NBN Discussion

[Quickstatus]

The new build connection fee is not new, it has been there since the start.

If your building is getting fttp it will definitely be faster than 4/5g, provided you choose the right plsn ss no technology is faster than fibre. 4g and 5g both rely on fibre to connect the base stations so nothing can be faster than fibre.

Dont forget the link in the fibre called CVC


Edit “kink”

 

[Lynda2475]

Dont forget the link in the fibre called CVC

Well this is where quality of ISP comes into play - some don't purchase enough CVC to go with the AVC; but most of the high speed plans 50 and 100 now have bundled minimum CVC included, so generally its only a problem for people on legacy 12/1 plans which have no cvc; and on coughpy ISPs that oversell.

Congestion on Optus 4G is terrible in many areas, I've lost count of the number of times my phone/tablet have struggled to load the most basic pages in some areas where there is high degree of high rises with lots of renter using mobile rather than fixed line internet.

5G only has good speed over short distance with quality line of sight, and Telstra/Optus/VHA are only beginning the roll out, it will be years before it is a ubiquitous as 4G, hell there are still heaps of areas only on 3G.

If you are stuck on FTTN then mobile can be a genuine alternative, but if you are lucky enough to live in a premises with FTTP then you'd be silly not to get fibre for the speed and more importantly the reliability.

 

[Hvr]

So @Lynda2475 what is your opinion of HFC which is what I'll be getting?

 

[Quickstatus]

but if you are lucky enough to live in a premises with FTTP then yours be silly not to get fibre for the speed and the reliability.

Most on fibre don’t want fibre speeds.

 

[marki]

The new build connection fee is not new, it has been there since the start.

If your building is getting fttp it will definitely be faster than 4/5g, provided you choose the right plan as no technology is faster than fibre. 4g and 5g both rely on fibre to connect the base stations so nothing can be faster than than that fibre.

I agree however we only can get a max speed of 100MB/Sec on Fiber ( theoretically) maybe the Fiber between large servers and telco companies is closer to 1Gig/sec. The core 5G technology has a maximum speedof tens of Gbit/s (gigabits per second). In testing, the transfer speeds for the "5G" network sent data at 1.056 Gbit/s to a distance of up to 2 kilometres.with the use of an 8*8 MIMO.

 

[marki]

Well this is where quality of ISP comes into play - some don't purchase enough CVC to go with the AVC; but most of the high speed plans 50 and 100 now have bundled minimum CVC included, so generally its only a problem for people on legacy 12/1 plans which have no cvc; and on coughpy ISPs that oversell.

Congestion on Optus 4G is terrible in many areas, I've lost count of the number of times my phone/tablet have struggled to load the most basic pages in some areas where there is high degree of high rises with lots of renter using mobile rather than fixed line internet.

5G only has good speed over short distance with quality line of sight, and Telstra/Optus/VHA are only beginning the roll out, it will be years before it is a ubiquitous as 4G, hell there are still heaps of areas only on 3G.

If you are stuck on FTTN then mobiel can be a genuine alternative, but if you are lucky enough to live in a premises with FTTP then yours be silly not to get fibre for the speed and the reliability.

AVC Asian Volleyball Championships?

 

[Hvr]

AVC Asian Volleyball Championships?

The nbn Ethernet Bitstream Service is primarily charged in two components – the monthly access charge for a service to each end user premises (called an "Access Virtual Circuit" or AVC) and a monthly charge for network capacity which serves multiple end user premises (called a "Connectivity Virtual Circuit" or CVC).

 

[marki]

Thanks Hvr good to know the nitty bitty I learn slowely

 

[Lynda2475]

however we only can get a max speed of 100MB/Sec on Fiber

Not true several ISPs offer retails 250GB plans on nbn FTTP now (although these are rightly expensive) and you can order 1Gb on business plans. Most home usage is video streaming and gaming and 50/20 plan is more than sufficient for that. Netflix 4K can run on 25/5 fine, the higher speeds become more important depending on the number of devices you have connected and how many teenagers are streaming different things in different rooms at the same time whilst your sending huge image files in another room.

The fibre used in the NBN transit network i.e. to transport data between the Points of Interconnect (POIs) runs at minimum of 10GB. All fibre can do more than this, it comes down to the equipment you put on each end of those fibres; and new standards are being released.

5G can do 1Gbps over very short distances at the moment, its only been real world tested to 2Kms with line of sight, add some trees or building in the way and speed drops considerably. 8*8 MU MIMO (which is separate to 5G as will also work on 4G) is still buggy, I've yet to see it demonstrated successfully on either 5G or 4G here in Aus with the bands we use. Irrespective of what you get between your phone/5g Modem to the tower, the towers are still connected to each other and the POIs by fibre, there is no 5G without the fibre.

Most on fibre don’t want fibre speeds

Yes this is true, and most certainly dont want to pay for it. Your average person who wants to make some calls, browse the web and stream netflix/stan doesn't need fibre speeds greater than what is offered now.

So @Lynda2475 what is your opinion of HFC which is what I'll be getting?

I have nbn HFC and have had no issues, as my place already had foxtel port, install took less than 10 mins, and has been very stable (huge improvement on my old naked ADSL which would drop out every time it rained). Started on 25/5 and Netflix/Stan/CatchUp tv in HD all stream without any buffering, only upgraded to 52/20 as i sometimes work from home and the faster upload for large files is noticeable, but no visible difference from doubling the download speed, I cant watch tv faster than real time.

I pay less for 50/20 300GB plan with Aussie Broadband, than I did for my coughpy naked ADSL 2 with iinet, that never got above 7Mbps down and 1Mbps up (my mobile did better), but in busy evening period I consistently get 48/19.7. I could pay $5/month more and have unlimited data but so far havent needed to make that change.

 

[marki]

there is no 5G without the fibre.

Thanks, Lynda this obviously the case and do not deny this in any way.

stan doesn't need fibre speeds greater than what is offered now

.....Obviously, these speeds are offered at no extra cost in other countries like Poland or Germany ...occasionally one requires to download a 50-100 GB file in several seconds. Australia is behind most OECD countries for internet speed reliability and CVC,= i.e. the pipe width in one's fibre connection, not just the ACS.

 

[Quickstatus]

Does 5g even have a globally accepted set of standards yet?. It sounds more like what people would like the next iteration of cellular technology to be rather than what it is now. Everyone talks about it like it has defined globally accepted standards.

To say that 5g is x times faster or x times lower latency or x times more bandwidth etc etc is just hype and lots of it.

 

[marki]

5G - Wikipedia

Here are some standards are shown by Wiki. But the Millimeter waves will be for a city block. Not several Kilometers with Previous technology.

 

[Lynda2475]

3GPP define the standards, and only some of the 5G (mm wave ones) are currently agreed. Some US providers are already deploying their own 5G for in home (not mobile) but their deployment is unlikely to be the final standard.

Some of the handsets being sold as 5G ready, have the required chip set but do not yet have the software because of the immaturity fo the standards. You will notice the adverts say you need to return the Samsung Galaxy 10S in 6-9 months time to swap it for a 5G version if you need that.

I personally wouldn't buy a 5g handset until the second half of next year when things have matured. 4G isnt going away anytime soon, but we will start to see the demise of 3G as some frequencies are repurposed.

Millimeter waves will be for a city block

No expectation is that it will go further if have line of sight so in a non CBD environment . But yes for mobile coverage (where having to hand off to next cell as you move) and dense urban environments with very short distance line of sight the cell coverage is much much smaller than for 4G, mm wave does not penetrate buildings as well as 3G and 4G.

 

[Quickstatus]

Yes I have not found any formal “standards” for “5g” so whatever the chatter is at the moment, no one really knows what it is. Lots of speculation and hype abound.

MIMO tech Exists now

 

[moa999]

I have nbn HFC and have had no issues, as my place already had foxtel port, install took less than 10 mins, and has been very stable

You should have got Telstra Cable before then.

Personally don't see a big issue with FTTC, FTTB or HFC. In the vast majority of cases it will deliver nbn100 and has upgrade paths (g.fast and Docsis3.1 for faster speeds) and is generally cheaper to roll out (though does have higher power consumption)

The main issue with NBN MTM (ie Turnbull/Abbots changes) is FTTN.
Some people get lucky and can comfortably get 100 down.. Others, particularly those in the 500-1500m range from a node can have much slower speeds, there isn't a simple upgrade path and still subject to a lot of the old copper issues.

Some of the spend on HFC infill had also been crazy. Makes sense in an area where 60-80% of people have or previously had Foxtel/Telstra Cable.

Absolutely doesn't make sense rolling out fresh HFC to units/apartments that Foxtel hadnt previously served with new backbones and hallway conduit etc - this should have been fibre.

 

[Lynda2475]

occasionally one requires to download a 50-100 GB file in several seconds

120 mins of a 4K movie/tv file can be up to 100Gb but it is unclear to me why it would be necessary to download such a file in its entirety is a couple of seconds? You can stream it live quite easily over a 50Mbps service. I tend t do larger downloads as a background task.

Australia is behind most OECD countries for internet speed reliability and CVC

For mobile internet we are ranked 5th in the OECD, Australia has always had one of the highest mobile uptakes as a % of population in the world; and we have surprisingly good coverage given the size of our country and small population.

Our nbn fibre is no less reliable than anyone other countries fibre.

CVC is an artificial constraint introduced as nbn were directed to charge based on speed used whereas most of the world charge based on data usage. It was designed so that speed limits could allow for tiered pricing; .meaning that low volume users (i.e. oldies who only make phone calls or just read a website or two) had an option for a basic service, and those who want more speed (and therefore use a lot more data) could opt to pay more.

Removing CVC and introducing usage charges would be fairer in my opinion. Other countries who do not have CVC, do not guarantee minimum speeds (its rarity globally to see residential services based on speed), instead they operate similar to our mobile network in that you get the best available at any point in time (depending on congestion etc), except where you usage has exceeded your plan and you then get throttled to a much slower speed or pay for more data.

There has been a huge land grab for customers with some dodgy providers lowered prices to below ADSL costs and put customers on lowest speed tier which was really meant for voice only services and did not advise this is less than some adsl services to attract price sensitive customers. The ACC has clamped down on that practice.

The OECD fixed line internet measurements are averaged across all fixed line services so in Australia that means adsl, fttn/b, fttc, hfc and fttp; and are also based on what people choose to purchase so our ranking is lower in part because others dont buy based on speed.

Also need to understand that OECD stats do not include homes without a fixed line or mobile service, that is why some 3rd world places rank highly on avg speed as that average speed is measured across the tiny % of the population who can actually get internet. Most of countries ahead of us though have large populations concentrated in much smaller area, which makes roll-out more efficient. The reason we had to have an nbn is because the big telcos were never going to offer high speed services everywhere, rather just where it was profitable for them to do so.

The nbn has given aussies more choice of providers, and the erosion of Telstra and Optus cable broadband duopoly, has actually driven them to start down the 5G path (and improve their 4G) faster to provide more competition to fixed line. We should see our ranking improve as the roll-out finishes and the next round of upgrades start.

 

[Lynda2475]

You should have got Telstra Cable before then

Telstra cable internet was never really economical for me, when ADSL2+ was down i just used mobile internet. Plus pre nbn, Telstra:
a. wouldn't let you have naked cable internet, they forced you to bundle with a pstn line something i didn't need or want,
b. required 2 year contracts with expensive harsh exit penalties;
c. Limited upstream to 1-2mbs depending on plan.

However, nbn launched and not only was it $35 cheaper per month than Telstra's cable, the upstream speeds were 25-50-100 times faster depending on plan chosen.

The main issue with NBN MTM (ie Turnbull/Abbots changes) is FTTN.

Totally agree and i think you will see this swapped out for FTTC once the initial roll-out targets have been met next year. Its a shame that FTTC wasn't an option when the fttn (VDSL) decision was made - im very happy to not have been in a FTTN area.

 

[rogerkambah]

Optus has wireless/mobile 4g broadband current special 500Gb for $80

Is there a way to find out what the speed may be in my area as I don't have a 4G optus connected phone?

 

[Quickstatus]

@rogerkambah
Yes go to Officeworks and get a cheap $20 (approx) prepaid USB Optus/Huawei 4g dongle and connect to computer and check speed

Optus offer:
4G Plus WiFi Modem (Cat 6) B525 Plans - Optus
4G Wi-Fi Modem (CAT 11) AC800S - Optus

Scroll down view plans then click right to see 500gb plan

 

[Lynda2475]

Is there a way to find out what the speed may be in my area as I don't have a 4G optus connected phone?

Find a friend with an optus phone, have them over to your house, tether you tablet/laptop to their phone (to use their phones data) and do a speed test (or could just do a speed test from their phone).

Note however there is huge variability in speeds over the course of the day.

Also read the terms closely as on a lot of the unlimited mobile data plans, you get max speed available up to a certain level then throttled speed after that.