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Types of broadband in UK

Andy Goss

Member
Having just returned to the UK after forty years in Australia I am confused about the types of broadband on offer, and can't match them to what is being done in our street.
According to the Openreach Fibre Checker we can get Standard Broadband, which I take to be the plain ADSL that we have installed, Superfast Fibre, which our ISP Plusnet sells in two flavours and is, I think, Fibre to the Cabinet, and we can't get Ultrafast FullFibre.
I have yet to see any big green boxes in the village, and there are now two small plastic lids in the pavement outside our house, rumoured to be three shortly. I can't match these lids to any of the technologies listed. I've looked for examples of these lids in image searches but all I see is green boxes and big pits.
Can anyone enlighten me?
 
https://bidb.uk/ appears to say that only Swish Fibre is in my street, though the other lid has Gigaclear on it. What I am curious about is the technology under the lid, as it does not seem to match any that are described. Cabling has been inserted into the ducting, so is this Full Fibre? The only descriptions I can find for this relate to properties that already have the cabling built in. In Australia we had Fibre To The Curb, which sounds a bit like G.fast.
Both Swish Fibre and Gigaclear are offering pre-ordering.
 
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The UK is a bit of a complex mess. There are many networks all down the country. A bunch sell services directly, the rest wholesale.

Both Swish Fibre and Gigaclear only sell full fibre (Swish are XGSPON, Gigaclear is point to point). Both companies sell their services directly.

The only company really dealing with non-fibre technologies is Openreach (there's KCOM in the Hull area too), and that's the services you will see from Plusnet.
 
Ah, so they are full fibre connections then. I'll wait and see who is number three. I'll be glad to see the back of this dropout-ridden ADSL.
 
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Time to fulfil a pre-order is unfortunately a bit of a case of how long is a bit of string, it infers that some part of the full end to end build of all the necessary components is not yet complete.

It might be worth asking your neighbours if they have any clue when Swish or Gigaclear are due to go live.

If you need some stopgap connectivity if you can survive on 4G/5G that's probably the best for a short period of time. If you would prefer to have something physical, there are a few resellers of ADSL using the Openreach (previously BT) copper phone line that will do that on a rolling monthly contract for a higher than usual monthly fee.
 
It's worth registering your interest with the relevant Altnets if they allow you to do so. If they have some sense they will have a process (either manual or automated) to communicate with said customers once their service can be ordered. As @plunet has said it's imposible to predict when will the service be enabled. It's goes from the same night, to a week, a month, a year, 2 years and in some cases never (ie the network decides some part of the build is too expensive and will not enable your street/house).
Aside from doing the above the only other thing you can do is check on the relevant altnet sites to try to order their service.
 
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It's worth registering your interest with the relevant Altnets if they allow you to do so. If they have some sense they will have a process (either manual or automated) to communicate with said customers once their service can be ordered. As @plunet has said it's imposible to predict when will the service be enabled. It's goes from the same night, to a week, a month, a year, 2 years and in some cases never (ie the network decides some part of the build is too expensive and will not enable your street/house).
Aside from doing the above the only other thing you can do is check on the relevant altnet sites to try to order their service.
Thanks. I'll keep an eye on the players and on https://bidb.uk/.
 
If they are offering Pre-ordering it may be worth getting your name down, my parents had a Gigaclear install a few years ago & there were some significant savings to be had by pre-ordering. Just a minor comment, (certainly in Gloucestershire) there are a small number of other ISPs who will supply over Gigaclear Fibre
 
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