What broadband speed are you getting?

[rich1068]

And what tangible benefits does the massive increase give?

A quiet life.

 

[G7Wagen]

Full Fiber

 

[HappytalkAgain]

Haven’t a scooby what the results mean but here you go.

 

[ALFAitalia]

I have TalkTalk 65 fibre....they guarantee 50 minimum.....whenever I check I'm getting around 57 to 60....so that's fair enough. More than enough for me to watch HD TV and my son to game on Fortnite in Hi Res at the same time with my wife on her phone facebooking her friends. We used to have 2 meg until about a year ago as there was no fibre in our local exchange and all the phone cabling is underground (rather than on poles) and old and that was about the limit....so much better now......but not as much faster in actual use than you might think. TV used to work fine on two mb (non HD) even though it was supposed to need 5 minimum.

 

[flying haggis]

on FTTP in Rural Norfolk

 

[fourwheels]

I have TalkTalk 65 fibre....they guarantee 50 minimum.....whenever I check I'm getting around 57 to 60....so that's fair enough. More than enough for me to watch HD TV and my son to game on Fortnite in Hi Res at the same time with my wife on her phone facebooking her friends. We used to have 2 meg until about a year ago as there was no fibre in our local exchange and all the phone cabling is underground (rather than on poles) and old and that was about the limit....so much better now......but not as much faster in actual use than you might think. TV used to work fine on two mb (non HD) even though it was supposed to need 5 minimum.

You are not a million miles from us and all our fibre phone cabling is underground (under the roadside footpath) then copper under the front garden to a point well inside the house. They are overcoming those problems on the other side of our estate by planting new wooden telephone poles in the pavement and running overhead fibre directly to the gutter area of the house.
Just hope they don’t decide to plant a pole directly in front of our house (they seem to give very little notice). The next argument will be as to how they will get their fibre cable through the house to the existing BT termination point. The outside of the house is also tile hung just to make the task more interesting.

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

 

[markjay]

I am currently in the South of Italy, where most residential areas had FTTP for nearly 10 years now (it's just being rolled-out in London as we speak....):

 

[190]

And what tangible benefits does the massive increase give?

There will be some who need the high speeds and use it but also some that don't in which case it's just a case of mines bigger than yours. It's like thinking you need 300 BHP to drive the kids to school. It's a quite a few years ago now but I used to run a whole school network on the higher speeds mentioned here.

I'm on Plusnet fibre to the cabinet and get a reliable 29Mbps which is a little better than advertised for £25/month. I have no earthly need for anything faster at the moment. If it streams HD then that's all I want and in any practical sense I'd notice precious little difference if it was only half that speed. When I'm staying at either of my sons houses who have 60 or 70 Mbps I notice zero difference in the way my laptop performs. When I need to stream 4k then that will be the time to pay for something faster.

 

[Swotty]

French prices make Brits gulp but you are where you are. Only other people living in France can throw light on that.

For private use, any speed faster than 50 mb is normally irrelevant. Is your provider offering a slower speed through the cable? If the most you want to do is watch video feeds, 50's plenty.

Your router problem is a red herring. You'll get a new Super Duper router with the connection, your old one won't be up to the job. The new one will offer faster protocols. Just ask your neighbour what happens with their router and speed loss through their walls. Beyond their recommended fast router, there's also an option of Mesh WIFI, but worry about that if, as and when.

Specifically answering your question, people don't "split" a fibre cable, assuming it's FTTH or FTTP (same thing: end to end fibre). If you want two connections, you get two fibre connections. But see above.

It's only with FTTC (Fibre to the (Roadside) Cabinet) that you might do multiple copper connections between your home and the "Cabinet" down the road. But from what you've said about that 850mb speed and price, I'm sure you've been offered FTTH.

Don't understand your passing comment about cabling running overground from the roadside: do you mean risk of damage?

It's five decades since I debugged some TC code for IBM Hursley, so I've seen TC speeds improve a bit. But the folk on here have all kinds of arcane knowledge.

Thanks - we're signed up to the "up to 1 Gb" package which we've never attained and the 870 Mb is the SpeedTest figure which matches the router one.

Yes, we have a super-duper new router but the property is quite rambling, being 2 knocked into 1 and part of the new area is still bereft after several thick stone walls. The neighbour has a much smaller property. We can get 2 cables in, but they want to charge us for 2 lines!

The overground cables - especially the 'leccy - have a habit of cutting out in the high winds we sometimes get here. The broadband posts are a mixture of new and old, so crossed fingers!

I agree that the speeds we're getting sound impressive but, as you say, are probably excessive for what we need. I remember - not too long ago - that we were happy to have 2 Mb which was the benchmark for online tv.

I just wondered, in my ignorance, if it was a simple job to split the signal where it enters the property and put in an extra router. I have a friend who installs wifi extensions for a living, so will see what he suggests.

 

[whitenemesis]

Super high speeds are all well and good but ultimately it's the website bandwidth you're visiting that determines the download speed, surely?

 

[rich1068]

Super high speeds are all well and good but ultimately it's the website bandwidth you're visiting that determines the download speed, surely?

You're quite right. Try explaining to a 10yo that the reason Roblox is slow is nothing to do with "our" internet and the fact it might have been quicker at a friend's house is nothing to do with their BT/Sky/whoever connection but sheer luck.

To answer your earlier question in a little more detail, I have to download large files regularly, my wife works from home and manages a national team via Zoom/Teams, we have a 15yo, 12yo and 10yo in the house and we stream 4k UHD to more than one screen via Sky Stream. Full fibre is absolutely rock steady and coupled with the very reliable Zen Internet being the provider only costs a little more than their FTTC.

 

[Dippo]

I just wondered, in my ignorance, if it was a simple job to split the signal where it enters the property and put in an extra router. I have a friend who installs wifi extensions for a living, so will see what he suggests.

A friend lives in an old stone French farmhouse in Limousin. He's got the really thick walls, and uses two separate routers linked by wire to ensure a signal throughout the property - you just log on to both, and your phone or tablet switches between the two as you move from room to room. He's a retired electronic engineer, so I suspect he knows more about these things than I do!

 

[MikeInWimbledon]

Thanks - we're signed up to the "up to 1 Gb" package which we've never attained and the 870 Mb is the SpeedTest figure which matches the router one.

Yes, we have a super-duper new router but the property is quite rambling, being 2 knocked into 1 and part of the new area is still bereft after several thick stone walls. The neighbour has a much smaller property. We can get 2 cables in, but they want to charge us for 2 lines!

The overground cables - especially the 'leccy - have a habit of cutting out in the high winds we sometimes get here. The broadband posts are a mixture of new and old, so crossed fingers!

I agree that the speeds we're getting sound impressive but, as you say, are probably excessive for what we need. I remember - not too long ago - that we were happy to have 2 Mb which was the benchmark for online tv.

I just wondered, in my ignorance, if it was a simple job to split the signal where it enters the property and put in an extra router. I have a friend who installs wifi extensions for a living, so will see what he suggests.

Ah, that puts it more in context. Apologies, I jumped to the wrong conclusion that your connection would be more primitive.

Your issue is internal distribution rather than line speed.

Solution is to look at improving wifi distribution or creating a distribution post router.

I’d talk to the provider about their recommendations for wifi networking, or call in a local WiFi techie.

See Fabes’ comments about creating a Nest 6 WiFi network. That might work alone, or could work with a wired connection between two ends of the house.

Running in a second “motorway” because of a blockage at a run-off seems unnecessary, but I know why it’s tempting.

Ps You lucky, lucky man….
(The property, not the cable)

 

[ChrisEdu]

I long for the day I can get FTTP, instead of just FTTC. I have three routers, plus a repeater dotted around the house to ensure decent coverage for all the gadgets that rely upon WiFi these days.

 

[Dickster]

I am currently in the South of Italy, where most residential areas had FTTP for nearly 10 years now (it's just being rolled-out in London as we speak....):

That’s typical of the UK. London has had pathetic internet for years. We had to have a dedicated leased line at work, at £300 plus pm, to get decent speeds.

 

[Dickster]

We are with zen. This is Wi-Fi in the living room - main router upstairs.

 

[Steveml63]

Hi,
Living in sunny Abu Dhabi - we are very lucky to have an amazing internet & mobile phone network.
Our home internet & TV package costs around £250 per month - but is far quicker than what we got in our UK place in a mid Wales village!
Fibre comes right into the cabinet in our house straight into a GPON unit - this is connected by Ethernet to our main Wi-Fi router downstairs.
We then send an Ethernet cable back from that router to the cabinet (there are multiple twin Ethernet wall sockets around the house).
In the cabinet we then have a 16 way gigabit Ethernet switch - which we patch to various socket outlets around the house.
Upstairs we have two further Wi-Fi routers (the walls are concrete and range is seriously impeded by these).
I just did a speed test on my iPad which is connected by Wi-Fi to the router in my upstairs office - results below:-



We get a great speed here - but it is expensive!
Cheers
Steve

 

[C220DLondon]

Thanks - we're signed up to the "up to 1 Gb" package which we've never attained and the 870 Mb is the SpeedTest figure which matches the router one.

Yes, we have a super-duper new router but the property is quite rambling, being 2 knocked into 1 and part of the new area is still bereft after several thick stone walls. The neighbour has a much smaller property. We can get 2 cables in, but they want to charge us for 2 lines!

The overground cables - especially the 'leccy - have a habit of cutting out in the high winds we sometimes get here. The broadband posts are a mixture of new and old, so crossed fingers!

I agree that the speeds we're getting sound impressive but, as you say, are probably excessive for what we need. I remember - not too long ago - that we were happy to have 2 Mb which was the benchmark for online tv.

I just wondered, in my ignorance, if it was a simple job to split the signal where it enters the property and put in an extra router. I have a friend who installs wifi extensions for a living, so will see what he suggests.

I would get these. They make a huge difference to WiFi stability and performance. You can set them up to have the same WiFi network id and password as a meshed WiFi network and should solve many of your thick wall problems.

https://www.argos.co.uk/product/951302

You can wire them together using standard Ethernet cables if they still don't penetrate the walls.

 

[AntC43]

circa 950Mb through a local Alt Net - Toob.

At £25pm i'm more than happy