FTTP compatibility with 3rd party Routers

[#1]

Hi all. My grandparents live in a rural area of Langley, Maidstone and the other day my Granddad noticed BT Openreach were installing fibre cables on the telegraph poles on his road outside his house.

He asked the Openreach engineer at the time and they told him there were upgrading the broadband in his area. I have checked on https://www.broadbandchecker.btwholesale.com/ and the only FTTP service advertised for his landline number is FFTP on demand, which I know is a very expensive and different service from your normal FTTP.

Currently on FTTC (aka VDSL2) with a Draytek router and a Openreach VDSL modem; should the Openreach engineer he met be correct and FTTP come to his area, is it possible for him to keep his 3rd party Draytek router (that I manage) and simply replace his Openreach VDSL modem for a fibre modem?

As someone who works as a network engineer professionally and due to my grandparents age, I look after their network and also gain advantage of features I guess would be absent from the default Plusnet router such as having a site-2-site IPSec VPN tunnel between my subnet and my grandparents subnet. Similar thing with VLANs on the LAN side.

Regards: Elliott.

[#2]

is it possible for him to keep his 3rd party Draytek router (that I manage) and simply replace his Openreach VDSL modem for a fibre modem?

Yes. With FTTP, Openreach install an ONT(Optical Network Termination) unit. This replaces the FTTC modem, so the Draytek WAN port is simply connected to the ONT LAN port and that's it!. You shouldn't need to change any configuration on the Draytek.

[#3]

@GrottoTree 

But Plusnet do not sell FTTP so he would have to switch ISP

[#4]

Thanks, I did not know that Plusnet did not do FTTP products. Were Plusnet not doing a few FTTP trails a number of years ago?

When Openreach commission a FTTP network in a local area, do they open it up to all FTTP providers like how FTTC is used by various providers that rely upon Openreach's network, or is it exclusive to BT?

In others words, if you can get BT's FTTP service for example, can you also get Zen's FTTP service for example.

[#5]

In one word - Yes!

BT wholesale FTTP just like FTTC.

It is Plusnet's lords and masters in BT consumer who control the retail products that Plusnet can offer.

[#6]

@GrottoTree 

PlusNet had a long running FTTP Trial but this closed to new applicants a couple of years back. There has been no word if or when PlusNet will offer FTTP commercially.

Once the service has been commissioned you can choose any ISP that uses the OR backbone. You're looking for "WBC FTTP" in the left hand column of the Checker you mentioned previously to confirm it's available.

An ONT needs to be installed inside the house. The following 2 articles show what you might get (not certain if the "new" one is currently available).

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2019/09/a-look-at-openreachs-compact-fttp-broadband-ont-and-mi...

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.php/2021/01/a-look-at-openreachs-future-4-port-ont-for-fttp-broadb...

Brian

[#7]

---

@GrottoTree wrote:

He asked the Openreach engineer at the time and they told him there were upgrading the broadband in his area. I have checked on https://www.broadbandchecker.btwholesale.com/ and the only FTTP service advertised for his landline number is FFTP on demand, which I know is a very expensive and different service from your normal FTTP.

---

The installation / commissioning time for FTTP can be quite long and the updates to the broadband checker are frequently delayed until the end of the process so don't get disheartened yet 

In our village it was about 8 months end to end with informal "Real soon now messages" - then out of the blue came a note to all BT subscribers "orders for FTTP accepted from next Monday".  Hope it happens soon for you.

[#8]

@GrottoTree 

While the timetable will be uncertain there is one thing you can do to confirm FTTP is coming.

Have a look at the pole serving the house - has it got a Distribution Node hanging from it? There are plenty of pictures online of OR DN's.

Brian

[#9]

---

@bmc wrote:

@GrottoTree 

While the timetable will be uncertain there is one thing you can do to confirm FTTP is coming.

Have a look at the pole serving the house - has it got a Distribution Node hanging from it? There are plenty of pictures online of OR DN's.

---

True, but in our case they were there for three months before service was available.