Openreach Trials New FTTP Broadband Speed Test for UK ISPs UPDATE

Network access provider Openreach (BT) has launched a new “speed test trial” for UK ISPs on their gigabit-capable Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) broadband network, which aims to make it easier for providers to identify the cause of speed issues by ruling out as many other potential variables as possible.

Some people probably think that new “full fibre” networks are impervious to speed issues, but that has never been true. Consumer broadband connections still share their capacity between many users (not uncontended) and network faults, at different points in the connection chain, do sometimes occur. But identifying the cause still requires some detective work, even if this is nowhere near as tedious as the many complex caveats seen on older copper lines.

In response, Openreach recently informed their FTTP ISPs about a forthcoming “speed test trial” (here), although both the public and private briefings for this are quite incredibly vague. Suffice to say, it’s taken me a few days of asking around to figure out precisely what the test was trying to achieve, but thanks to all the feedback we now have a pretty good idea.

The test itself appears to be a throughput speed test, which examines the link between the Optical Network Terminal (ONT) inside your home (example pictured) and a special tester in the Openreach network (i.e. L2S in the handover exchange). When conducted, the test essentially reroutes your line from the ISP’s switch in the handover exchange and sends the data packets to the Openreach tester instead (i.e. your connection will briefly go down for the duration of the test).

The test is thus able to rule out various potential causes, such as conflicting speed issues that may occur in the customer premises (e.g. problems with your broadband router, WiFi or Ethernet cables). Furthermore, it can also rule out some issues in the provider’s own network, such as those caused by capacity links (e.g. Cablelinks and backhaul), shaping problems on the Broadband Network Gateway (BNG) and so forth.

The downside is that it does require the end-user to agree to a brief disconnection of their service with the ISP, but this at least ensures that the connection isn’t being impacted by devices on the customer’s own network that might otherwise be utilising the bandwidth. Suffice to say, the new speed test trial could take a significant chunk out of the investigative workload and save everybody a lot of hassle.

At present this is only a trial, so we don’t know how long it will take to become a standard tool or even if that will occur (pending results from the trial). But it sounds like a useful option for both ISPs and Openreach to have in their toolbox.

UPDATE 10:40am

We’ve had a few extra details through from Openreach, which may help to answer some of the questions people have. Firstly, the test itself will take a few short minutes to complete and will push the connection speed up to 1Gbps.

The operator also noted that no change to the PON or ONT is required for this to work. As stated above, the objective is to identify if a customer’s speed issue is within the Openreach domain or the ISP/end customer’s domain. Openreach actually tested this approach before in December 2021, but they only did this with some of their employees.

Apparently, this is all being done as part of a new collaboration with VIAVI Solutions to automate testing the quality and speed of their FTTP network using Fusion, a virtual performance monitoring system. Fusion will effectively deliver an on-demand network “speedometer“, showing near real-time views of the speeds that end users can achieve.

Openreach claims this will be the first time that proactive network testing of end user speeds has been deployed in fibre access networks across the UK independent of the customer’s internet connection, although we haven’t yet had enough time to verify if that is indeed the case. Here’s the official blurb..

Openreach Statement

VIAVI Fusion incorporates both hardware and software, which will be used to rapidly isolate and troubleshoot faults on the network. Diagnostics will be automated for any issues as they’re raised by Openreach’s Communications Provider (CPs) customers.

In addition, customer service will be enhanced as contact center procedures will be automated, equipping operators with near real-time test results for rapid pass/fail interpretation. This allows further troubleshooting to be focused on the root cause, whether inside the Openreach network, or back with the CPs.

A key element of Fusion is its smart small form-factor pluggable (SFP) capability, enabling micro-probes plugged into thousands of nodes across the country. These probes enable automated throughput testing from all CPs ingress points to end-user premises, for millions of consumers. Now in its fourth generation of technology, VIAVI smart SFP technology supports 1G & 10G line rates across a variety of physical standards.

VIAVI has a long-standing relationship with Openreach and, in March 2021, they also began using the VIAVI Optical Network Monitoring System (ONMSi) for remote testing of the network.

Trevor Linney, OR’s Network Technology Director, said:

“As the country’s largest digital infrastructure provider, we recognise that service and broadband reliability has become more integral to everyday life especially when millions of people switched to working and schooling from home. Last year, we saw our broadband usage more than double with 50,000 Petabytes (PB) of data being consumed across the country.

We’re also seeing record of numbers of people signing up to our ultrafast, ultra-reliable Full Fibre broadband with over 1.5 million customers taking up the service to-date. It’s therefore crucial that we continue to meet our already strong service performance by identifying and preventing faults before customers report them. The deployment of VIAVI’s automate testing solution is one part of the overarching technical innovative solutions we’ve adapted to help determine potential issues we detect on our network in near real-time or when a request comes through from our CP customers.”

So there you have it.