Switching from FTTC to FTTP

[Gurke and Hare]

I know that when you change your FTTC broadband supplier, the new supplier will give notice to your existing supplier as they are taking over the physical connection so they have to, but if I order an FTTP connection will they give notice to my existing supplier as well? After all, I could theoretically have both connections running couldn't I?

[Sebastian Cobb]

Using Plusnet blurb as an example, but it should be the same for any provider:

Move to a new provider
For most moves you don't need to let us know. Just set everything up with them and they'll tell us when to switch your Plusnet service off.

Moving to Virgin or someone not on the Openreach network? You will need to tell us. Your Plusnet account will only close once your new service has been set up.

https://www.plus.net/help/my-account/thinking-of-leaving/

So it'll depend who owns the FTTP network. If it's still Openreach the automatic migration should work as it does for FTTC/ADSL, but if it's someone like CityFibre, I think you might have to.

Where I live they seem to be installing both Openreach and CF. They apparently have the same (assymetric) subscriber contention ratios, but Openreach have a hard asymmetric cap on the upload whereas CF is symettrical, so you can get a faster "burst" upload providing lots of other subscribers aren't uploading at the same time. Making it a better offering imo.

[Gurke and Hare]

Thanks, that makes sense.

Also, I definitely need gigabyte fibre, right? There's no point living really with crappy 500 meg download speeds is there?

[Sebastian Cobb]

Depends on concurrent use really. I only bothered with 100mbit in the end because besides torrenting, nothing I do would saturate it.

[seepage]

I may have missed the window of opportunity to upgrade to BT FTTP as BT are now rolling out 'new EE' instead. BT FTTP packages are shown for my address as a new customer but not for my account, only an offer to renew my FTTC current contract at the same high price (why would I do that?). I'm reluctant to go 'new EE' as I think you have to return the BT-branded kit to be replaced with EE-branded, even though they are identical internally.

^{(Also I have a suspicion that the voice charge has gradually been rolled into the base broadband charge but I'd have to look at old bills to prove it. e.g. a month ago removing voice PAYG would save £5/mo but now it's £3 although my total bill is the same. Time to go on the BT forums.)}

[Sebastian Cobb]

I'm with Vodafone. I think despite being a big mobile network they're still growing as an ISP. No problems so far and being a small ISP it seems that copyright holders don't bother to include them on injunctions so all the torrent sites and that aren't blocked like they were when I was with Virgin (it's trivial to work around of course, but nice I don't even need to bother).

[seepage]

If I have to change kit at some point anyway I might switch to Sky and pay £7.50/mo to keep my BT email address - the total would probably still be half what I'm currently paying BT for FTTC 

[Gurke and Hare]

the torrent sites and that aren't blocked like they were when I was with Virgin

Ooh, thanks for that - Vodafone are one of the ones I've got in consideration and that's a point in their favour.

[Sebastian Cobb]

Ooh, thanks for that - Vodafone are one of the ones I've got in consideration and that's a point in their favour.

Dunno if you plan to use your own equipment but if not their own router is pretty much fine and configurable. Can have a guest network and lets you set your own DNS (I have it pointed at pihole). I mean to replace it with an edgerouter but haven't got around to setting it up, but it seems like you can use your own gear, just need to speak to an agent on the live chat to get the creds to put into it.

[Gurke and Hare]

I don't plan to use my own router, but now that you mention it, how many wired ports does theirs have?

[Sebastian Cobb]

I don't plan to use my own router, but now that you mention it, how many wired ports does theirs have?

4 dedicated lan ports as the input/wan is separate. It has phone jacks for voip calling if you need it (I can't be arsed) and can have 4g backup if you want (also couldn't be arsed).

[Gurke and Hare]

Followup question: I've got an engineer coming round in the afternoon, will the old internet stay on till he gets there or is there a chance it will get turned off before?

[canadagoose]

Dunno if you plan to use your own equipment but if not their own router is pretty much fine and configurable. Can have a guest network and lets you set your own DNS (I have it pointed at pihole). I mean to replace it with an edgerouter but haven't got around to setting it up, but it seems like you can use your own gear, just need to speak to an agent on the live chat to get the creds to put into it.

That's good to know - we're with BT just now and have 1Gb FTTP (we have no copper line here because it's a pretty new house) but the lack of DNS configurability is annoying. Could just get another router but we have the mobile backup which only works with the BT router.

Edit: either way we're not out of contract until June 2025, so it doesn't matter much.

[greencalx]

We're in the process of (hopefully) escaping Virgin's clutches and migrating to an Openreach FTTP service via an independent ISP. We'll see how it goes. Got a worrying email on Tuesday saying that some "unexpected" works needed to be done and this could take some time. Then someone turned up yesterday to perform the completely expected work of running a fibre cable from the telegraph pole to our house so not exactly sure what's going on.

[greencalx]

All up and running now.

The engineer turned up this morning, and replaced our legacy copper phone socket with a fibre modem. We established that the router was letting me access the internet and then she disappeared. At which point I got a text saying that the engineer was working on the installation away from the property, which I ignored because as far as I was concerned it was all good. And then when I logged into the router to peruse its settings, it invited me to upgrade the firmware...

...after which it seemed no longer able to connect to the internet. Tried a few different things, but then it sprung back as I got another text saying that the work had finished. My hunch is that it was initially set up in some sort of test mode, and then switched over to the real thing. (Possibly you don't need the PPPoE username and password in the first instance, to make any problems with the setup easier to diagnose.)

Although the speed is in principle the same as the outgoing Virgin connection, it seems to peak a bit lower, although it's getting a bit faster each time I try it, so I wonder if there's some adaptive stuff going on to optimise the connection. The wifi sync rate with the router is insane, though, thanks to finally being able to break free of no-name ISP-supplied gear. Pages here seem to be loading faster despite this - I suspect because less is getting in the way.

Virgin have been calling me daily to try and keep me as a customer. I've not been answering the calls as I wanted to be sure the new connection was working before burning any bridges... We'll see if they call again. I had to go through two retentions agents, each of whom followed the same script after I was passed from one to the other, to get them to accept that I wanted to move on.

[seepage]

Got BT FTTP yesterday, a week after ordering. Was worried as people on the BT forum said some engineers won't route optical cable over a door frame as there is a max bend radius but mine tacked it on the front of the frame so that wasn't an issue.

Install inside was very quick but had to wait a bit for another van with a hoist to arrive to connect to the telegraph pole, even though the broadband checker did say 'hoist required'. The ONT modem is a teeny weeny 3" square and different to any of the models on Openreach's site. They left the old master socket in place.

Ordered 150 Mbps and think got 500 Mbps free for a month to tempt me to pay more but it's currently on 1,000 Mbps and Steam downloads at 550 Mbps. Xbox app 350 Mbps and torrenty thing 250 Mbps. So maybe sweet spot is currently 300 Mbps but that package wasn't available even though Openreach says it should be.         

EDIT: apparently the router manager status page will always show the max modem speed e.g. 1,000 Mbps, regardless of the actual speed

[Gurke and Hare]

Had my installation this week too. I was panicking slightly as I was worried the Openreach engineers would look at the icy ground and say "Ooh, can't put ladders up there, far too slippery" but no problems and I'm now on a lovely fast 200 Mbps.

I meant to watch to see, but how do they get the line from the pole to the house these days? Do they use a drone or something? The ground level route from the pole to my house is through people's gardens.

[Sebastian Cobb]

I live in a tenement, so when they did the run they cabled the whole block and ran it up the close in galvanised trunking. There's a blanking plate above your door that's about the size of a double socket.

They just ran Hyperopic the same way (although reused the Virgin trunking for that) so we've got at least two networks, think openreach might be available or on the way. Seems a bit excessive really.

Hyperopic looks better value although I think I might be locked in to a 12 or 18 month contract.

[seepage]

I'm now on a lovely fast 200 Mbps.

I meant to watch to see, but how do they get the line from the pole to the house these days? Do they use a drone or something? The ground level route from the pole to my house is through people's gardens.

what package are you on, as I thought there was just 150, 300, 500 Mbps etc. but nothing in between?

Another van with a cantilevered hoist pulled up for mine, so perhaps that could reach over?

[Sebastian Cobb]

When did we start calling them 'cantilever hoists' instead of 'cherry pickers'!?

[seepage]

I thought a cherry picker might be something smaller but apparently not

[greencalx]

I wasn't here for the first leg of our install, so not sure how they ran the fibre from the pole to the house. It ran alongside the existing phone line so wondering if they put a pulley on it or something.

I took my time moving all the devices over to the new connection. Maybe a bit unnecessary but needed to change the topology of the wired network due to the router now being in a different place. This also makes the second access point (originally added to avoid having to deal with the shitty virgin hub) essential for connectivity across the house. Needed to carefully check that all the links in the chain were running at full speed (one dodgy cable can bring the whole lot down to 100Mbs which defeats the point of a fast connection). All good and everything seems to be synching at the highest speed it's capable of.

For our needs the 300M package is at the price/speed sweet spot. Unless all three of us are downloading OS upgrades we're unlikely to notice.

[Gurke and Hare]

what package are you on, as I thought there was just 150, 300, 500 Mbps etc. but nothing in between?

I'm with Vodafone, not BT - it's called Full Fibre 200.

[greencalx]

One worry I had was whether overhead fibre would be robust to stormy weather. After last night I can confirm the answer is that it is.

[greencalx]

Came home last night surprised to find the Virgin service still operational, but it seems to have been duly disconnected overnight. After giving my notice to cancel, I was called almost every day for a period from a number that Google revealed to be Virgin's retention department. It just so happened that I was not in a position to take a call each time, so in the end they gave up and sent me a text with a "fantastic offer" of a £19 broadband deal - although the speed wasn't specified, nor how long that deal might be in place for. So it seems that if you want to bargain with them at the end of your contract, the way to do it is to cancel and wait for them to call back.

I was actively wanting to leave, though, as I wasn't particular impressed with the stability of the connection, the quality of the router hardware, the hopeless customer service and the fact that they massively whacked up the bill mid-contract, having agreed a half-decent price when it was renewed. But I know people who are very happy with their connection, so it probably depends on where you are.

Back on topic... the new FTTP service is still great, serving a consistent speed close to the headline through several storms and an extended period of gale force winds. I guess it remains to be seen how the new ISP reacts in the event of any kind of problem arising, but initial impressions during the installation period were good. I'm glad to be back with an independent after a lacklustre experience with Sky and then Virgin - let's hope they don't get bought out like the last one I was with...

[Sebastian Cobb]

I don't think Virgin pestered me too much when I wanted out about 6 months ago. I used whatsapp and the guy on there was a bit of a pain, it was like breaking up with a needy partner, they were expressing faux concern as I'd downloaded shitloads and they were 'worried' my new fibre connection would be able to keep up. I just told them I valued the symmetry in the upload speeds more than the extra download they were trying to throw at me for more than what I'd signed up for anyway.

[greencalx]

Apparently WhatsApp is the best way to interact with VM, but I don't trust it enough to use it with people I don't personally know.

Our new connection is asymmetric, but that's not a big deal for me, as (according to the stats on the new connection) the ratio between data up and data down is about 1:10. I'm surprised it's even that high - most of the data up is bytes worth of HTTP requests and the odd email. I don't do offsite backups or anything like that. The general reliability and corporate awfulness was an issue though.