BT Infinity & FTTx Discussion

Soldato
Joined
23 Aug 2005
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Beds
Hmmm quick question, I've got the engineer coming on Wednesday and just received this email from BT:



What does that mean exactly, any "existing wire-connected computer"? I'm guessing/hoping that doesn't apply in 99% of cases?

It means the modem has to go next to the master socket. If you currently have the modem connected to an extension sockets you will no longer be able to do this.
 
Soldato
Joined
22 Nov 2010
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5,712
cowboys.

BT webiste says i can get inifnity, openreach is showing that my exchange is accepting orders. ive just had a call from BT and theyre saying i cant get it. :confused::(
 
Man of Honour
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13 Oct 2006
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91,027
Straight after the install was done I was getting slightly higher downstream and slightly lower upstream than the estimated speeds. Due to some other issues it all fell apart and I was getting half the speeds I should - its slowly improving again now but still isn't quite as good as it was (its looking like the issues are as much saturation in the BT network tho as due to the other issues I was having).

My downstream is bouncing around 55-67MBit/s and upstream 12-13MBit/s when before it was 75Mbit/s down solid and 17MBit/s up and ping has gone from 15ms to 25ms.
 
Associate
Joined
18 Oct 2002
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463
Location
Cambridgeshire
Bit of advice on how to deal with what I believe to be a bit of a botched Infinity upgrade would be appreciated please.

Firstly, before the Infinity upgrade I had ADSL and everything was working perfectly. I had a master socket that my DSL modem was connected to (no phone connected to the other output) and a standard voice phone in another room on an extension.

On Friday a guy came from Openreach to upgrade to Infinity. The internet connection is working fine at the speed predicted. But, the phone on the extension socket now rings just once when a call is received. If I happen to hear it and pick it up then the voice call works fine and I can make outgoing calls no problem.

If I put the phone in the 2nd socket on the Openreach faceplate then it rings continuously.

I have spoken to BT "support" and they are saying they will charge me £99 to send out an engineer to fix it. I told them again and again that it worked before the Infinity upgrade but now doesn't.

He went on to say that the wiring might need to be reconfigured whatever that means and that the wiring to my house had been changed from copper to fibre!!!

How can this be my problem and be chargeable to me ? As far as I am concerned whatever the engineer did has stopped something working and I am not going to be paying for it.

Is there any other number you can call to argue the toss over this sort of thing?

Thanks
 
Associate
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Somewhere
if you have twitter send a message to @BTCare they will sort the situation out.

I wouldn't bother phoning BT, you could try the BT forums but they are kind of useless too.

Another option is to email Ian Livingstone of course might seem like over the top but it will get you results.
 
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Man of Honour
Joined
13 Oct 2006
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91,027
I'm afraid if the problem goes away with the phone directly connected to the master socket (or as you tried the faceplate) then it would seem to indicate the problem is your internal wiring which is ostensibly outside of BT's remit and any work done on it is chargeable.

You don't still have microfilters connected anywhere on the extension wiring do you?

BT support is however useless for anything other than simple problems you will have to escalate it either via twitter or contacting either Ian Livingstone or the head of openreach directly :( in this case tho I'd double check everything as it sounds more likely to be an internal problem rather than something from the master socket outwards.

EDIT: There may be some exceptions depending on how the extension is wired in.
 
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Associate
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463
Location
Cambridgeshire
I'm afraid if the problem goes away with the phone directly connected to the master socket (or as you tried the faceplate) then it would seem to indicate the problem is your internal wiring which is ostensibly outside of BT's remit and any work done on it is chargeable.

You don't still have microfilters connected anywhere on the extension wiring do you?

BT support is however useless for anything other than simple problems you will have to escalate it either via twitter or contacting either Ian Livingstone or the head of openreach directly :( in this case tho I'd double check everything as it sounds more likely to be an internal problem rather than something from the master socket outwards.

EDIT: There may be some exceptions depending on how the extension is wired in.

My issue though is that their engineer replaced the old ADSL faceplate with a new Openreach one and in doing so stopped the extension ringing properly. It worked before his visit and not afterwards.

My internal wiring was fine before the visit. Now it seemingly is not.

All he seemed to do while I watched was change the faceplate.

I am struggling to see how this can be anything other than something the engineer has done - Like leaving a wire unconnected for example.
 
Associate
Joined
10 Dec 2012
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205
Been reading through, gotten to page 200. :) Have a couple of questions for the thread:

1. My Master socket is at the front of the house (on the window sill of the living room) where the dropwire comes down to the window from the roof. However, the computer room is towards the rear of the house and one of its walls is an outside wall of the property. Would a BT engineer be allowed to reroute the dropwire around the side of the house so that the Master socket can be placed in the computer room?

2. After looking around at FTTC service providers, I'm thinking of going with Plus Net once my cabinet is enabled (31st December 2012 - here's hoping) and my contract with O2 expires (February 2013). What are people's experiences with Plus Net?

3. The BT 160Mb service. Given the price quoted, this obviously isn't FoD, so does it still require an FTTC-enabled cabinet, but extends the fibre line from the exchange in a "pass-through" to the premises, bypassing the VDSL DSLAM?

Many thanks. :)
 
Associate
Joined
24 Oct 2011
Posts
79
My issue though is that their engineer replaced the old ADSL faceplate with a new Openreach one and in doing so stopped the extension ringing properly. It worked before his visit and not afterwards.

My internal wiring was fine before the visit. Now it seemingly is not.

All he seemed to do while I watched was change the faceplate.

I am struggling to see how this can be anything other than something the engineer has done - Like leaving a wire unconnected for example.

Mine wouldn't let me keep any extension connected. Seems wise to me to try and get every last bit of line quality possible, and with cordless phones working so well and being so cheap, extensions are fairly pointless now anyway.
Base station in the master socket, extra phones in other places just requiring power, job done.
 
Man of Honour
Joined
13 Oct 2006
Posts
91,027
Been reading through, gotten to page 200. :) Have a couple of questions for the thread:

1. My Master socket is at the front of the house (on the window sill of the living room) where the dropwire comes down to the window from the roof. However, the computer room is towards the rear of the house and one of its walls is an outside wall of the property. Would a BT engineer be allowed to reroute the dropwire around the side of the house so that the Master socket can be placed in the computer room?

2. After looking around at FTTC service providers, I'm thinking of going with Plus Net once my cabinet is enabled (31st December 2012 - here's hoping) and my contract with O2 expires (February 2013). What are people's experiences with Plus Net?

3. The BT 160Mb service. Given the price quoted, this obviously isn't FoD, so does it still require an FTTC-enabled cabinet, but extends the fibre line from the exchange in a "pass-through" to the premises, bypassing the VDSL DSLAM?

Many thanks. :)

#1 Will depend a lot on the engineer - ostensibly they won't move the master socket unless theres another issue rather than just you wanting it moved, some of the infinity engineers aren't certified as telephony engineers and can't touch it anyway other than upgrading the faceplate. Some you can "bribe" with tea and cakes to do it and others will do it as chargeable work - but usually you will have to book it as an extra job either before or after the FTTC job is done. (Usually costs £99 or £130 depending on a few things).

#2 Plus.net used to be good back in the day but they've been rather mediocre of late not sure what the current state is tho.

#3 Is a bit more complicated as a lot of the details about the 160Mb product and the coming 100Mb product are subject to change at the moment and mostly in trial or limited roll out. AFAIK FoD will only be available in areas which have been FTTC enabled but require the presence of an "aggregation node" within a certain distance of the property bypassing the VDSL DSLAM.
 
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Soldato
Joined
2 Dec 2006
Posts
8,204
Hey guys. Virgin is being such a joke at the moment so I think I might switch to BT infinity. I would like to know though what the speed throtterling is actually like. My internet is cutting out every couple minutes and so it's kind of hard to research atm. Also, is the latency in games low?
 

KIA

KIA

Man of Honour
Joined
14 Nov 2004
Posts
13,782
Apparently there's a major fault on FTTC in the Basingstoke area.

Hmm, I wonder if it's affecting latency.

Code:
 5  217.41.168.207 (217.41.168.207)  120.987 ms  120.988 ms  121.126 ms
 6  217.41.168.109 (217.41.168.109)  95.874 ms  94.581 ms  91.568 ms
 7  acc2-10GigE-0-1-0-6.l-far.21cn-ipp.bt.net (109.159.249.222)  10.040 ms acc2-10GigE-0-0-0-6.l-far.21cn-ipp.bt.net (109.159.249.218)  41.073 ms 109.159.249.238 (109.159.249.238)  8.029 ms
 8  core1-te0-15-0-15.faraday.ukcore.bt.net (109.159.249.149)  13.500 ms core2-te0-0-0-16.faraday.ukcore.bt.net (109.159.249.131)  76.835 ms core1-te0-15-0-16.faraday.ukcore.bt.net (109.159.249.157)  138.279 ms
 9  peer3-te0-5-0-12.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net (109.159.254.197)  74.562 ms  74.541 ms peer3-te0-5-0-11.telehouse.ukcore.bt.net (109.159.255.107)  11.940 ms
10  linx.bandwidth.co.uk (195.66.225.123)  93.182 ms  95.371 ms  95.362 ms
11  rt1.chelt.gamingdeluxe.co.uk (217.146.94.10)  71.806 ms  72.294 ms  72.296 ms

:(
 
Associate
Joined
10 Dec 2012
Posts
205
Well I emailed the NGA Enquiries people and got this response:

In your locality work is ongoing as part of a later phase and the estimated date for cabinet 58 enablement is close May 2013 assuming there are no major issues. Please register your interest on the above webpage as this helps us assess local demand patterns

Many thanks

Peter Dean
[email protected]

At least now I can a) ignore the holding date, and b) take (small) comfort in the fact that "close May 2013" is not end of quarter, and is therefore not a holding date. I went looking for cabinet P58 along my road, but couldn't find any cabinet marked as such. However there are at least two FTTC cabs within walking distance. :)

Would it be safe to assume the "later phase" would be Phase 10a?
 
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