Hi, I’m supposed to be getting connected in the next couple of weeks. I’ve spoken to Virgin To confirm that I am getting FTTP. They have confirmed on each occasion that I am. There’s no mention of it in the contract though and the chat links are all dud - I’d like to get confirmation in writing obviously.. Should I be concerned? I don’t want the engineers to turn up and say they are not doing FTTP and I have to start all back at the beginning again.. Thanks for any advice..
FTTP could mean XGS-PON or RFoG ( as we have ).
If you could order a 2Gb/s service or a symmetrical service that is a clue for XGS-PON.
If 1Gb/s ( Gig 1 ) is the max on offer RFoG or CATV / coax connections are likely.
Speak to folks in your street and ask them what has been supplied.
https://advanced-television.com/2024/09/16/ofcom-enforces-clearer-broadband-information/
This may help, if VM CS are aware of it.
good luck
Kreid4
AFAIK, they don’t mix RFoG and XGS-PON inn the same locality. XGS-PON is provided on the NexFibre infrastructure and hooked up to VM at a peering point (open to correction there).
If you speak to any neighbour who has VM, if they have a white box attached to the inside wall, connected to the mains, then you will be getting an XGS-PON service which mean offer your 2Gbps now and up to 10Gbps at some market driven future stage.
Finally to say - FTTP is well overhyped save for the higher attainable speeds. It’s main advantage is that for XGS-PON, upstream speeds are bounded only by the laws of physics (light transmission) whereas coax speeds are bounded by a noise prone frequency range.
RFoG has its advantages over coax because although there is the same narrow upstream frequency range, it is not noise prone due to light transmission rather than copper.
My 1Gbps is coax and has never glitched. My 100Mbps upstream is all I need, though some people would want more for their purposes.
Full Fibre has its limitations too. There are only so many wavelengths of light that a fibre (you get 1 fibre) can carry in either direction and they must not interfere with each other. At the fibre aggregation point, everyone’s traffic comes together and the trick there is for VM to have enough fibres onto which that load can be multiplexed without significant queuing. That ism the dark art we’ll never be informed about as to detail but I think I trust VM tom get that part right.
”Full Fibre” is overhyped for marketing purposes, but it is a good thing.
Sephiroth wrote:AFAIK, they don’t mix RFoG and XGS-PON inn the same locality. XGS-PON is provided on the NexFibre infrastructure and hooked up to VM at a peering point (open to correction there).
Finally to say - FTTP is well overhyped save for the higher attainable speeds. It’s main advantage is that for XGS-PON, upstream speeds are bounded only by the laws of physics (light transmission) whereas coax speeds are bounded by a noise prone frequency range.
RFoG has its advantages over coax because although there is the same narrow upstream frequency range, it is not noise prone due to light transmission rather than copper.
Full Fibre has its limitations too. There are only so many wavelengths of light that a fibre (you get 1 fibre) can carry in either direction and they must not interfere with each other. At the fibre aggregation point, everyone’s traffic comes together and the trick there is for VM to have enough fibres onto which that load can be multiplexed without significant queuing. That ism the dark art we’ll never be informed about as to detail but I think I trust VM tom get that part right.
”Full Fibre” is overhyped for marketing purposes, but it is a good thing.
That isn't how XGSPON works. Everyone on a port is connected to it via passive optical splitters. Everyone receives all the downstream and filters their own from it, it's encrypted so that's all they can see. Upstream every 125 microseconds the OLT sends the ONTs a BWMap message telling them when they may transmit and for how long, that way there should never be two ONTs bursting at the same time and interfering with each other. No dark art just TDMA.
It's a superior experience to HFC or RFoG as latency and jitter are both significantly better leading to faster website loading times. The many requests needed to load a site will be sent sooner, clustered closer together, and the acknowledgements of receipt arrive sooner at the website.
RFoG can't pick up noise once out on the network but can and does pick it up from the main source of noise: people's homes. Doesn't support OFMDA / DoCSIS 3.1 upstream very easily either.
Nexfibre and VM aren't 'peering', that's probably the wrong word to use. Nexfibre send VM a bunch of VLANs over some fibre, it's not peering as a couple of ISPs would peer. They take a ride along EVPNs on VM's network to BNGs where they terminate and the IP session starts.
Thanks all, it seems like it’s not a bit problem so maybe I should be happy with either..! Think I’m the first in the area to get it but I’ll ask around and see..
Forum TeamHey aaltron, thank you for reaching out and I am sorry to hear this, also a very warm welcome to the community.
I can see you've spoke to the team since this post, did they manage to help at all?
Stick your address on bidb.uk and it will usually tell you what kind of technology is live in your area and with which providers.
Virgin packages are referred to as fibre or full fibre, too. What was the package that you went for called? If you have your order confirmation emails it should tell you there.
I've just had their full fibre installed, in Skelmersdale and I believe I was first on this estate to sign up and get it in.
There are also limitations on TV services over FTTP, if that is important to you.
