Full Fibre 900 speed question

[Mickypd]

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.

[imjolly]

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

[iniltous]

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  ? 

[Will168]

@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):

[pippincp]

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.

[Mickypd]

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

[gg30340]

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.

[Will168]

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.

[pippincp]

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@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.

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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.

[Will168]

@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.