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Full Fibre 900 speed question

Mickypd — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 09:18:05 GMT

I have full fibre connected into my property and get good speeds on my current package - Full Fibre 500.

I keep getting e-mails inviting me to upgrade to 900 but an Openreach engineer has told me that domestic computer equipment simply cannot cope with these sorts of speeds, implying that BT are conning us by even offering it (of course BT only guarantee half their advertised speeds which in my view is in itself worthy of Trading Standards/Advertising Standards Authority intervention!).

Was the engineer correct? Does anyone on here have Full Fibre 900 and ever get anywhere near 900 Mbps?

Thanks.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

imjolly — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 09:23:14 GMT

if you read the forum posts you will see how many customers are very happy with their FTTP 900 package - engineer talking rubbish

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

iniltous — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 10:34:45 GMT

OR FTTP each PON is something like 2.4Gb download, 1.2Gb upload shared potentially between 32 customers , so obviously if there are several Gb users each ‘maxing out’ then capacity could be an issue , so one reason why the guaranteed speed is less than the headline rate ( want everything guaranteed then you pay much more ) , as far as is it worth it ( the increase from 500 to 900 ) there cannot be any one rule that fits all, some may think the upgrade fantastic , others may not notice a difference , it depends on your own usage ( and having kit that can benefit from those speeds )

TBH , I often think others when complaining that in getting ( for example ) 72Mb instead of the 80Mb ‘they are paying for’ , they are being conned , but what is the real world noticeable difference between them ?

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Will168 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 14:40:43 GMT

@Mickypd As the others have said, it's rubbish that normal domestic equipment cannot get 900 Mbps. Plenty of people on this forum, including myself, happily get the headline 900 Mbps speeds.

It is absolutely not a con, as most consumer services are contended services, meaning that the overall connections are shared between multiple households and speeds can be affected by usage of others sharing it. This is how they can supply you a 900 Mbps service for £50-60 per month, as opposed to hundreds per month. Additionally, most of the other mainstream ISPs that I had checked don't even give you a guaranteed minimum speed, but simply have a note telling you that the headline speed is an average and the speed you will actually get at any given time is affected by a whole bunch of factors. So if anything, BT are actually being upfront about it.

2016 MacBook Pro and 2018 iPad Pro, testing via ethernet deliver just over 900 Mbps down and 110 Mbps most of the time. During peak periods in the evenings, I have seen it drop to about 850 Mbps. There are only about half a dozen people in the neighborhood on the Openreach full fibre at the moment though. Most are still on FTTC or on cable.

So as more people take out FTTP, I suspect I will see some drops in the top speed more often, but to be honest, I would not notice. It's rare that anyone is maxing out their connection all the time; I certainly don't. Even more rare that everyone on that particular share is maxing out the service at the same time, therefore it will have no noticeable impact.

I still think the 900 Mbps is overkill and would wonder what real world benefit anyone would notice in 99.9% of cases, over the Fibre 500 package. But I wanted the higher upload speed, which is why I went with the 900 package.

Run just now (15:38, 2 Sept 2021):

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

pippincp — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 15:20:58 GMT

I suspect the Openreach engineer was referring to the product Openreach sell to ISP's. In that case he is correct, most residential equipment can't recieve 1Gb, mostly because ISP routers only have 1Gb ports.

That's why BT don't sell it as a 1Gb service even though that is what they have purchased.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Mickypd — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 15:22:19 GMT

Thanks for the comprehensive reply. As you suggest, I don't really need the extra from 500 to 900 tbh but it is only £5 per month more so went for it. Hopefully I'll see a reasonable increast from my current 400-450

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

gg30340 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 15:37:21 GMT

If you have never maxed out you 500 connection the only way you will notice any difference will be when you do a speed test.

In the real world you will not notice it.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Will168 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 15:43:39 GMT

The only time I really make use of it is to do speedtests and when downloading reasonably large files from good servers. But that is rare and usually download speeds are limited by the server too. Maybe it's better for bigger families with multiple people online at the same time watching 4K content and downloading/playing games.

Sadly, the Openreach network can't offer symmetrical up and down. If it did, I'd likely be on a 300 or 500 service and save my money.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

pippincp — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 15:56:22 GMT

@Will168wrote:
The only time I really make use of it is to do speedtests and when downloading reasonably large files from good servers. But that is rare and usually download speeds are limited by the server too. Maybe it's better for bigger families with multiple people online at the same time watching 4K content and downloading/playing games.
Sadly, the Openreach network can't offer symmetrical up and down. If it did, I'd likely be on a 300 or 500 service and save my money.

That doesn't mean it won't offer symmetrical speeds in the future. It will happen and is being tested. Then you have the problem of ISP's actually taking it up once offered.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Will168 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 15:58:34 GMT

@pippincp Ah, I didn't realise they were considering it and testing, so that's good to know! Yeah, I guess uploads are not really a priority for most ISPs. But here's to hoping it might be on offer in the future! Thanks.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

qs123456 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 16:09:35 GMT

This pic shows my 2020 MacBook that is connected via Ethernet using 1Gig Port, cannot download at the speeds advertise. Same for every laptop in the house using Cat 6.

Hoping its a faulty ONT.

I think I have to disagree with everyone here and kinda agree with the OpenReach engineer. Something is up with FTTP 900.

I had VM 500 package before and hit 600ish via Wi-Fi. With BT FTTP directly plugged into the ONT via Ethernet on a 2020 MacBook Pro that can handle the speeds I cannot get over 200mb mark.

I have spent hours on this, BT coming out tomorrow to take a look. There speed test shows I am downloading at 900mb+, however, I believe that speed test is the speed between my house and the Exchange. No other speed test fast.com, speediest, Google fibre, other shows these speeds.

I can only assume, they are miss-selling and showing speeds between my house and the Exchange, not real world. BT keep saying it could be Wi-Fi issues when this is over Ethernet.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Will168 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 16:16:58 GMT

@qs123456 I know we've had conversations about this on the thread you started, but one thing I'm not clear on...when you say the BT speed tester, are you referring to the BT Wholesale Speed Tester or the one you run from your BT account after logging in with your BT ID?

If it's the former, then there have been many reports of the BT Wholesale tester showing wild speed results with Macs. I myself get a result of around 3.5 Gbps on that tester (2016 MBP), which is obviously not right. If you are seeing 900 Mbps on that tester, I would imagine that real world is actually only about a third of that. In which case, your service is not right and BT and Openreach need to figure out what is going on and fix it.

If it's the latter, then it means you are getting the 900 Mbps to the Hub and there is something wrong either with the Hub itself, your device, or something inbetween. It is not mis-selling, but there would surely be something wrong there if the Hub is receiving 900 Mbps and your device, which is plugged in directly via ethernet is only getting a fraction of that. There are overheads and losses to be expected, but not that much!

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Will168 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 16:25:26 GMT

@qs123456 What specific ethernet adaptor are you using with your MacBook? I have tried a few on mine and the only ones I could get the full 900 Mbps through are the Apple thunderbolt adaptor, Belkin USB-C to gigabit, Caldigit Thunderbolt 3 dock.

I have a Microsoft USB 3 to gigabit and that won't get anywhere near. Also, I bought a Cat 7 cable off Amazon previously before too, where the stupid thing couldn't transfer at more than 300 Mbps. So as stupid as these things may sound, have you tried to eliminate those things in the chain too, as part of your testing?

Wouldn't have thought it be a faulty ONT, as you're getting 900+ to the Hub.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

qs123456 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 16:31:10 GMT

Hey @Will168 - I've got the Belkin and when I check on my managed switch it shows 1gig connected. I'm having this issue on all my devices connected via Ethernet. My sister had a HP Business Laptop, Mum has a Lenovo business device (working from home) same issue.

Wi-Fi is hitting 200mb as well. With VM I had 1Gig and got over 600 on a Wi-Fi connection. Its so weird, I don't know why I am facing the issue.

If you can shed any other ideas let me know. I've tested my cables with my managed switch too, all 1gig connection.

- You are right BT Wholesale test is a mess and after logging in I get 900mb speed test. I also have been given access to another speed test which shows device speed test and hub speed test as shown above.

This is driving me insane, I can only assume faulty ONT box? or if the engineers wires up the ethernet port, maybe a doge job?

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Will168 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 16:34:26 GMT

@qs123456 There are plenty of people on here that are much smarter than me, that might have some ideas too.

The screenshot you provided above, where is it from? I don't recognise the interface as being the same as my SmartHub 2.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Will168 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 16:46:55 GMT

@qs123456 For the sake of completeness, I've just done a direct PPPoE connection from my MBP to my ONT. It's a Nokia ONT > 1 metre Cat 5e > Belkin USB-C gigabit adaptor > 2016 MBP and still getting 910 Mbps down / 100 Mbps up on Speedtest.net and Fast.com.

Something is not right somewhere in the chain on yours.

Also, with the SmartHub 2, the wifi performance isn't brilliant. Never seen more than about 400 Mbps on wifi on mine and that was standing right next to it. Sounds like your VM Hub had better wifi performance.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

qs123456 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 16:55:23 GMT

@Will168 - You are a very nice person. Thank you for doing that. Yes something is wrong with my setup. That speed test was sent to me from BT, you login to it (different login details to My BT account)

I will have an £80 bill added to my account if BT come out and deem nothing is wrong, so these tests you've done make me feel more conformable.

I will update this thread with the outcome of BT engineer. A friend is coming over tonight with a 10gig ethernet port on his Mac mini to rule out issues. Just don't want £80 bill and really want BT to acknowledge this issue..

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

Will168 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 17:13:37 GMT

@qs123456 No worries. We all just try and help each other on this forum. I can understand that you would not want to get charged £80 unnecessarily.

But the result for my testing is the same for the following scenarios and all return speedtest.net and fast.com results of 900 Mbps. For reference, the BT line speed tester (not the bonkers BT Wholesale one), reports a speed of 930.5 Mbps down and 112.0 Mbps up, from the Exchange to the Hub. So my overhead losses are in the region of 20 to 25 Mbps on the downstream and around 2 Mbps on the upstream.

Direct PPPoE from the MacBook Pro into the ONT.
Ethernet connected directly to the SmartHub 2.
Ethernet connected to a Netgear unmanaged switch, in turn connected to the SmartHub 2.
I also did it with 3 Netgear switches (2 unmanaged, 1 managed), daisy chained, just to be daft and still get just over 900 Mbps.

Good luck, hope you sort it out one way or another.

Re: Full Fibre 900 speed question

gg30340 — Thu, 02 Sep 2021 18:27:11 GMT

@qs123456 wrote:

I will have an £80 bill added to my account if BT come out and deem nothing is wrong, so these tests you've done make me feel more conformable.

BT will not charge you £80 if the find nothing wrong with their equipment or wiring/cables etc or if no fault is found.

What they will do is charge you if the fault is found to be with your equipment or wiring/cables all of which you are responsible for.

While this link is for the copper network the same principles apply for the fibre netwrok.

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