Eircom eFibre VDSL/FTTC rollout – plans to reach 1.6m premises by mid 2016

Mayo Yid

Villain wrote: »

FTTC has not and will not help fixed wireless.

Not true, I know one fixed wireless provider already using it for their core network

Villain

Mayo Yid wrote: »

Not true, I know one fixed wireless provider already using it for their core network

Can't be much of a WISP if they are using eFibre for backhaul with the upload limits

Mayo Yid

Villain wrote: »

Can't be much of a WISP if they are using eFibre for backhaul with the upload limits

Who said it was main backhaul, it's perfect for backup and maintenance. And they're actually a big player in the west

bk

Villain wrote: »

Can't be much of a WISP if they are using eFibre for backhaul with the upload limits

Obviously you don't understand what we are talking about when we say fixed wireless using FTTC as backhaul.

I'm not suggesting FWA using the VDSL element. Instead I'm suggesting it uses fibre for backhaul from the FTTC cabinets.

Eircoms FTTC network is the largest and most widespread fibre network in the country. Eircom has been wiring enough fibre to each FTTC cabinet to allow the connections to be upgraded to FTTH in the future.

Eircom can lease this fibre backhaul to 4g and FWA aerials. The point is that the expansion of the FTTC network into rural areas brings fibre backhaul deep into rural areas that never had fibre before and that fibre can be used as leased lines for business, backhaul for 4G and FWA and FTTH and FTTdp in the future.

The FTTC network isn't just about VDSL for today, it is about building a strong fibre network for the long term.

Villain wrote: »

It may be a basis for Eircom to deliver something close to real fibre connectivity in the future to populated areas but my main issue, which you don't share, is that I believe we should be there already.

And also rural areas. I've heard that Eircom has already started a new FTTH trial in rural Ireland.

Of course I wish we all already have FTTH. I wish Eircom wasn't privatised in the way that it was. Instead it should have been separated into a separate retail and network company and the network company should have been kept semi-state. Then the network division would never have had Eircoms terrible debts and we all might have FTTH today.

But unfortunately it didn't happen that way. And instead we have to deal with the reality of what did happen and the resources available today.

Really I'm delighted with what Eircom is doing with the rollout of their FTTC network. They are building a fantastic fibre deep network that will be the basis of high speed broadband far into the future.

The thing is even if Eircom went straight to FTTH, they would still have had to build this FTTC network anyway. FTTH requires a FTTC network and cabs to be in place to act as backhaul for FTTH. The only difference would be that the FTTC cabs would continue extra optical termination gear rather then VDSL ISAMS.

The advantage of Eircom going with VDSL over FTTH for the last mile from the FTTC cabs is that it gets a decent high speed to the majority of people much faster then with FTTH.

Today Eircom has 1 million premises able to get VDSL. If the 70% of people getting 70mb/s or greater is true, then that means 700,000 premises can get 70mb/s or more today. That is fantastic news. If they went with FTTH from the start instead, I don't think they would have more then 300,000 homes done by now given the complexity of FTTH installs.

And worst of all those 300,000 homes would probably be mostly in areas already served by UPC 200mb/s. Thus offering little in the way to the rest of Ireland.

Actually looking at it this way, you can see that Eircoms decision to go with VDSL is actually a decision to get "good enough" high speed broadband to the majority of people outside UPC areas as quickly as possible.

Personally I'm much more concerned about getting decent high speed broadband (say minimum 30mb/s) to everyone in Ireland, then getting 1Gb/s to a few urbanites.

And I think Eircoms FTTC network will go a long way to achieving that in time.

Villain wrote: »

Hopefully a rising economy and some proper research will result in the Government funding the ESB to deliver FTTH everywhere and then Eircom can leave the pitch

Won't happen under EU subsidy rules.

More likely the government will give subsidies to both Eircom and the ESB and Eircom will probably get the majority of it for the most rural of people.

Villain

bk wrote: »

Obviously you don't understand what we are talking about when we say fixed wireless using FTTC as backhaul.

I'm not suggesting FWA using the VDSL element. Instead I'm suggesting it uses fibre for backhaul from the FTTC cabinets.

Eircoms FTTC network is the largest and most widespread fibre network in the country. Eircom has been wiring enough fibre to each FTTC cabinet to allow the connections to be upgraded to FTTH in the future.

Eircom can lease this fibre backhaul to 4g and FWA aerials. The point is that the expansion of the FTTC network into rural areas brings fibre backhaul deep into rural areas that never had fibre before and that fibre can be used as leased lines for business, backhaul for 4G and FWA and FTTH and FTTdp in the future.

The FTTC network isn't just about VDSL for today, it is about building a strong fibre network for the long term.

So you are saying Eircom will allow FWA to pop at a cab and use that as backhaul? The only advantage in that is the dig to bring Fibre from the FWA equipment to the cab might be shorter but that isn't usually a main issue as the FWA usually find a building near the exchange to get their backhaul and bounce from there.

I do have a little knowledge in this area as I have been involved in connecting some WISPs to ENET and Eircom networks.

If Eircom were bringing Cabs to highsites in rural areas then I could 100% see the benefit but they aren't.

bk wrote: »

Personally I'm much more concerned about getting decent high speed broadband (say minimum 30mb/s) to everyone in Ireland, then getting 1Gb/s to a few urbanites.

And I think Eircoms FTTC network will go a long way to achieving that in time.

This magic 30Mbps for rural areas won't happen unless there is FTTH and even at that I wouldn't be happy with those speeds.

bk wrote: »

Won't happen under EU subsidy rules.

More likely the government will give subsidies to both Eircom and the ESB and Eircom will probably get the majority of it for the most rural of people.

State Aid rules could be an issue but there are always ways to resolving them, just like the Nuclear Power deal in the UK

Mayo Yid

You do realise Eircom are already a fibre wholesaler, it's in their interest to have fibre to cabs

Villain

Mayo Yid wrote: »

You do realise Eircom are already a fibre wholesaler, it's in their interest to have fibre to cabs

Of course, I have worked with them on delivering circuits, having a bigger fibre network helps but it just doesn't help WISPS to the amount that has been stated here imo.

bk

Villain wrote: »

So you are saying Eircom will allow FWA to pop at a cab and use that as backhaul? The only advantage in that is the dig to bring Fibre from the FWA equipment to the cab might be shorter but that isn't usually a main issue as the FWA usually find a building near the exchange to get their backhaul and bounce from there.

More cabs all over the village means it is easier to find a building close by to one of a few cabs then a single exchange.

Also FTTC is coming to some villages that currently have no fibre at all.

All are steps in the right direction.

Villain wrote: »

This magic 30Mbps for rural areas won't happen unless there is FTTH and even at that I wouldn't be happy with those speeds.

Not necessarily, it could also be done with FWA and potentially with more VDSL cabs and pole mounted VDSL.

Villain wrote: »

State Aid rules could be an issue but there are always ways to resolving them, just like the Nuclear Power deal in the UK

That is different. Here I think the EU is "bending" their own rules because they desperately need to shift their disastrous energy policy of the last 10 years, to restart Nuclear development, so that they can reduce their dependence on Russian gas.

Gonzo

ED E wrote: »

You're missing the point. For everyone 1 rural cab there will be 15 urban/suburban ones. So statistically most will obtain 70+.

I find the stats hard to believe, if Dunshaughlin is anything to go by, I realize this is perhaps different to many other VDSL exchanges in that it is a rural exchange which covers a large area of land, most of which is not served by decent broadband. The tiny section of the exchange which does have VDSL is limited within the small boundary of Dunshaughlin, about 6 or 7 cabs very closely packed together which deliver VDSL to mainly housing estates leaving everyone beyond these areas without vdsl and many people within still without vdsl as there are many direct line connections within the town itself. Most people I know cannot get fibre inside the town and those who can are syncing at less than 50megs.

I know im also sounding like a broken record as well going on about lack of decent broadband in rural areas etc etc as well, hopefully this will be fixed within the next few years to some degree.

murphaph

They are addressing the direct fed problem for those in the town by installing cabinets at the exchange.

lucernarian

I've written about this before, some of the cabs enabled simply had a VDSL cabinet plonked beside it and the cabinet itself is still over a km the village and estates that would benefit from it! Who does that benefit, apart from the 30 or so houses within 500m of it?nobody, except eircoms contracted friends over in Shenzhen. This grotesque inefficiency is not something for rural ireland to welcome.

Furthermore, how can we trust eircoms coverage figures when they spent years misconstruing their ADSL coverage by advertising "lines served by enabled exchanges" rather than the 80% or so that could actually receive a service? 80% of "80% percent of all phone lines" is only 64%.

I await the governments mapping exercise with great interest.

Basically, the whole point is moot about even half of rural ireland being served unless these figures can be confirmed or proven in some sort of impartial manner.

bk wrote: »

There are roughly 2 million premises in Ireland. That figure includes both homes and business. Eircom are already up to 1 million premises or about 50% of all premises. At 1.6 million premises that will be about 80% of all premises in Ireland.

Given that Ireland is about 60% urban, that means that 20% represents about half of all rural homes.

Yes that will leave about half of rural homes without high speed broadband and that will be the hard remaining 20% to do. These premises will likely need to be covered by the National Broadband Scheme, with subsidies from the government and perhaps technology like fibre feed fixed wireless access.



Well in fairness, until 3 years ago, Eircom never showed any interest in offering high speed broadband to anyone! Yet there seems to have been a titanic shift at Eircom and the rollout of VDSL is one of the fastest and most impressive network rollouts we have ever seen.

Hopefully this shows us a new Eircom and that when they finish bringing VDSL to the low hanging fruit, that they will continue into rural areas and start using more interesting technology like these micro ISAMS and FTTdp to bring high speed broadband to more rural areas.

There are already clear signs of them taking rural areas more seriously now with them already installing VDSL cabs in many rural areas and there current plan to hit half of rural homes with VDSL. Times are definitely changing.

bk

lucernarian wrote: »

Furthermore, how can we trust eircoms coverage figures when they spent years misconstruing their ADSL coverage by advertising "lines served by enabled exchanges" rather than the 80% or so that could actually receive a service? 80% of "80% percent of all phone lines" is only 64%.

Eircoms transparency has increased significantly from the old days.

The numbers of lines capable of getting eFibre and the speeds they can get are all available in Eircoms prequal database.

This database is visible to Comreg and all the other operators, it is how Vodafone, etc. order and setup new customers.

So really these figures are confirmed.

As for Eircom just plonking VDSL cabs at every distribution cab, even if most people aren't close to the cab in a particular rural village. Yes, that sucks, but it also makes sense.

The distribution cab is the single point where all the lines from the surrounding area converge, thus the place where maximum number of lines can be connected to the VDSL cab.

If you put the VDSL cab somewhere else, for instance closer to a group of homes, then you have to do very expensive re-routing work to run the lines to this new cab rather then the existing cab. I would imagine that it ends up being much more expensive then just dropping the VDSL cab next ot the existing distribution cab.

Now I have heard that Eircom have been doing some re-routing in places and put new distribution cabs in place, but I'm not surprised that it isn't being done widely, probably just too costly.

However this certainly isnt an issue in urban areas and I also doubt it is an issue in the majority of rural areas. Really it just sounds more like you are annoyed because it happened in your own particular village, then it really being a widespread problem.

Another solution for this other then re-routing, will be for Eircom to run fibre from the VDSL cabs to mini VDSL ISAMs mounted on poles nearer particular housing estates in rural areas. But understandably that is something you would do in later phases once the low hanging fruit is dealt with first.

Johnboy1951

bk wrote: »

Another solution for this other then re-routing, will be for Eircom to run fibre from the VDSL cabs to mini VDSL ISAMs mounted on poles nearer particular housing estates in rural areas. But understandably that is something you would do in later phases once the low hanging fruit is dealt with first.

Eircom also, some years ago, when upgrading/correcting faults, laid underground ducting in some rural areas, from village cabs out to underground distribution points, from where the 'cluster' of home telephone lines were connected.

Those underground 'cabs' could also be (in the longer term) a fibre distribution point.
Hopefully there are sufficient numbers of those for Eircom to put a plan in place for their use in this manner.

Doing so would bring a lot of 'housing clusters' into the 'e-fibre' service area.

bk

Oh that would be nice Johnboy1951, sounds like a perfect location for 16 and 48 port micro ISAMS.

One thing though, it might be in peoples interest if Eircom holds off on doing this for a year or two!!

If Eircom do it today, then they will have to use VDSL ISAMs and thus max speed 100mb/s.

However the new G.Fast standard is expected to complete in the next few months. If they wait for this to complete, that would mean they could potentially offer speeds of up to 1Gb/s to these customers rather then 100mb/s.

Just something to think about and maybe a reason why Eircom hasn't rolled out any micro ISAMs yet.

Johnboy1951

bk wrote: »

Oh that would be nice Johnboy1951, sounds like a perfect location for 16 and 48 port micro ISAMS.

One thing though, it might be in peoples interest if Eircom holds off on doing this for a year or two!!

If Eircom do it today, then they will have to use VDSL ISAMs and thus max speed 100mb/s.

However the new G.Fast standard is expected to complete in the next few months. If they wait for this to complete, that would mean they could potentially offer speeds of up to 1Gb/s to these customers rather then 100mb/s.

Just something to think about and maybe a reason why Eircom hasn't rolled out any micro ISAMs yet.

I honestly do not expect Eircom to even consider such extension until after all the more concentrated centres are fully covered .... and by that I mean small villages

I am particularly interested in this, as I am about 3.5Km from the proposed location of a cab in the nearest village.
There is an existing cab there to which my tel line goes underground in an Eircom duct.
The same applies to my neighbour.
The underground 'cab' is at the boundary of our sites - and actually the duct is through my site rather than outside it.
They asked to bring it through at the time because outside the site is bedrock.
So duct and u/ground cab is actually on private land

Anyway, I went looking at houses between mine and the cab in the village.
All are apparently serviced from an Eircom pole .... but close examination reveals that the wire from the house, comes to the pole and then runs down underground!
So I reckon all houses at least as far as me are all connected to that village cab via the u/ground ducting.

As the village will not receive a new (fibre) cab until end of next year probably, there is lots of time for Eircom to get ready to give me 1GB out in the sticks!

lucernarian

When has comreg or any other third party confirmed the contents of the prequal database and the numbers who can get a VDSL service of some kind or other?And no matter how likely it is that eircom are more transparent, I would still want to see incontrovertible proof of this. This is why im looking forward to the mapping exercise that will be subject to operator AND public scrutiny.

My point regarding distribution points and CCPs is not that they are a necessary evil but that they were not placed at the edge of the village or the nearest point where the lines converge. On the contrary, I have seen some egregious examples of historical factors and laziness in siteing cabinets within Louth alone which coupled with Huawei's "consultancy" and VDSL site selection, has meant that the VDSL cab serves with complete certainty, either less than 20 lines or else serves 20 lines out of about 200. I would pay good money just to see the lines served by vdsl and the total lines provisioned values for the cabinet DBC 010. And to think there was already an RSU sitting in the damn village for nearly 10 years now and eircom still haven't bothered carrying out the most minimal of rerouting of cables at one manhole. The existing ADSL DSLAM at said rsu has spare capacity too, assuming 192 lines!

Look what a search just dragged up:
http://touch.boards.ie/thread/2057279726/1/#post92009175.

I wonder if eircom could actually show with rudimentary arithmetic how diverting in-situ cables to a preexisting cabinet with preexisting DSLAM would somehow cost more than a 30k VDSL DSLAM along with having to replace DBC 010's chassis, ESB provision and new copper links between the new VDSL and the cabinet, and the labour to do all that?

bk wrote: »

Eircoms transparency has increased significantly from the old days.

The numbers of lines capable of getting eFibre and the speeds they can get are all available in Eircoms prequal database.

This database is visible to Comreg and all the other operators, it is how Vodafone, etc. order and setup new customers.

So really these figures are confirmed.

As for Eircom just plonking VDSL cabs at every distribution cab, even if most people aren't close to the cab in a particular rural village. Yes, that sucks, but it also makes sense.

The distribution cab is the single point where all the lines from the surrounding area converge, thus the place where maximum number of lines can be connected to the VDSL cab.

If you put the VDSL cab somewhere else, for instance closer to a group of homes, then you have to do very expensive re-routing work to run the lines to this new cab rather then the existing cab. I would imagine that it ends up being much more expensive then just dropping the VDSL cab next ot the existing distribution cab.

Now I have heard that Eircom have been doing some re-routing in places and put new distribution cabs in place, but I'm not surprised that it isn't being done widely, probably just too costly.

However this certainly isnt an issue in urban areas and I also doubt it is an issue in the majority of rural areas. Really it just sounds more like you are annoyed because it happened in your own particular village, then it really being a widespread problem.

Another solution for this other then re-routing, will be for Eircom to run fibre from the VDSL cabs to mini VDSL ISAMs mounted on poles nearer particular housing estates in rural areas. But understandably that is something you would do in later phases once the low hanging fruit is dealt with first.

So what happens if, as the post I linked to implies, eircom cannot reroute customers to nearby exchanges or VDSL cabinets because other operators have existing LLU equipment or plan to install it in the older exchange?

The implications of this go far beyond Tullyallen.

lucernarian

One more point to note about the Tullyallen thread, the RSU in question is actually supplied by single-mode fibre much like many other exchanges were over the course of 1990s and 2000s, contrary to what the eircom responses implied. Certainly NOT microwave.

KOR101

Not sure whether people have been following this thread......

"ESB/Vodafone Fibre To The Home" (on page 59)

887 Mbits/sec in Cavan ...WOW!

ED E

KOR101 wrote: »

Not sure whether people have been following this thread......

"ESB/Vodafone Fibre To The Home" (on page 59)

887 Mbits/sec in Cavan ...WOW!

Yes but not really relevant to this thread. eFibre is in production now after 2yrs of trials, esb have just started the trial. eFibre rollout to the majority of premises will be done before the ESB go into full scale rollout.

jaykay2

Folks, I have been following this thread since day one and am finally approaching the end of my wait for eFibre and I have a question that you might be able to help me with.

One half of the estate I live in got fibre around 12 months ago while the other half have had to wait for a second cab to be upgraded. Work started on this cab over the last month or so, and yesterday we had two eircom vans along with two esb vans working on the fibre cab.

They did some massive ground work there along with presumably powering the new cab. Can anyone tell me what's left now to be done.

Do they still have to lay the fibre or is that something that would have been done earlier in the build? Just looking for an indication of how much longer I'm set to be waiting.

I'm approximately 100m or less from the cab so I'm hoping for a very fast connection.

Anyway, thanks in advance.

_John C

Its hard to say;

They installed a fibre cab in my estate in June or July and its still not available. The date for my town on the efibre map went from April 2014 to September 2014 to October 2014 and now it says Jan to Mar 2015 !!!!!! Even though there are 6 cabs installed already

jaykay2

_John C wrote: »

Its hard to say;

They installed a fibre cab in my estate in June or July and its still not available. The date for my town on the efibre map went from April 2014 to September 2014 to October 2014 and now it says Jan to Mar 2015 !!!!!! Even though there are 6 cabs installed already

That doesn't sound promising. Can only hope they are nearly ready to flip the switch. My cab is one of only 3 planned cabs in my area on the eircom wholesale website, and the only one that is marked blue as in that the build had commenced and completion work is in progress.

Just hope they don't wait till all 3 are ready before sorting mine out. Would seem like a waste but I guess that wouldn't be any different than your situation.

ED E

Its not the cabs that are the delay really, its the ability to fulfill appointments. Once a cab is rfo they get an influx of orders and have to have teams ready to do installs. That's why cabs aare sitting dormant for ages.

red_bairn

jaykay2 wrote:

That doesn't sound promising. Can only hope they are nearly ready to flip the switch. My cab is one of only 3 planned cabs in my area on the eircom wholesale website, and the only one that is marked blue as in that the build had commenced and completion work is in progress.

Greystones had work started early 2013. Our local cabinet went in and powered by June of last year but it still isn't available to the majority in my estate because of direct fed lines to the Exchange.


if your housing estate wasn't build around the 70s or so, you might not have to worry.

chopperbyrne

Finally after almost a year of delays I was able to sign up for eFibre in Bunclody yesterday. Installations start from November 5th.

jaykay2

red_bairn wrote: »

Greystones had work started early 2013. Our local cabinet went in and powered by June of last year but it still isn't available to the majority in my estate because of direct fed lines to the Exchange.


if your housing estate wasn't build around the 70s or so, you might not have to worry.

My estate is only 6 or 7 years old and i am 100% sure I'm connected to the nearby cab.

Can only hope now I guess. Thanks to all for the info. I will let you know if I get sorted.

Forest Demon

Another month and Eircom pushes efibre another month forward on the efibre map. It was originally supposed to available from June 2014. :mad:

sparky63

Dont think they've just pushed it froward another month. Planning permission for VDSL cabinets, ESB cabinets, Ground works for both, license applications for opening roads to provide ducts, not to mention any objections. Any delays in the above can cause very long delays. Objections to the siting of cabinets can cause major delays.

raytaxi

I know about problems with cabinets, builder of my estate refused eircom permission to site cab beside existing one :-(
In fairness to Eircom they got a site and installed cab only problem now is exchange is live with 2 cabs left one been mine with no date for finishing work on it.

murphaph

Is the long term plan to site a DSLAM beside every cabinet in the country?