Full Fibre and Phones - Simple issues that seed sorting.

[#1]

BMC - "One thing you didn't mention (unless I missed it) is power cuts - VOIP doesn't work without power."

That applies already to our landline number - but we do have mobiles as a standby.

[#2]

I have exactly the same problem - don't want to lose my email address and want to keep my landline number.  However, if Plusnet don't want to offer a VOIP service, I would be quite happy to get this from someone else like Andrews and Arnold, BUT I would want to keep my existing landline number.  Surely a way to retain that number and port it to another provider should be possible?? The current situation is incredibly frustrating.

BTW, small UPS battery backup units are relatively cheap (< £100) and simple to install to provide a phone service when there is a power cut!  Worth it for the surge protection alone. You don't need to rely on your ISP to provide one as some people seem to believe !?

[#3]

@davec13 

With PlusNet it's quite simple - you lose either your landline number or your e-mail. That is their offering.

Brian

[#4]

"BTW, small UPS battery backup units are relatively cheap (< £100) and simple to install to provide a phone service when there is a power cut!"

Hardly cheap!

Particularly to do something that does not need to be done at the moment.

The beneficiaries from moving customers telephones to an internet based service are the Communications Providers / ISPs, so it is they who should be providing this back up - free of charge to their customers.

[#5]

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@Mr_Paul wrote:

The beneficiaries from moving customers telephones to an internet based service are the Communications Providers / ISPs, so it is they who should be providing this back up - free of charge to their customers.

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I can remember the outrage when cars started being designed with no starting handle, What on earth were people to do if they had a flat battery? I see this as similar.

From the consumers point of view the service should be more reliable and cost much less to maintain. Getting rid of many local telephone exchanges will also reduce running costs. The current problem is the cost of installation. I guess it was the same when the GPO installed automatic switching into local telephone exchanges and made telephone operators redundant. The change cost money but in the long term, the relative cost of using the phone is now very little compared with those days when only the well off could afford one in their home. If you had an emergency then you got out your bike and cycled to the nearest phone box. Today we have mobile phones and the option to buy a UPS.

You can't stop progress.

[#6]

@Baldrick1 

"You can't stop progress."

I'm not trying to stop progress, however in my view the fact that the ability to call emergency services etc in a power cut is being removed is a serious retrograde step. I have been told many times in other forums that the batteries in broadband cabinets and mobile phone masts are only designed to power them for about 30 minutes in the event of a mains failure. What good is having your own UPS after that?

Having a "copper" connection to the exchange means that the telephone line is backed up by the exchanges 50 volt batteries and diesel generators. When I used to work in a Strowger telephone exchange, the batteries and generators were designed to be sufficient to power the equipment indefinitely in the event of mains power failure, (assuming an adequate supply of fuel).

Has that changed since those days?

"From the consumers point of view the service should be more reliable and cost much less to maintain. Getting rid of many local telephone exchanges will also reduce running costs."

Will the prices we pay for telephone and broadband start to fall then, or are we still looking at potentially a ~15% next April? Or, will it just be more profit for the providers, with the customers having to pay for extra equipment, (currently not needed), to mitigate against the issues it creates?

[#7]

This thread is going way off topic. The OP's question has been answered, I suggest that if the rights and wrongs of the answer needs more airing that a new topic is started on the General Chat board.

[davec13]

@Baldrick1 

"This thread is going way off topic"

I don't agree.

The subject of this thread is "Full Fibre and Phones - Simple issues that seed sorting"

I'm merely pointing out potentially serious, (such as in the OP's case, with a disabled resident),problem with the move to telephony over broadband that many people are not aware of.

I responded to davec13's comment that customers can buy themselves a UPS, with the inference that this solves the problem, when it does so only for a short time.

To be clear:

I do not object to true progress, but this one has a serious flaw. The Communications Providers / ISPs / Openreach need to ensure that the cabinets and phone masts can operate for far longer than 30 minutes without mains power - either by greatly increasing the capacity of the backup batteries or by fitting alternative power provision.

One of the reasons I moved to Plusnet from BT about 6 months ago was that BT were forcing my exchange area to move to "Digital Voice".

[#9]

Cabinets aren't used for full fibre...

[#10]

@Browni 

Not in the sense of telephone and FTTC cabinets no, but where do the fibres from peoples homes go?

I'm looking at a CityFibre cabinet right now - directly opposite my house.

Is Openreach's FTTP network design different, and fibres from homes on their network go directly to buildings, (or other infrastructure), with full power back up in the event of extended mains failure without passing through any poorly backed up active equipment?

A chain is only as good as its weakest link.

[#11]

Excellent to see so much feedback to my question. Thank you. I don't see an short term solutions. The technology that we live with is amazing, but it seems that simple things are overlooked. I am thinking about all sorts of work-arounds.

[#12]

@Mr_Paul 

Can't speak about power but as I understand things an OR fibre network is fed all the way back to what's known as an Internet Head End. OR has about a thousand of these (of around 5000 exchanges in total) at major Exchanges throughout Britain. I believe the fibre for FTTC cabinets also comes from these

I have FTTP. Depending on how I check my address my Exchange is shown either as the local one (which used to supply my phone line) or a larger one (for FTTP) in the local city.

Once PSTN is finally shut down OR is expected to close the 4000 odd exhcnages that are not an Internet Head End.

Brian

[#13]

@bmc 

Yes, I was aware that the end plan is for circuits to terminate at one of a thousand or so Head Ends, but what I'm not clear on is what happens between each individual customer premises and the Head End. Does each individual fibre, from each house travel all the way back to the head end without passing through any active, (ie powered), along the way? I'm not counting passive joints.

I am under the impression that equipment is used along the route to combine individual home fibres into less fibres en-route to the Head End, where they "join" the internet - possibly using Wave Division Multiplexing to combine say 48 homes on to one fibre to the Head End.

Can anyone point me towards any documentation on how Openreach are building their network in this respect please?

If it transpires that there is no active equipment between the home and Head End, which I am confident will have proper power backup facilities, then I will be a lot happier.

Then I'll just complain about having to pay for a UPS to maintain the reliability that I have enjoyed since we first had a landline phone. 😉

[#14]

@Mr_Paul 

No specific information for you but I was re-reading on old ISPReview article from 2019 anot OR ONT's which also included the following snippet.

This year has seen Openreach introduce a new type of splitter (aka – Gigabit Passive Optical Network Splitter), which fits in a street cabinet or small rural exchange and “means we can now get FTTP to customers who are up to 98 kilometres from the exchange,” said Openreach.

Brian

[#15]

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@Mr_Paul wrote:

"BTW, small UPS battery backup units are relatively cheap (< £100) and simple to install to provide a phone service when there is a power cut!"

Hardly cheap!

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@Mr_Paul 

To answer your questions about powered network equipment, the network is passive*, including the splitters etc.

So, as an idea from @Baldrick1 's comment about progress being made when cars lost their starting handles, how about one of these, which can be obtained cheaply and do not rely on battery run-time.  

Hand crank generator

Edit: *the BT OR FTTP network