Rural cables and expanding cellphone reception

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estepeste

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Wannabe Geek

Topic # 204224 22-Sep-2016 11:28

We are rural (20 mins from Tauranga, a long way from the State Highway), the copper speeds are absolutely terrible, so we have committed to 4G very very recently.

1) We had a recent notification in the mail saying some cables will be laid on our road. They started this morning, so i asked one of the workers and he said it's for Broadband. Surely in this day and age nobody would be laying Copper anymore, but unlikely it's Fibre also.
What do you think it could be? The cables were blue or green (can't remember now).We just had 4G box installed with varying results, I was going to get the technician to come out again and put the aerial on the roof to improve things. But if there is scope of another type of fast (and hopefully unlimited) internet becoming available soon, I might hold fire on the aerial...

2) Also keen on expanding out cellphone coverage, which from my understanding can be done in a number of different ways, one of them being Vodafone Sure Signal (which has to be plugged into a fixed line which we don't currently have). Or can they be plugged in to the 4G box? Wasn't sure if you would call the 4G box with aerial "fixed line". If this is not an option, any suggestions on how the cellphone signal can be improved?

Suggestions and information greatly appreciated :-)

Sidestep

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Reply # 1638705 22-Sep-2016 12:10

We're also rural, live right at the end of the world (near Cape Reinga)

One day they laid green conduit down our gravel road. About 1km - as the crow flies - away from the house. Yes it was fibre.

It was actually for backhaul of a cellphone tower they were putting in, but because it was publicly funded it shows in blue on this map, and we can - in theory - connect directly to it.

We looked into it, the cost is prohibitive. However we're super happy with the 'wireless' RBI in place of our previous satellite internet connection.

Check out what they're up to, but a rooftop antenna for better reception's a good idea.

froob

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Reply # 1639954 24-Sep-2016 18:21

estepeste:

...

2) Also keen on expanding out cellphone coverage, which from my understanding can be done in a number of different ways, one of them being Vodafone Sure Signal (which has to be plugged into a fixed line which we don't currently have). Or can they be plugged in to the 4G box? Wasn't sure if you would call the 4G box with aerial "fixed line". If this is not an option, any suggestions on how the cellphone signal can be improved?

According to this post, SureSignal will actually work on a 4G connection with Vodafone as the ISP. Might be worth giving it a try? It does seem like it definitely needs to be 4G, and not 3G.

atomeara

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Reply # 1639969 24-Sep-2016 19:06

Chorus are continuing to upgrade rural cabinets, I think there are about 150 being done between May and the end of the year.

This is there own money as the RBI funding has finished.

There are 2 in the Tauranga area.

One off Shaw Road, Te Ranga out the back of Te Puke.

The other near Wainui South Road and Esdaile Road, Whakamarama out the back of Omokoroa. Are you near here by any chance? this one is not fibre fed from what I can see, the one on Shaw Road appears to already have fibre to it so is unlike to involve much civil work. If the Chorus maps are correct.

Geektastic

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Reply # 1640023 24-Sep-2016 20:44

We live in Martinborough. No fibre and our address shows as "never getting fibre" on the Chorus plans.

We do not have 4G either - Featherston does (about 16km away) but Martinborough does not. When I am somewhere with 4G it is much faster than our copper.

estepeste

8 posts

Wannabe Geek

Reply # 1640030 24-Sep-2016 21:13

froob:

estepeste:

...

2) Also keen on expanding out cellphone coverage, which from my understanding can be done in a number of different ways, one of them being Vodafone Sure Signal (which has to be plugged into a fixed line which we don't currently have). Or can they be plugged in to the 4G box? Wasn't sure if you would call the 4G box with aerial "fixed line". If this is not an option, any suggestions on how the cellphone signal can be improved?

According to this post, SureSignal will actually work on a 4G connection with Vodafone as the ISP. Might be worth giving it a try? It does seem like it definitely needs to be 4G, and not 3G.

I spoke to Vodafone who said the Sure Signal won't work with 4G, apparently it just goes round in circles or something. ?

estepeste

8 posts

Wannabe Geek

Reply # 1640032 24-Sep-2016 21:15

atomeara:

Chorus are continuing to upgrade rural cabinets, I think there are about 150 being done between May and the end of the year.

This is there own money as the RBI funding has finished.

There are 2 in the Tauranga area.

One off Shaw Road, Te Ranga out the back of Te Puke.

The other near Wainui South Road and Esdaile Road, Whakamarama out the back of Omokoroa. Are you near here by any chance? this one is not fibre fed from what I can see, the one on Shaw Road appears to already have fibre to it so is unlike to involve much civil work. If the Chorus maps are correct.

Thanks for that. yes we are near Wainui South and Esdaile Road, ended up cornering the workers digging next to the road, they said it was fibre (green cable), upgrading the cabinet. Will be interesting to see what it does to normal broadband speeds.
Which Chorus maps are you looking it? Any chance you could send a link? The ones I looked at had no indication of any work planned near us?!

froob

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Reply # 1640043 24-Sep-2016 22:10

estepeste:

froob:

estepeste:

...

2) Also keen on expanding out cellphone coverage, which from my understanding can be done in a number of different ways, one of them being Vodafone Sure Signal (which has to be plugged into a fixed line which we don't currently have). Or can they be plugged in to the 4G box? Wasn't sure if you would call the 4G box with aerial "fixed line". If this is not an option, any suggestions on how the cellphone signal can be improved?

According to this post, SureSignal will actually work on a 4G connection with Vodafone as the ISP. Might be worth giving it a try? It does seem like it definitely needs to be 4G, and not 3G.

I spoke to Vodafone who said the Sure Signal won't work with 4G, apparently it just goes round in circles or something. ?

They were probably suggesting that your RBI modem ("4G box") would try to connect to the Sure Signal, creating a "loop", which would stop anything from working. But, Sure Signal is a 3G device, so I don't think a 4G RBI modem would try to connect to it.

I haven't tried this myself, so can't confirm that it works, but @jjnz1 might be able to give you some reassurance that it does.

Linux

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Reply # 1640048 24-Sep-2016 22:39

One person supports this post

Chorus is on a crusade to remove Conklin cabinets from its network

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Zeon

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Reply # 1640049 24-Sep-2016 22:52

Geektastic:

We live in Martinborough. No fibre and our address shows as "never getting fibre" on the Chorus plans.

We do not have 4G either - Featherston does (about 16km away) but Martinborough does not. When I am somewhere with 4G it is much faster than our copper.

I thought that the local computer store in Martinborough runs a WiFi network which presumably is connected to fibre?

atomeara

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Reply # 1640071 25-Sep-2016 07:43

estepeste:

atomeara:

Chorus are continuing to upgrade rural cabinets, I think there are about 150 being done between May and the end of the year.

This is there own money as the RBI funding has finished.

There are 2 in the Tauranga area.

One off Shaw Road, Te Ranga out the back of Te Puke.

The other near Wainui South Road and Esdaile Road, Whakamarama out the back of Omokoroa. Are you near here by any chance? this one is not fibre fed from what I can see, the one on Shaw Road appears to already have fibre to it so is unlike to involve much civil work. If the Chorus maps are correct.

Thanks for that. yes we are near Wainui South and Esdaile Road, ended up cornering the workers digging next to the road, they said it was fibre (green cable), upgrading the cabinet. Will be interesting to see what it does to normal broadband speeds.
Which Chorus maps are you looking it? Any chance you could send a link? The ones I looked at had no indication of any work planned near us?!

If you are near the cabinet you will be able to get VDSL (maybe within 1km), then it drops back to ADSL 2+.

It was on the Chorus network build update, https://www.chorus.co.nz/our-network/about/network-build-update

There are shapes files you can put into Google Earth.

They have also in the last week or so update there CCM (Chorus Customer Maps) but you need to be a direct Chorus customer to get access (e.g. a service provider)

quickymart

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Reply # 1640074 25-Sep-2016 08:49

Linux: Chorus is on a crusade to remove Conklin cabinets from its network

Linux

They won't be removed everywhere though as it's not financially viable.

Linux

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Reply # 1640075 25-Sep-2016 08:50

quickymart:
Linux: Chorus is on a crusade to remove Conklin cabinets from its network

Linux

They won't be removed everywhere though as it's not financially viable.

50% of them by Christmas

estepeste

8 posts

Wannabe Geek

Reply # 1640099 25-Sep-2016 09:46

froob:

estepeste:

froob:

estepeste:

...

2) Also keen on expanding out cellphone coverage, which from my understanding can be done in a number of different ways, one of them being Vodafone Sure Signal (which has to be plugged into a fixed line which we don't currently have). Or can they be plugged in to the 4G box? Wasn't sure if you would call the 4G box with aerial "fixed line". If this is not an option, any suggestions on how the cellphone signal can be improved?

According to this post, SureSignal will actually work on a 4G connection with Vodafone as the ISP. Might be worth giving it a try? It does seem like it definitely needs to be 4G, and not 3G.

I spoke to Vodafone who said the Sure Signal won't work with 4G, apparently it just goes round in circles or something. ?

They were probably suggesting that your RBI modem ("4G box") would try to connect to the Sure Signal, creating a "loop", which would stop anything from working. But, Sure Signal is a 3G device, so I don't think a 4G RBI modem would try to connect to it.

I haven't tried this myself, so can't confirm that it works, but @jjnz1 might be able to give you some reassurance that it does.

The 4G box changes between 3G and 4G (it has capability for both) because the home phone runs off the 3G capability. So I guess it makes sense that the Sure Signal would be able to connect to it, thus go around in circles :-(

quickymart

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Reply # 1640111 25-Sep-2016 10:09

Linux:
quickymart:

Linux: Chorus is on a crusade to remove Conklin cabinets from its network

Linux

They won't be removed everywhere though as it's not financially viable.

50% of them by Christmas

That's still not everywhere though. Have you got a link to this figure?

atomeara

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Reply # 1640121 25-Sep-2016 10:30

30 June 2015 to 2016, the number of BUBA connections went from 106,000 to 55,000.
Old cabinets are only BUBA (ADSL1 normally on slow backhaul). New ones support (EUBA) ADSL 2+ and (WVS0) VDSL and fibre with mostly fibre backhaul.

I think saying 50% by the end of the year is a bit ambitious.
I would say maybe they may knock off 20% by the end of the year.

There are a reasoanble number of cabinets that are already fibre fed, they can be upgraded without to much cost.

There are also a number that are not to far from existing fibre.

Then there are the last lot like Optio Bay on the Coromandel, Bethells Beach on Aucklands West Coast, Molesworth inland from Blenheim and a lot of coastal Wairarapa that are going to be very expensive to upgrade due to the distance and topography they need to run fibre down.

If Chorus keeps spending / upgrading at the current rate I would say the majority are gone by the end of 2019.

Not all are totally fibre fed, a number are linked by radio and some fibre, Great Barrier Island is an example of this.

The Stage 2 RBI funding is also likely to help fund part of it too.