half a mile of damp string isn't a Fibre connection!

    1. chivo243 Silver badge
      Coffee/keyboard

      Re: False advertising!

      @StephenTompsett

      ...followed by half a mile of damp string isn't a Fibre connection!

      Too funny! Too true too!

    2. Pen-y-gors

      Re: False advertising!

      https://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/12/13/adsl_signal_passed_through_wet_string/

    3. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

      Re: False advertising!

      An inch of fibre followed by half a mile of damp string isn't a Fibre connection!

      But where do you draw the line? If the Fibre stops at the modem and has copper/wifi to the PC, is it still "Fibre"? What if the Fibre stops at the pole 10m down the path? 100m? The cabinet 500m away?

      Most people really don't care, they just want "fast enough" Internet, and they aren't going to pay more than they need to for clever technology that they don't understand anway.

      1. jonfr

        Re: False advertising!

        @ Phil O'Sophical, You can get fibre LAN card in the computer. But those are expensive (up to $599) and that would require a different modems than are in use today. Normal Ethernet works today at the speed of 1Gbps or more (depending on hardware and cables in use) even if it is a copper connection.

        Most of my LAN is at 1Gbps and I have 100Mbps fibre connection in Denmark (until I move to Iceland, then I'll be switching to VDSL connection).

        1. Phil O'Sophical Silver badge

          Re: False advertising!

          @ Phil O'Sophical, You can get fibre LAN card in the computer. But those are expensive (up to $599) and that would require a different modems than are in use today. Normal Ethernet works today at the speed of 1Gbps or more (depending on hardware and cables in use) even if it is a copper connection.

          Yes, I'm well aware of that, we have racks of the stuff, Fibre, 10G and 1G, in the server room beside me. It's not something the average home user wants, need, or cares about, though and nor does it change the question. Almost no "Fibre" connection is 100% fibre, so why nitpick on the name as long as you're getting sufficient performance at a suitable price?

      2. rh587

        Re: False advertising!

        But where do you draw the line? If the Fibre stops at the modem and has copper/wifi to the PC, is it still "Fibre"? What if the Fibre stops at the pole 10m down the path? 100m? The cabinet 500m away?

        An otherwise unqualified "Fibre" product should comprise solely of fibre between the ISP backbone and the CPE. i.e. the entire product that they are providing is operated over fibre. Anything else is a a hybrid product and should be advertised as such - whether it's G.Fast (FTTDP), FTTC, ADSL with fibre to the exchange, or dial-up with a short length of fibre between the modem bank and the ISDN backbone.

        What happens after the Demarc/CPE is then of no relevance - whether people then connect to it using wifi, ethernet, token ring, MoCA/Coax or "other".

    4. AndrueC Silver badge
      Meh

      Re: False advertising!

      Well technically even BT's DSL solutions are 99.9% fibre if you include all of the backhaul. It's only the last few hundred metres that are still copper ;)

      But yeah - I wish the ASA had stamped that out when VM first started it but instead they let it slide so BT joined in.

    5. jeffdyer

      Re: False advertising!

      Can you get optical fibre modems? No. So it has to convert to coax at some stage. 50m of coax on the end of a fibre is no loss.

      1. rh587

        Re: False advertising!

        Can you get optical fibre modems? No. So it has to convert to coax at some stage. 50m of coax on the end of a fibre is no loss.

        Nonsense. There's no shortage of CPE boxes that can be ordered with SFP cages instead of an RJ45, RJ11 or Coax socket. Genexis and Mikrotik are just two that come to mind.

      2. Cursorkeys

        Re: False advertising!

        "Can you get optical fibre modems? No. So it has to convert to coax at some stage. 50m of coax on the end of a fibre is no loss."

        Incorrect gibberish.

        I had a 1 Gbps FTTP connection with Gigaclear. It terminated straight onto a Genexis fiber modem via a normal SC connector (https://genexis.eu/product/hybrid/).

        No co-ax involved at any point, it was then gigabit ethernet over copper to the rest of the house.

    6. Richard Parkin

      Re: False advertising!

      “. An inch of fibre followed by half a mile of damp string isn't a Fibre connection”. Surely string is fibre?

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Better in Hull

    One thing KCOM have got right is in its monopoly area is that it has installed FTTP/FTTH. It's still ongoing but if you did a survey of just that area it would be ahead of the game with 75% coverage of its customer base so far.

    1. TonyWilk

      Re: Better in Hull

      Absolutely!

      Out here 6 miles from Hull, a mile to nearest village and we get 26.4Mbps

      Oh, sorry that's the upload speed... we get 227.9Mbps down :)

      (apologies for rubbing it in, we don't get much to crow about here in Latvia Hull )

    2. AndrueC Silver badge
      Meh

      Re: Better in Hull

      One thing KCOM have got right is in its monopoly area is that it has installed FTTP/FTTH.

      It's easier to fund when you know that you're going to get 100% of the profits. Both TalkTalk and Cityfibre also have a wholesale product but - as far as I know - it's unregulated so they can continue to charge whatever they feel they need. BT has no such luxury. If it's lucky Ofcom might give it a few years of freedom as it did with FTTC but sooner or later it will be told what to charge other CPs.

      It's quite right that BT should have Ofcom breathing down its neck but that must be a significant discouragement to investment.

  9. jonfr

    Iceland speeds

    Many people in Iceland get a minimum of 50Mbps over VDSL or VDSL2 connection. Most of the capital area now has fibre connection or is going to be connected soon. Remote areas (farms) are being connected to a fibre in the summer since it is cheaper and better than using the old copper lines for VDSL connection. The plan in Iceland is that minimum speed is going to be at least 100Mbps by 2020 or 2022 (not sure what year is the official guideline).

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Over 80% FTTP in Jersey

    At least according to JT in marketing materials at https://www.jtglobal.com/Jersey/Personal/JT-Fibre/

    I've been using it since 2012, and was the first gigabit fibre customer, but I guess we're not in the EU, only the EEA, so wouldn't be included. Shame!

  11. Daz555

    Do VM qualify as fibre given the last leg to the house is always a big chunky bit of coax? For it to be fibre do I need a flashing red cable to actually terminate in my house?

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Apparition??

    Ronan, either you're letting Brussels lobbyists put words in your mouth, or you've been out there too long yourself.

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The biggest cause of inertia

    is money...

    Fibre rollout is expensive. It will need long term investment to deliver regardless of how ubiquitous its need/take up becomes.

    Shareholders like short term guaranteed returns...This is not compatible.

    I am sure you could build out a national fibre network (if you could afford it) and in 10 years time you would have bought out BT and stripped them of copper and have enough money to start competing with Apple in starting a new form of corporate "state" wealth.

    This will never happen, as shareholders will not wait 10 years for a return...

    1. rh587

      Re: The biggest cause of inertia

      The biggest cause of inertia

      is money...

      Fibre rollout is expensive. It will need long term investment to deliver regardless of how ubiquitous its need/take up becomes.

      As true as this is, it boggle the mind why BT are still doing new-build copper installs. A BT engineer friend tells me it's just whatever the developer wants to pay for - they'll do copper (VDSL), or Copper+Fibre or pure fibre as requested.

      Were I in a position of power in DCMS, I would seek legislation to render it illegal to offer a solely copper product - a minimum is FTTP and if they want to install a POTS copper line as well, then that's an option. But fibre-first. Were legislation not an option then simply make any sort of funding under BDUK conditional on the operator discontinuing copper-only products. It is insane that BT are installing obsolete technology - presumably in the hope that the Government will pay them to dig it up and install fibre in 10 years time.

      Retrofits are expensive, but the price differential between rolling fibre or copper to a new-build housing estate is zero. All the cost is in digging the trenches and drilling holes in walls (i.e. people. Payroll is expensive). Actual fibre costs very little.

      1. AndrueC Silver badge
        WTF?

        Re: The biggest cause of inertia

        As true as this is, it boggle the mind why BT are still doing new-build copper installs. A BT engineer friend tells me it's just whatever the developer wants to pay for - they'll do copper (VDSL), or Copper+Fibre or pure fibre as requested.

        Yup. It's entirely down to the developer to request the infrastructure they want. And for a couple of years now BT have been doing FTTP for the same cost as twisted pair copper. Frankly if I was in the market for a new build I'd refuse to consider a property if it wasn't FTTP. Unfortunately it seems most people just don't care so builders just keep on doing things the way they always have. I think that FTTP should have been the legal requirement for many years now.

        Unfortunately there is one possible reason why it isn't. FTTP was installed on some sites in the early 00s. Unfortunately it didn't support data (presumably only video) so the developers and/or residents had to pay for a twisted pair overlay so that they could use DSL.

        Maybe that burnt enough fingers to put some developers off the idea completely.

        1. Roland6 Silver badge

          Re: The biggest cause of inertia

          >FTTP was installed on some sites in the early 00s. Unfortunately it didn't support data

          Probably because the exchange and/or street cabinet wasn't fibre enabled...

          One of the (few) good things to come out of the BDUK programme is that BT has no excuse to not have fibre enabled all of it's exchanges and the vast majority of its street cabinets. Plus, a new development can convert a "not economically viable cabinet upgrade" into a viable upgrade, particularly if the development is for 28+ houses (ie. above BT's default threshold for FTTP on new developments).

          So if your cabinet is still languishing in ADSL hell, I suggest you, and your neighbours, individually submit comments on any new development planning application stipulating that planning permission should only be granted if the development has an operational FTTP service installed...

    2. AndrueC Silver badge
      Meh

      Re: The biggest cause of inertia

      10 year return? You should be so lucky. It's probably more like 20 years. And for the 'final 10%' it could be never.

  14. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not surprised...

    And I've been stuck at half a Megabit for nearly a year now...

  15. David Roberts
    Windows

    Picking up a few points

    "If the clowns at Ofcom don;t address this soon, then people getting new Talktalk, Vodafone or Cityfibre connections will be permanently locked into single ISPs providing high speed broadband at whatever price they like. Customers of Virgin Media will be familiar with the "benefits" of this lock in, such as appalling customer service, ineffective technical support, a monopoly mindset, and rampant price increases. And once an area has one high speed broadband network, who would invest to duplicate that? Nobody in their right mind."

    and

    "One of the main reasons given by Openreach for not immediately running FTTP into every building in the country is the cost - they have a point, digging up roads, sending blokes up poles with reels of stuff all cost money. Billions."

    So riddle me this. I have a VM fibre/coax service and have had for years. I've always found their customer service (at least for line faults) to be outstanding. Same for previous house half way across the country for 4 years. None of this crap about charging for an engineer's visit either. I think the service you get very much depends on your local office. My package is good for 200 Mb/sec but I'd have to agree to a Superhub 3 so I am staying on my original Superhub with a solid 160 Mb/sec and sometimes more. Currently looking at a free upgrade to our old Tivo which is getting a bit long in the tooth.

    I was prompted to look for alternatives because the local telephone poles have recently sprouted (via cherry picker) reels of black something and a black block with loads of sockets on the top. The contractors said it was fibre but they didn't know when the tails would be pulled back to the exchange.

    Online checking also shows that my location is supplied with FTTC, which implies that there is already ducting running fibre, although not that it has any spare capacity.

    Trying to track down a ready date established that nobody apart from Openreach knows anything about this. One person said that if you had FTTC available it was very unlikely they would roll out FTTP as well. I have a query in with OR and they say that they will get back to me within 28 days.

    Anyway, in my specific instance it looks as though fairly shortly I may have the choice of VM, FTTC and FTTP.

    Which suggests that the quotes above may not apply to everywhere.

    To my cynical mind it also suggests that OR may be rushing out some installs in quick and easy locations (very close to the exchange, fibre already run to the local cabinets) for a quick win in the numbers game so they look to be ahead of the competition.

  16. EuKiwi

    Surprised Germany isn't higher...

    I live in a very small town in rural Bavaria... and I have 500Mbps down, 50mbps up...

    Having said that, it's up to the local councils whether or not to invest the money into upgrading etc. They do get a very large chunk paid for by the state, but still it's not an insignificant chunk of cash they have to find.

  17. GlasshalfHull

    KCOM have more FTTP subscribers than DSL subscribers in its regulated area. Their first step was installing the fibre to pass the majority of homes and premises (and filling in the significant gaps will still take time), but getting a majority of customers to move to FTTP is already a fantastic success.

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    May the UK needs ration coupons for fibre.

    After all, half the population apparently want to return to the "good old days".

  19. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Mandate Fibre for new builds

    If every new build had to incorporate fiber from the house to a central point on each new estate, the cost and benefit would be huge.

    Had we started this as a requirement when it was a possibility, then huge sections of the country would be covered.

    It’s cheaper to install when building and diggers are on site rather than any other time.

    The street cabinets could allow connection to the telcos to allow a choice of providers onto their own networks and removes the last mile issue for households.

  20. GlasshalfHull

    OFCOM still require copper

    I believe OFCOM still require a copper connection be delivered to each building to meet the universal service obligation. So, neither BT nor KCOM will yet be able to deliver just fibre to any new build, whereas other carriers will not be tied down by that.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: OFCOM still require copper

      The same attitude as the Academic committee that blocked the patenting the solid state in fibre erbium amplifier (EDFA), a patent that would have earned that University an absolute fortune, "who wants fibre, copper's perfectly good enough".

  21. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Fibre? Well maybe.

    OK I'll be up front with this, I work in the University Dept that has been behind some of the key advances in fibre, I've also worked for BT marine on sub-sea fibre, and Pirelli cables in the distant past. The thing that killed the advance of FTTH (FTTP) was the bean counters, the amount of 'dark fibre' put in during big projects for future expansion that wasn't being lit meant they couldn't see the point of keeping production capacity and closed down both cable manufacturing and a lot of research funding. Now there's a renewed drive there's a significant shortfall in cable production capacity in Europe, so he who has the deepest pockets and pays the premium gets the fibre. Will we ever get universal FTTH, without significant investment, probably not, it's got to be worthwhile for those investing in the fibre and if the returns aren't coming in the bean counters will fight installing more, just like before.

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