Advertisement
If you have a new account but are having problems posting or verifying your account, please email us on hello@boards.ie for help. Thanks :)
Hello all! Please ensure that you are posting a new thread or question in the appropriate forum. The Feedback forum is overwhelmed with questions that are having to be moved elsewhere. If you need help to verify your account contact hello@boards.ie

When might Eircom to enable vectoring on their eFibre/VDSL service?

Options
13468937

Comments

  • Registered Users Posts: 2,705 ✭✭✭fat-tony


    I'm actually less than 30 meters much closer to 20... however... there's two more cabinets about 150/200 meters away...

    I wonder if they connected me to one of the remoter cabinets as it's almost certain they have available slots due to their position?
    ...

    Been doing a little calculations base on statistical analysis and it looks like I am between 160 and 170 meters from a cabinet which tallies with being connected to one of the remote cabinets...
    Depends on which exchange cabinet your house is wired to. The VDSL cabinets are located beside the existing copper cabinets and the connections are looped from one to the other. Your house was probably linked to an existing cabinet further away and that determines which VDSL cabinet is used. Wouldn't have anything to do with available slots - just existing wiring.


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,792 ✭✭✭BionicRasher


    Line Status

    Line standard VDSL2
    Channel type
    None
    Downstream line rate (kbit/s) 71672
    Upstream line rate (kbit/s) 20479
    Downstream SNR (dB) 7.8
    Upstream SNR (dB) 10
    Downstream line attenuation (dB) 8.9
    Upstream line attenuation (dB) 3
    Downstream output power (dBmV) 11.2
    Upstream output power (dBmV) -12.9
    Downstream CRC 18
    Upstream CRC 13
    Downstream FEC 1815416
    Upstream Feb 23401


    I get close on 69mbps up and 20mbps down since I have had this installed a few months ago. About 500 meters as the crow flies from the cabinet.


  • Registered Users Posts: 71 ✭✭michaelotoole


    fat-tony wrote: »
    Depends on which exchange cabinet your house is wired to. The VDSL cabinets are located beside the existing copper cabinets and the connections are looped from one to the other. Your house was probably linked to an existing cabinet further away and that determines which VDSL cabinet is used. Wouldn't have anything to do with available slots - just existing wiring.

    I appreciate that now, just watched a video explaining quite a bit about the cabinets and cabling methods...
    From the video, and using a bit of common sense I gather it's something like this...

    Old method: (assumption)
    Cables run from the local exchange to a various termination cabinet (old green cabinet)... From these termination cabinets, other cables run to various underground termination point (identified by the P&T rectangular cement cover), where they are then fed to various polls which then feed the individual homes...

    New Method:
    (assumption)
    Cables from the exchange are replaced with fibre which terminates in the new e-cabinets located beside the old cable copper wire termination cabinets... The two cabinets are interconnected however no connection is made to individual line pairs until you get broadband, at which point, the technician simply make the link...

    Just an exercise in imagination but it's got to be close, doesn't it?

    Anyway the point being, your line doesn't necessarily connect to the nearest cabinet (as it looks increasingly unlikely in my case)... and is definitely a possible in areas of high density or where line capacity in the past was maxed out...

    The costs have already been paid:
    If memory serves, when Eircom took over from the P&T (Post & Telegraph) many years ago, they nearly lost the line rental revenue but argue the income was necessary to maintain the lines and help pay for future developments and new technologies... isn't that e-Fibre....

    The revenue form line rental has got to be many times the cost of the current fibre roll out and in fact should pay for fibre to the door, never mind the curb/cabinet....
    Mike


  • Registered Users Posts: 2,705 ✭✭✭fat-tony


    One thing about the fibre connection from exchange to cabinet. It does not replace existing copper from exchange to cabinet. It is a parallel system and may run alongside the copper from pole to pole or in the ground. Your telephone service still runs on copper wires from your house back to the copper cabinet and from there back to the exchange on twisted-pair copper wire. Your eFibre service is tapped and filtered at the VDSL cabinet and goes back to the exchange on optical fibre. Eventually the copper back to exchange may be replaced altogether and a full digital phone service (voice over IP) provided either in the cabinet or via a unit in your house. Various modem/routers provided by the ISPs can give you a VoIP facility.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,088 ✭✭✭SpaceTime


    I appreciate that now, just watched a video explaining quite a bit about the cabinets and cabling methods...
    From the video, and using a bit of common sense I gather it's something like this...

    Old method: (assumption)
    Cables run from the local exchange to a various termination cabinet (old green cabinet)... From these termination cabinets, other cables run to various underground termination point (identified by the P&T rectangular cement cover), where they are then fed to various polls which then feed the individual homes...

    New Method:
    (assumption)
    Cables from the exchange are replaced with fibre which terminates in the new e-cabinets located beside the old cable copper wire termination cabinets... The two cabinets are interconnected however no connection is made to individual line pairs until you get broadband, at which point, the technician simply make the link...

    Just an exercise in imagination but it's got to be close, doesn't it?

    Anyway the point being, your line doesn't necessarily connect to the nearest cabinet (as it looks increasingly unlikely in my case)... and is definitely a possible in areas of high density or where line capacity in the past was maxed out...

    The costs have already been paid:
    If memory serves, when Eircom took over from the P&T (Post & Telegraph) many years ago, they nearly lost the line rental revenue but argue the income was necessary to maintain the lines and help pay for future developments and new technologies... isn't that e-Fibre....

    The revenue form line rental has got to be many times the cost of the current fibre roll out and in fact should pay for fibre to the door, never mind the curb/cabinet....
    Mike

    Basically, but P&T was actually a government department analogous to The Department of Communications. The majority of the current eircom physical copper infrastructure was rebuilt in the 1980s by Telecom Eireann. The old P&T network was mostly an absolute mess due to underinvestment. TE was a state owned company much like ESB etc.

    It was privatised and is eircom.

    The infrastructure was put in place with state support, also with EU aid in the 80s and it was basically subsidised because TE was a legally protected monopoly for most of its existence. The company would have also raised a lot of money privately too though.

    That's how eircom ended up so dominant and why it's forced to allow access to other companies over its local network.


  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users Posts: 1,335 ✭✭✭OneEightSeven


    I appreciate that now, just watched a video explaining quite a bit about the cabinets and cabling methods...
    From the video, and using a bit of common sense I gather it's something like this...

    Old method: (assumption)
    Cables run from the local exchange to a various termination cabinet (old green cabinet)... From these termination cabinets, other cables run to various underground termination point (identified by the P&T rectangular cement cover), where they are then fed to various polls which then feed the individual homes...

    New Method:
    (assumption)
    Cables from the exchange are replaced with fibre which terminates in the new e-cabinets located beside the old cable copper wire termination cabinets... The two cabinets are interconnected however no connection is made to individual line pairs until you get broadband, at which point, the technician simply make the link...

    Just an exercise in imagination but it's got to be close, doesn't it?

    Anyway the point being, your line doesn't necessarily connect to the nearest cabinet (as it looks increasingly unlikely in my case)... and is definitely a possible in areas of high density or where line capacity in the past was maxed out...

    The costs have already been paid:
    If memory serves, when Eircom took over from the P&T (Post & Telegraph) many years ago, they nearly lost the line rental revenue but argue the income was necessary to maintain the lines and help pay for future developments and new technologies... isn't that e-Fibre....

    The revenue form line rental has got to be many times the cost of the current fibre roll out and in fact should pay for fibre to the door, never mind the curb/cabinet....
    Mike

    Do you have a link to this video?


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,088 ✭✭✭SpaceTime


    The other issue is that a % of lines aren't connected to PCP cabinets at all.

    Some areas were wired with 'breakout' points underground in large vaults rather than street cabinets.

    This is very much the norm in central Dublin and Central Cork for example. Large areas of the very centre of those two cities have no efibre yet at all. There is a rumor they may get FTTH (fibre to the home/premises) rather than VDSL. There are issues squeezing cabinets into those areas and planning permission restrictions.

    You've also got that situation in some housing developments, particularly 1950s/60s era with fully underground wiring. Although you can't generalise. Some places had cabinets some didn't. In those cases they'll most likely retrofit cabinets.

    If you're very close to the exchange in some areas you may discover your line is direct fed from there too without any cabinet.

    In areas where buildings are of mixed age, you can find older ones have totally different routing of phone lines to neighbouring newer build stuff too. So you might find old buildings going back to a different cabinet or even directly to the exchange. In other areas you (like mine) you could be next door to the exchange and still go through a cabinet.

    It's all very difficult to generalise and different wiring methodologies were used in different eras and areas

    Most lines are connected to PCP cabinets though. So in general FTTC is pretty straight forward to roll out.

    There is a more general discussion on the rollout thread though.

    This one is just about vectoring.


  • Registered Users Posts: 71 ✭✭michaelotoole


    @SpaceTime
    Oops done it again... forgot the topics so I finish off with this post and back vectoring...
    I pretty much understood that was the case, just pointing out that revenue from line rental never seems to get any mention... it's got to be substantial, certainly enough to pay for some modernisation...

    As to improvements, they didn't impact me so I didn't realise they had made any... for example, back in the old days when modems operated at a massive 1200 baud, I tied, for seven or eight years, to get connected to the internet... Each time, I was informed my line could not handle it... (my line was on an analogue multiplexed system according to the engineer in the exchange)... so I never saw any signs of investment....

    @OneEightSeven
    Didn't keep the link but I will look for it and post back...
    Try this one but could be be of the others too... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=53NcsctuxV0&list=UUPJPRFCFcf1Atsh-blmRnfQ skip to the interesting bits...


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,088 ✭✭✭SpaceTime


    There was huge ( government and EU driven) investment in the 1980s and 90s. The network was basically rebuilt and moved from a very clapped out analogue system to a pretty high tech digital system. They spent billions and it was a big part f irelands key selling points as a place to invest etc.. Eircom was privatised as a PLC and floated on the stock markets. Shortly after it was taken over and taken off the stock market again by investors.

    Investment levels plummeted after eircom came into existence and the company ran up enormous debts mostly due to multiple leveraged takeovers. Essentially, bought out by investors who borrowed money based on predicted cash flows / rising value of telecoms stock. Those didn't materialise as they were largely built on predictions based around the original 'dot com' bubble.

    That saddled it with so much debt it had to go into examinership and ultimately did a deal where its shareholders were wiped out and its creditors took over the company with about 50% of debt written off.

    So basically until recently it had no money and had very little ability to finance capital investment that was seriously needed.

    As for your line in the past. Basically, they were short of copper pairs in some areas in the 1990s. So to provide voice service they multiplexed several customers into a single copper wire. That was done by BT and At&T and others too. Its called DACS in the UK or Pair gain in the US.

    The networks were probably planned with pre-boom time loads in mind. That coupled with Irish planning laws allowing ribbon development in rural areas and really huge levels of housing growth put them into a very bad situation in many areas where their network ran out of capacity.

    These days they don't have the same level of demand due to people dropping landline services and due to DSL doing away with the need for second lines. Cable is also competing head to head with them in urban areas which forced them to compete.

    There are lots of factors in play!

    The market has changed and eircom is not the same company it was a few years ago either. Different ownership, different management and a much more long term view of what they're doing.

    Previously it was very much a victim of the speculative financial markets and various investment funds that were out for short term profits.

    Hopefully, it's now all about running a profitable, sustainable telecommunications company!

    They've just built out a new all-IP core network and this FTTC next generation acres efibre stuff is the first time that we're getting to use it as end users.

    Fingers crossed its going to keep going this way!


  • Registered Users Posts: 71 ✭✭michaelotoole


    @SpaceTime Excellent post!


  • Advertisement
  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,088 ✭✭✭SpaceTime


    As for Vectoring... Still no sign of it on my line anyway.

    Has anyone gotten a major speed bump yet?


  • Registered Users Posts: 215 ✭✭bloodyhawk


    bloodyhawk wrote: »
    Downstream 43.156 and upstream of 16.447? what in the world i am on the 70mb package have i been switched? i am going to ring eircom tomorrow...

    ============================================================================
    VDSL Training Status: Showtime
    Mode: VDSL2 Annex B
    VDSL Profile: Profile 17a
    Traffic Type: PTM Mode
    Link Uptime: 0 day: 5 hours: 28 minutes
    ============================================================================
    VDSL Port Details Upstream Downstream
    Line Rate: 16.447 Mbps 43.156 Mbps
    Actual Net Data Rate: 16.383 Mbps 43.009 Mbps
    Trellis Coding: ON ON
    SNR Margin: 14.5 dB 18.7 dB
    Actual Delay: 4 ms 8 ms
    Transmit Power: -13.7 dBm 11.2 dBm
    Receive Power: -24.7 dBm -2.8 dBm
    Actual INP: 2.0 symbols 3.0 symbols
    Total Attenuation: 10.9 dB 13.9 dB
    Attainable Net Data Rate: 28.376 Mbps 85.044 Mbps
    ============================================================================
    VDSL Band Status U0 U1 U2 U3 D1 D2 D3
    Line Attenuation(dB): 2.3 13.5 18.5 N/A 8.4 18.1 28.1
    Signal Attenuation(dB): 2.3 12.8 17.6 N/A 7.2 17.9 28.1
    SNR Margin(dB): 14.5 14.4 14.5 N/A 18.7 18.8 18.7
    Transmit Power(dBm):-25.1 -16.0 -18.7 N/A 3.4 7.8 6.9
    ============================================================================
    I rang eircom this morning and told them the issue i was having. It appears that the speed was decreased in order to stabilize the connection, since i just signed up for evision. I don't really know what connection does evision have with efiber but yeah. the person i was talking to put me back on the 70mb and told me to wait couple of hours to see the change...


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,335 ✭✭✭OneEightSeven


    bloodyhawk wrote: »
    I rang eircom this morning and told them the issue i was having. It appears that the speed was decreased in order to stabilize the connection, since i just signed up for evision. I don't really know what connection does evision have with efiber but yeah. the person i was talking to put me back on the 70mb and told me to wait couple of hours to see the change...

    Yeah, you have to sacrifice some of your speed for eVision. I heard eVision is bollocks. I wouldn't have bothered myself.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,088 ✭✭✭SpaceTime


    Yeah, you have to sacrifice some of your speed for eVision. I heard eVision is bollocks. I wouldn't have bothered myself.

    It's hanging on your broadband unlike UPC TV which runs separately.


  • Registered Users Posts: 14,782 ✭✭✭✭loyatemu


    @spacetime - I heard that they're working on a solution for exchange-fed lines, it'll still be VDSL not FTTH, probably be next year before its available though.


  • Registered Users Posts: 253 ✭✭tdonegan1990


    Looks like it's live in Newbridge!
    http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2056555985/592


  • Registered Users Posts: 242 ✭✭HellboundIRL


    My connection reset 21 hours ago and is now syncing at 51280/20549 and it was originally 50268/20479. My SNR has remained the same at 18db though so I'm not so sure...the speed increase is weird though.


  • Registered Users Posts: 5,415 ✭✭✭swoofer


    what is the actual speed? how far from cabinet? who is your ISP? make of router? do you know what your line profile is set at?


  • Registered Users Posts: 253 ✭✭tdonegan1990


    My connection reset 21 hours ago and is now syncing at 51280/20549 and it was originally 50268/20479. My SNR has remained the same at 18db though so I'm not so sure...the speed increase is weird though.

    Me too but it happend me last week!
    Hardly vectoring is it?


  • Registered Users Posts: 3,711 ✭✭✭Praetorian


    Those small changes in sync rates seem to be normal. Definitely not vectoring.


  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users Posts: 215 ✭✭bloodyhawk


    My Attainable Net Data Rate just sky rocketed:
    previous: up-28.376 Mbps down-85.044 Mbps
    now: up-28.384 Mbps down-125.704 Mbps




    so did my SNR margin.
    Previous: up- 14.5 dB down- 18.7 dB
    Now: up- 14.7 dB down- 30.0 dB


  • Registered Users Posts: 36,166 ✭✭✭✭ED E


    bloodyhawk wrote: »
    My Attainable Net Data Rate just sky rocketed:
    previous: up-28.376 Mbps down-85.044 Mbps
    now: up-28.384 Mbps down-125.704 Mbps




    so did my SNR margin.
    Previous: up- 14.5 dB down- 18.7 dB
    Now: up- 14.7 dB down- 30.0 dB

    Thats vectoring. Ask them to reprofile you if it stays that way.


  • Registered Users Posts: 744 ✭✭✭Cork981


    bloodyhawk wrote: »
    My Attainable Net Data Rate just sky rocketed:
    previous: up-28.376 Mbps down-85.044 Mbps
    now: up-28.384 Mbps down-125.704 Mbps




    so did my SNR margin.
    Previous: up- 14.5 dB down- 18.7 dB
    Now: up- 14.7 dB down- 30.0 dB

    Where are you located ?


  • Registered Users Posts: 215 ✭✭bloodyhawk


    Cork981 wrote: »
    Where are you located ?

    Athlone...


  • Registered Users Posts: 215 ✭✭bloodyhawk


    ED E wrote: »
    Thats vectoring. Ask them to reprofile you if it stays that way.

    Alright, where should I begin...I rang the eircom just like you told me and asked them to reprofile me, but unfortunately the guy who i was talking to didn't know what vectoring even was until i explained it to him? (Yeah makes you think huh) Anyway, then he went on to say that the vectoring is being available only on some cabs in dublin, and said that it wont be available at my address for at least 6 months time. Here as skeptical as i was I told him to make sure, and hey what do you know he said that i could actually be put on 85mbps. He also went ahead to say that i would of been able to get 100mbps if i didn't sign up for evision(Oh well). He just upgraded my profile now so i just have to wait for the changes to take place.



    What I am actually wondering is that shouldn't I be getting 125mbps
    according to my attainable net data rate?




    EDIT: here you go


    ============================================================================
    VDSL Training Status: Showtime
    Mode: VDSL2 Annex B
    VDSL Profile: Profile 17a
    Traffic Type: PTM Mode
    Link Uptime: 0 day: 0 hour: 15 minutes
    ============================================================================
    VDSL Port Details Upstream Downstream
    Line Rate: 20.549 Mbps 87.211 Mbps
    Actual Net Data Rate: 20.479 Mbps 87.041 Mbps
    Trellis Coding: ON ON
    SNR Margin: 11.0 dB 13.3 dB
    Actual Delay: 4 ms 6 ms
    Transmit Power: -13.7 dBm 11.2 dBm
    Receive Power: -24.7 dBm -2.8 dBm
    Actual INP: 2.0 symbols 2.0 symbols
    Total Attenuation: 11.0 dB 14.1 dB
    Attainable Net Data Rate: 28.024 Mbps 116.800 Mbps
    ============================================================================
    VDSL Band Status U0 U1 U2 U3 D1 D2 D3
    Line Attenuation(dB): 2.3 13.5 18.6 N/A 8.5 18.1 28.2
    Signal Attenuation(dB): 2.3 13.1 17.5 N/A 7.3 18.0 28.1
    SNR Margin(dB): 11.1 11.0 11.0 N/A 13.2 13.3 13.3
    Transmit Power(dBm):-25.0 -15.9 -18.6 N/A 3.4 8.1 6.8
    ============================================================================


  • Registered Users Posts: 1,335 ✭✭✭OneEightSeven


    bloodyhawk wrote: »
    What I am actually wondering is that shouldn't I be getting 125mbps according to my attainable net data rate?

    Attainable Net Data Rate: 28.024 Mbps 116.800 Mbps

    Your attainable net data rate is 116Mb, not 125Mb. Perhaps the missing 29Mb is going towards your eVision?

    How far away from the cabinet are you?


  • Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 22,489 Mod ✭✭✭✭bk


    If you sign up to eVision you get put on a "stable" profile rather then a "normal" profile. This means you trade speed for stability of the connection.

    For example if previously you were on the 70mb "normal" profile and signed up for eVision, then you would be changed to a 50mb "stable" profile.

    This is one of the major downsides of eVision. Another is that eVision uses your actual bandwidth while a stream is active (watching or recording a channel). It uses 2.5mb/s per SD stream or 10mb/s per HD stream, this is in addition to being moved to a stable profile. UPC doesn't suffer from this problem at all, their TV service is entirely separate from their broadband service. Watching TV has no impact on the BB speed.

    BTW just because your line can achieve a higher data rate, doesn't mean Eircom will sell you that profile. For instance my parents attainable download rate is 100mb/s even before vectoring was enabled (they are literally 10 meters from the cabinet), but Eircom put them on a 70mb/s profile as until now, that is the fastest profile Eircom made available.


  • Moderators, Motoring & Transport Moderators, Technology & Internet Moderators Posts: 22,489 Mod ✭✭✭✭bk


    Oh, so I've found the (proposed) new profiles for Vectoring enabled exchanges in this document:

    http://www.eircomwholesale.ie/WorkArea/DownloadAsset.aspx?id=1068

    High Speed Internet Profiles:

    Line Length (max) - Down (Mbps) - Up (Mbps)
    300m - 100 - 20
    450m - 90 - 20
    525m - 80 - 20
    600m - 60 - 20
    750m - 50 - 20
    850m - 40 - 10
    1000m - 30 - 8
    1200m - 25 - 8
    1300m - 18 - 5
    1500m - 15 - 3
    1700m - 12 - 1
    2000m - 7 -1

    High Stability profiles (for eVision)
    Line Length (max) - Down (Mbps - Fixed) - Up (Mbps - Rate Adaptive)
    300m - 85 - 5 to 20
    450m - 80 - 5 to 20
    525m - 70 - 5 to 20
    600m - 60 - 5 to 20
    650m - 50 - 5 to 16
    750m - 40 - 5 to 16
    850m - 34 - 5 to 16
    1000m - 28 - 50 to 15
    1200m - 20 - 2.5 to 8
    1300m - 18 - 2.5 to 7
    1500m - 12 - 0.25 to 1
    1750m - 10 - 0.25 to 1
    2000m - 4 - 0.25 to 1

    Really interesting, so a couple of things to note.

    - Even if your line can "attain" higher speeds (for instance 130mb/s in the case of my parents with vectoring), Eircom will only sell a max of 100mb/s to them.

    - Almost everyone is seeing a very large speed increase.

    - Eircom will now allow VDSL to be sold out to 2km, versus just 1km when they first rolled it out. This is fantastic news for rural Ireland.

    7mb down, 1mb up might not sound very exciting, but for those in rural areas, this can be a massive jump up from a crappy, very unstable potentially 1mb/200k ADSL1 connection.

    7mb would allow such people to easily do Video Calling and SD youtube and Netflix, it should also just be possible to do HD Netflix and Youtube, a great and very welcome improvement for such people.

    Even better 12/1 out to 1750m is even better, this is a very decent speed that makes most current internet services work very well including most HD streaming.

    This is really really good news for rural Ireland. Now we just have to try and make sure that every village in Ireland has at least one fibre connected cab at the centre of the village. Such fibre can then be used to help feed LTE and fixed wireless to those more then 2km from the village.


  • Registered Users Posts: 338 ✭✭Tonio


    Forgive me if these are stupid questions. Why do the upload speeds not get bumped up with vectoring switched on? Does vectoring only benefit the download speed? Is 20Mb/s the limit for upload via VDSL2?


  • Advertisement
  • Registered Users Posts: 320 ✭✭domeld


    I can confirm that vectoring in Athlone is enabled, profiles have been updated.


Advertisement