FTTP in Cornwall

Finally we have Fibre to the Premises aka FTTH

Published: Tuesday, Jan 5, 2021 Last modified: Monday, Dec 9, 2024

We have the GEA-FTTP 80/20 product as defined by BT Openreach:

Downstream peak 80
Downsteam Prioritised 30
Upstream Prioritised 20

iperf3 test to Linode

pi@praze:~ $ iperf3 -R -c gb.webconverger.com
Connecting to host gb.webconverger.com, port 5201
Reverse mode, remote host gb.webconverger.com is sending
[  5] local 81.187.180.146 port 56164 connected to 176.58.122.199 port 5201
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate
[  5]   0.00-1.00   sec  5.92 MBytes  49.7 Mbits/sec
[  5]   1.00-2.00   sec  8.46 MBytes  70.9 Mbits/sec
[  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  8.78 MBytes  73.7 Mbits/sec
[  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  8.73 MBytes  73.2 Mbits/sec
[  5]   4.00-5.00   sec  8.79 MBytes  73.7 Mbits/sec
[  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  8.79 MBytes  73.8 Mbits/sec
[  5]   6.00-7.00   sec  8.72 MBytes  73.1 Mbits/sec
[  5]   7.00-8.00   sec  8.80 MBytes  73.8 Mbits/sec
[  5]   8.00-9.00   sec  8.79 MBytes  73.7 Mbits/sec
[  5]   9.00-10.00  sec  8.51 MBytes  71.4 Mbits/sec
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Retr
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec  85.4 MBytes  71.7 Mbits/sec  221             sender
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec  84.3 MBytes  70.7 Mbits/sec                  receiver

iperf Done.
pi@praze:~ $ iperf3 -c gb.webconverger.com
Connecting to host gb.webconverger.com, port 5201
[  5] local 81.187.180.146 port 56168 connected to 176.58.122.199 port 5201
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Retr  Cwnd
[  5]   0.00-1.00   sec  2.75 MBytes  23.1 Mbits/sec    0    168 KBytes
[  5]   1.00-2.00   sec  2.59 MBytes  21.7 Mbits/sec    0    296 KBytes
[  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  2.77 MBytes  23.2 Mbits/sec    0    423 KBytes
[  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  2.97 MBytes  24.9 Mbits/sec    0    550 KBytes
[  5]   4.00-5.00   sec  2.71 MBytes  22.7 Mbits/sec    0    676 KBytes
[  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  2.60 MBytes  21.8 Mbits/sec    0    803 KBytes
[  5]   6.00-7.00   sec  2.53 MBytes  21.3 Mbits/sec   33    403 KBytes
[  5]   7.00-8.00   sec  2.14 MBytes  18.0 Mbits/sec    0    440 KBytes
[  5]   8.00-9.00   sec  2.84 MBytes  23.9 Mbits/sec    0    465 KBytes
[  5]   9.00-10.00  sec  2.13 MBytes  17.9 Mbits/sec    0    479 KBytes
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Retr
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec  26.0 MBytes  21.8 Mbits/sec   33             sender
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec  25.2 MBytes  21.1 Mbits/sec                  receiver

iperf Done.

Ping times

You can see from a brief smokeping, it goes from an unstable ~35ms (FTTC) to a stable 12ms (FTTP) ping time for Google DNS:

To Singapore from the UK, the picture is the same, but with a higher latency due to the long distance:

I have a long running Smoke ping from Singapore to Praze Farm and it’s looking FANTASTIC now that they are on Fibre:

Firebrick

FTTC:

With FTTP, notice the scale goes to 100M:

Sync rate

https://speed.prazefarm.co.uk/

For some reason A&A’s https://chaos2.aa.net.uk/broadband/info API is reporting the sync rate of FTTC:

download(tx)=11361000 upload(rx)=752000

Our new FTTP line rate is:

download(tx)=79575200 upload(rx)=20000000

Which is 7x better for download and about 26 times better for upload!

Monthy cost

FTTC:

Line rental 12GBP
Home:1 35GBP
Home:1 Addon for VDSL 10GBP

So 57GBP for 2TB bandwidth with a very unstable line.

FTTP:

Home::1 Broadband, 2TB usage allowance 35GBP
Home::1 Add-On: Fibre to the premises Non Transition Line 15GBP

Rural fibre is costing us 50GBP for monthly, a saving of 7GBP per month if you ignore the 4600GBP spent on the upgrade!