Virgin Media Community

[mojo-chan]

Is there somewhere that VM lists expected dates for fibre roll out? At the moment my area only has slow DOCSIS.

[BumbleVMTech]

Hi, Fibre still uses docsis system, both HFC and Fibre to the house are capable of 1gig download speeds

Rich

[mojo-chan]

Okay, well I just need a decent upload speed. 35mb isn't enough so when can I get more than that?

Ideally looking for 1 gig but 100mb would do.

[jem101]

Frankly the chances of getting gigabit upstream from Virgin Media in the foreseeable future is close to zero, 100 Meg, possibly in the next couple of years.

For those levels of bandwidth you need to look at one of the FTTP suppliers, if there already is one in your area then fine, otherwise you can get Openreach to run fibre on demand to you, as long as you have quite a few tens of thousands of pounds going spare! 

[mojo-chan]

I thought VM was doing FTTP in some areas now? How come the speed isn't full fibre 1000/1000?

[HowardML]

Because the system uses DOCSIS 3.1 which for the moment only offers asynchronous upload and download speeds via VM.

[mojo-chan]

So they are installing fibre but using rubbish technology that doesn't allow it to run at even 1 gigabit upload? I note that other countries with fibre networks are deploying 20 gigabit upload speeds right now.

[nodrogd]

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@mojo-chan wrote:

So they are installing fibre but using rubbish technology that doesn't allow it to run at even 1 gigabit upload? I note that other countries with fibre networks are deploying 20 gigabit upload speeds right now.

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To get 1 gig upload speeds requires the entire cable broadcast spectrum to be used. VM currently has 200+ TV channels occupying where the required upstream channels would sit, so it would mean 6 million people would need a new TV box & a total overhaul of the current system. In practice only a small proportion of the population want or can afford the higher speeds.

[mojo-chan]

Well I note that my friend in Tokyo has access to dozens of HD channels and a few 8k channels, plus 10,000/10,000 internet on a single fibre optic cable...

So Virgin's technology must be rubbish if they can't even manage a small fraction of that.

[nodrogd]

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@mojo-chan wrote:

Well I note that my friend in Tokyo has access to dozens of HD channels and a few 8k channels, plus 10,000/10,000 internet on a single fibre optic cable...

So Virgin's technology must be rubbish if they can't even manage a small fraction of that.

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They are not doing badly considering the system was built to carry TV only & we are still using the same infrasructure that was installed 3 decades ago.

And its not just Virgin that operates DOCSIS technology, most of the globe uses it, & there are still further developments down the line.

https://www.cablelabs.com/technologies/docsis-4-0-technology