Fibreup project mustang HFC -> XGSPON

[gonnella]

I know I won’t get any firm timelines, but does Virgin media realise they are losing customers in droves by not making their already built areas for available sale. 

[Tudor]

It would seem the XGS-PON areas are still ‘under test’, there is no modem mode that a lot of people require. These XGS-PON area not also not totally VM controlled, they are ‘owned’ by another company although VM as a large interest in it and are the currently the only ISP available. 

[suttonscloud]

The XGSPON network is owned by Nexfibre, and the FTTP rollout plan is a joint venture with VM and O2 (VMO2).

Virgin Media is the only ISP for Nexfibre at the moment while the network is in 'trial' state.

As Tudor mentioned below, there is no Modem Mode for the Hub5X and VM have confirmed there is no future plans to bring it to the 5X. If you haven't noticed, business customers cannot order a service on XGSPON; i assume this would be due to the lack of flexibility on the Hub5X, most businesses may need to integrate with their own network which currently is not possible as the ONT is built into the Hub5X with very little support.

I wouldn't be surprised if HFC areas get moved to RFoG before XGSPON. If VM moved all their HFC customers to XGSPON it would be a massive cost as you would need a new router, and a engineer visit to bring the fibre into your home. At least with RFoG the work can be done outside of your property, and no need for a new router, everything would stay the same inside of the home.

[Tudor]

"At least with RFoG the work can be done outside of your property" small point, but I think it still needs a mains power connection from your premises.

[suttonscloud]

True, think it’s a power injector. Either way, still a lot cheaper than a new router, and especially wouldn’t surprise me if Virgin sent them out with instructions and got the customer to do it with no engineer visit. 

more surprisingly, I’m shocked it’s not already built into the Hub5. I’m pretty sure TV providers like sky provide power over the coax straight from the box for the LNBs to work as it’s such low voltage. 

[Client62]

RFoG as replacement for HFC ?  No No No !
Virgin Media are awash with financial debt, lets not add technical debt to the situation.

The cost of a new VM Hub will be little when you factor in the 2 or 3 engineer visits to the customer premise to pull in a new fibre and get it inside the customers house where it connects to the internal ONT & PSU that are currently being used.

A lot of customer disruption and the outcome is loss of the 3.1 DOCSIS Upstream channels.

[unisoft]

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@suttonscloud wrote:

The XGSPON network is owned by Nexfibre, and the FTTP rollout plan is a joint venture with VM and O2 (VMO2).

Virgin Media is the only ISP for Nexfibre at the moment while the network is in 'trial' state.

As Tudor mentioned below, there is no Modem Mode for the Hub5X and VM have confirmed there is no future plans to bring it to the 5X. If you haven't noticed, business customers cannot order a service on XGSPON; i assume this would be due to the lack of flexibility on the Hub5X, most businesses may need to integrate with their own network which currently is not possible as the ONT is built into the Hub5X with very little support.

I wouldn't be surprised if HFC areas get moved to RFoG before XGSPON. If VM moved all their HFC customers to XGSPON it would be a massive cost as you would need a new router, and a engineer visit to bring the fibre into your home. At least with RFoG the work can be done outside of your property, and no need for a new router, everything would stay the same inside of the home.

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Conversion to RFoG first (with DocSIS 3.1 upstream issues) before XGS-PON LOL. Erm ,nope. Re-contracting and new customers defaulting to XGS-PON once available, yes. The start of this is dependent upon VM's billing and infrastructure provisioning services all talking to each other properly; this has been the hold-up as a number of area either done or being done right now in terms of street infrastructure (like Peterborough).

[nodrogd]

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@suttonscloud wrote:

True, think it’s a power injector. Either way, still a lot cheaper than a new router, and especially wouldn’t surprise me if Virgin sent them out with instructions and got the customer to do it with no engineer visit. 

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It is an inside & outside box change, not just the power supply. It is only around 3 years since VM upgraded the equipment in the HFC cabs (new amplifiers & tap blocks) in this area in prep for 1Gig, so I cannot see them binning all that relatively new kit for a while yet.

There was even a project in the pot to take fibre to all the slave HFC cabs & run distribution nodes off the 50 volt amp supplies, but that never got anywhere.

[IPFreely]

Billing and provisioning finally there. Live customer testing in progress. They remove the coax from omnibox into home and replace omnibox. May dig new drop from pot or use existing one. They reclaim the coax drop. 

Given they're at the stage now shouldn't be long and for you will depend on how much they release at once. 

Just FYI nothing to do with Nexfibre for now. Nexfibre are new build only, the Mustang build is VMO2 and will be spun off into their wholesale NetCo with the HFC. 

[IPFreely]

Also no mass, forced customer migration for the foreseeable. Existing customers recontracting will be encouraged to go XGSPON, sale of HFC to new customers will be ceased and that'll be it for years. The networks will run side by side into the 2030s.