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Why do most ISP's use PPPOE? Anyway to get them to stop?

Anth

Super Pro Member
I wasn't sure which section of the forum to post this topic within. If this is the wrong area could it be moved please.

But my question is a general one, and that is why do most ISPs in the UK seem to want to use the very old and outdate PPPOE connection type? Is there any particular reason for this and would there be anyway they'd reconsider and switch to one of the newer and better connection types?

From what I understand, PPPOE is a connection type created during Dialup days and is now considered so outdated and inferior to newer types. In most other countries the switch away has happened, but not the UK.

You would think in particular when FTTP was released they would use this as their chance to move away from it. But nope, still stuck with it.

What would it take for an ISP to switch away from this?
 
The head of BT wholesale in a presentation some years ago publicly said he wanted to ditch PPPoE, so it is interesting it survived for FTTP, I suspect the ISPs are used to it and dont want to support multiple authentication types so persuaded BTw to keep using it.

This would also explain why CF ISPs commonly use it as well.

Given its rampant across the UK industry with only a few exceptions I dont see it changing sadly.
 
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The issue is that IPoE is not a direct equivalent to PPPoE and is in no way a replacement for it without the ability to authenticate users which is a key point of having PPPoE at all.

Making the choice is important and inability to agree a choice blocks the substitution.
 
My understanding is that PPPoE is very efficient in its usage of IPv4 space, but also if a customer moves across the country it's easy to move their static IP address with them in a way that may not be so simple in networks where you're allocating certain blocks to certain routers that exist in geographical locations.

PPPoE isn't a problem, there's no throughput loss with baby jumbo frames, and hardware that ISPs give you for free is cable of hardware accelerating it to the point that you still get wire-speed performance. If third-party devices aren't capable of PPPoE without a performance hit then that's a design flaw in those devices.
 
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Why do most ISP's use PPPOE?

Because it works just fine, and it's a long-established standard. In particular: the LCP, PAP/CHAP and IPCP negotiations are well standardised, without having to introduce fancy and provider-specific DHCP options. And it's convenient to tunnel: L2TP is PPP over IP.

If your broadband router can't process PPPoE efficiently, then you have a rubbish router.

Anyway to get them to stop?

No.

However, it's a free market: you are free to choose any of the ISPs which use IP/DHCP instead of PPPoE (the largest ones being Talktalk and Sky) if it matters that much to you.

Just remember that it matters not a zot to the vast majority of users, especially those who use the ISP-supplied router (which is most of them).

Note also that Openreach and BTW are agnostic to the protocol carried. They just carry layer 2 frames, although they add extra attributes when relaying PPPoE PADI and DHCP Discover frames to identify the physical line where the request is coming from.

Therefore, it's purely down to the ISP to choose which protocol to use. If they thought there were some competitive advantage in using IP/DHCP instead of PPPoE, then they would do so. Clearly, most don't.
 
The issue is that IPoE is not a direct equivalent to PPPoE and is in no way a replacement for it without the ability to authenticate users which is a key point of having PPPoE at all.

Making the choice is important and inability to agree a choice blocks the substitution.
Which is why I said its the reason we have stayed on PPPoE. Even this page states IPoE main drawback is when wholesaling is used.


It can replace PPPoE, and is much more commonly used outside of the UK, in addition we already have 3 major ISPs here using IPoE.

So because WKDRED didnt give you the answer you wanted it doesnt mean it cannot be used.

You can ask talktalk retail, sky and VM if you want to know how it could be done I suppose.

I picked up on the loaded question but took the bite just to confirm. :)
 
My understanding is that PPPoE is very efficient in its usage of IPv4 space, but also if a customer moves across the country it's easy to move their static IP address with them in a way that may not be so simple in networks where you're allocating certain blocks to certain routers that exist in geographical locations.

PPPoE isn't a problem, there's no throughput loss with baby jumbo frames, and hardware that ISPs give you for free is cable of hardware accelerating it to the point that you still get wire-speed performance. If third-party devices aren't capable of PPPoE without a performance hit then that's a design flaw in those devices.
So its effectively fine as long as we ignore the drawbacks.

Been inefficient on none specialist devices is a very big drawback, and its not highly efficient either.

Baby jumbo frames caused me some issues with certain endpoints so its not a 100% solution. It is effectively a hack.

I believe the main benefit of PPP something designed for dialup networking is the authentication system been easier to implement as an ISP, particularly when wholesaling. Its benefits arent for consumers.

L2TP is another example as I seen it mentioned in this thread, when I got my L2TP service from aaisp and was setting it up, I noticed there was very little documentation or discussions regarding it on the internet, when I brought it up in some networking communities the responses were along the lines because it is ancient, and I was recommended to ditch the provider which I refused, then the conclusion was it was used probably because it can use PPP authentication to make life easier for the ISP.

So the answer to the question of this thread is almost certainly it makes it easier for ISPs as they want to authenticate their customers, not efficiency (its inefficient) or performance (it needs specialised devices to be performant).
 
when I got my L2TP service from aaisp and was setting it up, I noticed there was very little documentation or discussions regarding it on the internet,
L2TP is for experts only. It's normally deployed *within* an ISP to route broadband traffic to where it's needed, or between ISPs.

But it's basically just PPP encapsulated in IP datagrams.

In this case, it allows you to use AAISP as your "ISP" without actually having a physical connection to their network. Instead you carry your PPP session over the Internet, via some other provider, to hit AAISP's BRAS. It works conceptually like dialup, but you are using the Internet itself as the medium over which you "dial", rather than the phone network.
the conclusion was it was used probably because it can use PPP authentication to make life easier for the ISP.
In the specific case of the AAISP L2TP service, which operates across the open Internet, there *must* be some way to perform authentication - so that random users can't pretend to be you, and set up tunnels to capture your IP traffic.
 
So the answer to the question of this thread is almost certainly it makes it easier for ISPs
Absolutely correct. It gives them a lot of flexibility too, in how they route their broadband traffic.

For example, if an incoming PPP session arrives at a BRAS, and during authentication the RADIUS server finds that the user has a static IP address, it can send back special RADIUS attributes which tell this BRAS to tunnel the traffic (via L2TP) to a different BRAS which is dedicated to handling static IP customers.

PPP is also widely used in wholesale networks, where a user's PPPoA or PPPoE session is turned into L2TP over a provider interconnect to get the traffic from the wholesale network into the end-user's ISP.

"Making it easier for ISPs" translates into better and/or lower cost products to customers. (I don't think Sky or Talktalk Resi will sell you a service with a static IP address, for instance).
 
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Absolutely correct. It gives them a lot of flexibility too, in how they route their broadband traffic.

For example, if an incoming PPP session arrives at a BRAS, and during authentication the RADIUS server finds that the user has a static IP address, it can send back special RADIUS attributes which tell this BRAS to tunnel the traffic (via L2TP) to a different BRAS which is dedicated to handling static IP customers.

PPP is also widely used in wholesale networks, where a user's PPPoA or PPPoE session is turned into L2TP over a provider interconnect to get the traffic from the wholesale network into the end-user's ISP.

"Making it easier for ISPs" translates into better and/or lower cost products to customers. (I don't think Sky or Talktalk Resi will sell you a service with a static IP address, for instance).

Sky were doing IPoE with static IP when I was with them, they carried over the feature for ex ukonline customers hence I knew it was possible to lock it to users without PPP.
 
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In OFNL PPPoE seems to be useless. You sign with one of their resellers but in fact internet and IP address is being supplied by OFNL itself not the reseller. Moreover when I moved in to my new home and plugged my laptop to ONT for the first time it just worked without any PPPoE. I've been told later to configure PPPoE with something like resellername/resellername credentials and had to lower MTU on my static VPN links.
 
PeGV9Ff.png

Anyway to reveal that PW?
 
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