BT: superfast broadband held back by home tech

[Simon]

BT says consumers and online services might need to upgrade their hardware if end users are to fully benefit from next-generation superfast broadband.

Showing off a 100Mbits/sec, Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) trial in Milton Keynes, BT representatives and engineers explained that pilot customers were sometimes confused when the new fibre connections appeared to be delivering speeds below expectations.

BT said that these next-generation connections - not the standard Fibre to the Cabinet or copper services rolled out to most users - are so fast that the bottleneck is not always on the network but could be in consumer hardware.

Read more: http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/broadband/362245/bt-superfast-broadband-held-back-by-home-tech

[esh]

People who don't really know the full technical details don't experience full potential of technology!? News at 11! Mostly this is due to the extremely cheap influx of home 'routers' since 2000 that have very weak processors but have done the job fine. But short of your router, what is there to truly hold it back? Is anyone still using 10M grade ethernet cable? Really? I doubt it (apart from where the last place I worked at, cough). Hard drives? They'll do 300Mbit/sec fairly easily unless it's a bottom end drive from a decade ago.

Or you certainly won't experience 100Mbit with the packet loss a few FTTC people here have had...

[Steve]

Still not moving to MK even though my FTTC has been put back 6 months .

[Simon]

There's a place there that does great food! 

[Steve]

You mean that there is ever some left over? Somehow I doubt it.

[Simon]

 

[Glenn]

Simon was talking about the chippy, Mitch recommended. 

[Lance]

In answer to your question, esh, we still have loads of 10mb switches at work. Oddly enough, that is BT's fault as they didn't complete the network infrastructure update they were meant to when managing our IT.

[esh]

10M switches? Fantastic. Do they have coaxial ports as well?

[Rik]

You mean that there is ever some left over? Somehow I doubt it.

We always make sure there's enough if we know in advance.

[Rik]

Simon was talking about the chippy, Mitch recommended. 

[Rik]

We need gigabit routers with serious amounts of processing power...

[esh]

Quad core routers with liquid nitrogen cooling! Where does it end!?

[Rik]

When we all have air-conditioned equipment rooms.

[Lance]

10M switches? Fantastic. Do they have coaxial ports as well?

Fortunately not. Now we've brought IT back in house, we are spending approx £500k on upgrading all of the lan infrastructure.

[Rik]

So now you know where your council tax goes, folks.

[esh]

I suggest you upgrade to ....11M switches and pocket the rest of the cash!

[Technical Ben]

I suggest you upgrade to ....11M switches and pocket the rest of the cash!

No, upgrade to full 100mb or gigabit ones. Then limit it to 11mb, and get them to pay you to upgrade it again to 12mb in a few weeks. They will see real world increases too.

[Bill]

No, upgrade to full 100mb or gigabit ones. Then limit it to 11mb, and get them to pay you to upgrade it again to 12mb in a few weeks. They will see real world increases too.

You sound like me when I was in electronics/software design... produce what you know the customer actually needs, then limit it to what he asked for.

That way it's much easier to upgrade when they realise their mistakes

[Technical Ben]

Almost the opposite of BT... Tell the customer they need 100mb broadband, deliver 1mb... 

[Rik]

That much? 

[pctech]

Did you know that the Amsterdam Internet Exchange which IDNet is connncted to I believe has integrated Glimmerglass photonic switches into its network.

http://ams-ix.net/infrastructure-detail/

http://www.glimmerglass.com

[Rik]

No. I do now though, thanks. 

[pctech]

Need to persaude IDNet to put a few in but probably won't be cheap.

[Rik]

Will you ask or shall I?