Has anyone swapped from adsl/vdsl to UFB?

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Has anyone swapped from adsl/vdsl to UFB?

TeaLeaf

6325 posts

Uber Geek

#197878 16-Jun-2016 11:07

I love BigPipe. Just a no BS cheap ISP. Ive had very few issues (actually my only on is current) with them.

Im considering UFB as its only the street but I live in a single level apartment complex. How would chorus do the install, would they just follow the phoneline route? What do they need to install from the street, I presume they put some kind of HUB in the complex secure garage, near the leccy metres? I need to consider what costs will incur as I would need to take that to the owners etc and other apartment owners.

Anyway for the price of VDSL, its cheaper to have the $79 base UFB package which is miles faster. But is it noticeable in real world? Ive just been lazy not swapping over because VDSL is pretty dang fast anyway.

Flickky

303 posts

Ultimate Geek

Trusted

#1574932 16-Jun-2016 11:20

I've just moved from ADSL to UFB in the past couple of weeks (we're talking <8Mbps with bad internal wiring ADSL), and oh boy can you notice it in the real world. Whether you'd notice it speed-wise switching from VDSL to UFB is dependant on what your VDSL speed was, but personally I definitely noticed a sharp improvement on my latency.

As far as installs go, Chorus usually try to follow the easiest path they can, but whether they follow the current route of the phone line depends on so many factors (aerial lead/underground/is this going through half a driveway involving other properties?). Out of curiosity, how many units are there in the complex? Are body corporates involved?

Before the actual install you'll have a Chorus rep/contractor come out to the property and provide details on the recommended install path, so you'll know well before you sign off on a tech coming to install :)

Would also recommend reading this handy-dandy article: What to Expect When You're Expecting Fibre.

TeaLeaf

6325 posts

Uber Geek

#1574956 16-Jun-2016 11:47

awesome dude thanks.

i think 10 apartments, all one level and a basement garage. yes body corporate here.

by the looks of letters falling on the ground there is a lot of promotion of UFB going on from all kinds of ISPs. i guess they know our street has UFB laid.

DarkShadow

1647 posts

Uber Geek

#1574973 16-Jun-2016 12:08

I have upgraded to UFB from 45Mbps VDSL and it definitely is noticeable. The main thing is in Netflix, you can now fast forward/rewind almost instantly, with just a little bit of buffering. It makes it feels a lot more like the video file is on your hard drive instead of in the cloud. Of course, downloads go much faster.

TeaLeaf

6325 posts

Uber Geek

#1574976 16-Jun-2016 12:16

Where do they usually lay the fibre, is it under the footpath or in the drain etc?

Our complex is literally on the footpath, the 1st apartment overhangs the driveway, next to the driveway is a guest park spot.

Are UFBs terminated at every house on the street?

I guess its hard to know but I could go look where all the telephone lines lead to and if there is a pipe that goes under the footpath etc.

Hey DS, yes we are on about 45Mbps too, and about 7-8 up depending on the day. So if its noticeable over that then awesome.

Using an NF4V, love this router.

I cant imagine what 200 up would be like haha.

Cant afford that package though.

Is the $99 worth it over the $79

We were going to downgrade to adsl2 to save $10, so I think the $79 would be an improvement over both VDSL and clearly adsl2?

allio

885 posts

Ultimate Geek

#1575009 16-Jun-2016 13:16

I switched from ADSL to UFB 100/20 and found it quite noticeably snappier with general web browsing, although after a week or two I was used to it and no longer thought "wow this is fast". On the other hand I asked my partner the day we got it installed and she said she hadn't noticed a difference, so perhaps it's not as dramatic as I thought. The other main difference is that latency and responsiveness never suffers, no matter how hard you load the connection. Downloads of course are a great deal quicker but that's obvious.

DarkShadow

1647 posts

Uber Geek

#1575017 16-Jun-2016 13:41

TeaLeaf:

Are UFBs terminated at every house on the street?

Is the $99 worth it over the $79

Yes UFB will be installed inside every house that requests it.

You can change plan any time with Bigpipe so you can just go for the faster one and drop it down if you feel it's not worth the money.

TeaLeaf

6325 posts

Uber Geek

#1575020 16-Jun-2016 13:45

our lines run under ground to a chorus box about 40m up the road so I dont think that conduit will work. they will need to dig from the street (where does the fibre usually lie?) under the edge of the spare car park and put the ETP in the garage.

i doubt very much the body corp will go for it if there is a cost.

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TeaLeaf

6325 posts

Uber Geek

#1575022 16-Jun-2016 13:47

DarkShadow:

TeaLeaf:

Are UFBs terminated at every house on the street?

Is the $99 worth it over the $79

Yes UFB will be installed inside every house that requests it.

You can change plan any time with Bigpipe so you can just go for the faster one and drop it down if you feel it's not worth the money.

where on the street does it usually run though, like is there a pre cut terminal for each house under ground?

good point re rasing or dropping speed, thats what i like about bigpipe, no fees usually.