Broadband surges, fixed wireless speed drops

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freitasm

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#283916 19-Mar-2021 15:22

The report is from the Commerce Commission but Chorus pointed out...

Broadband use surges, fixed wireless speed drops - The Download

The report says most broadband technologies held up well during a year where norms were upended by the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns.

Yet the Commerce Commission noted a significant performance decrease for fixed wireless broadband users. The average fixed wireless speed dropped 25 percent during the year.

This drop happened as the number of fixed wireless customers climbed 16 percent during the year. The number of fibre broadband users increased from a little over 800,000 to more than a million. By the time the report period closed around two-thirds of those who could connect to fibre had chosen the technology.

tdgeek

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#2677348 19-Mar-2021 19:11

Hmmm, clickbait? 2020 and at June was a year of all years. Fibre grows, that would happen anyway? WBB grows as the telco's want to market it? With Covid, both technologies will have extra use, that will obviously affect cell towers more than light. Would the 25% decrease in WBB speed cause users to suffer issues? I wouldn't have thought so. Ive nat seen any WBB buffering threads here

Chorus is clearly anti WBB, thats all I can conclude.

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#2677350 19-Mar-2021 19:20

tdgeek:

Chorus is clearly anti WBB, thats all I can conclude.

Yes, that sums it up nicely. I'm on fixed wireless and my speeds are great, I don't experience lag. I don't live in the city, maybe that helps I'm not sure.

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#2677353 19-Mar-2021 19:29

snnet:

tdgeek:

Chorus is clearly anti WBB, thats all I can conclude.

Yes, that sums it up nicely. I'm on fixed wireless and my speeds are great, I don't experience lag. I don't live in the city, maybe that helps I'm not sure.

Towers are stop sell if they are getting to a congestion point. If its a tad cheaper and you can get it tomorrow, there is a place for it. Competition works I feel. Maybe Chorus and other LFC's might reduce the fibre line fee? Maybe WBB telco's will cut their prices? Classic competition.

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#2677398 19-Mar-2021 21:10

Rock solid WBB connection here too (see below).

I'm not convinced Chorus are anti WBB though - the more customers on 4G/Fibre the less Chorus spend on copper maintenance (read: incompetent contractors)...

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#2677416 19-Mar-2021 22:11

@K8Toledo Even with 50% of the copper base in an area, you're still not going to see a 50% reduction in costs as you've still got to maintain exchanges, major copper lines, deal with cut cables etc.

@tdgeek & @snnet - there is obviously a commercial bias from Chorus to keep customers on Chorus infrastructure whether its Copper or Fibre... however I'd venture this: As cell sites get loaded up, speeds do go down and often before the stop sell process kicks in. My folks who previously had Spark Wireless BB experienced peak time congestion consisting of high pings and sub 1mbps speeds whilst in offpeak, experienced low pings and >50mbps service. There is a heavy commercial focus from many telcos to reduce their input costs that they pay to Chorus and other LFC's. Its a tricky art - you not only need to balance how many customers to let on but those already on - their organic data growth over time as they consume more and more data heavy services.

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#2677464 19-Mar-2021 22:51

cokemaster:

their organic data growth over time as they consume more and more data heavy services.

It will never affect Grandma who all she does is email and a big of browsing

But those who add in Zoom and Streaming which may not have been around when they started on FWA will notice impact

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#2677481 20-Mar-2021 02:47

FWA speeds dropped in the time most providers removed their caps and managed the extra load.

Who would have thought... Its almost like caps are one of the mechanisms to control overall utilization....

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#2677482 20-Mar-2021 05:39

cokemaster:

@K8Toledo Even with 50% of the copper base in an area, you're still not going to see a 50% reduction in costs as you've still got to maintain exchanges, major copper lines, deal with cut cables etc.

@tdgeek & @snnet - there is obviously a commercial bias from Chorus to keep customers on Chorus infrastructure whether its Copper or Fibre... however I'd venture this: As cell sites get loaded up, speeds do go down and often before the stop sell process kicks in. My folks who previously had Spark Wireless BB experienced peak time congestion consisting of high pings and sub 1mbps speeds whilst in offpeak, experienced low pings and >50mbps service. There is a heavy commercial focus from many telcos to reduce their input costs that they pay to Chorus and other LFC's. Its a tricky art - you not only need to balance how many customers to let on but those already on - their organic data growth over time as they consume more and more data heavy services.

Fibre yes but I disagree on copper.

I say this because over the the last year or two I've seen more than a few cases where customers on ~100Mbps VDSL connections have been cold called and encouraged to switch to either Fibre or if fibre isn't available - FWA.

Who is driving this if not Chorus?

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#2677490 20-Mar-2021 08:29

cokemaster:

@K8Toledo Even with 50% of the copper base in an area, you're still not going to see a 50% reduction in costs as you've still got to maintain exchanges, major copper lines, deal with cut cables etc.

@tdgeek & @snnet - there is obviously a commercial bias from Chorus to keep customers on Chorus infrastructure whether its Copper or Fibre... however I'd venture this: As cell sites get loaded up, speeds do go down and often before the stop sell process kicks in. My folks who previously had Spark Wireless BB experienced peak time congestion consisting of high pings and sub 1mbps speeds whilst in offpeak, experienced low pings and >50mbps service. There is a heavy commercial focus from many telcos to reduce their input costs that they pay to Chorus and other LFC's. Its a tricky art - you not only need to balance how many customers to let on but those already on - their organic data growth over time as they consume more and more data heavy services.

Id say that school holidays doesnt help too

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#2677635 20-Mar-2021 15:22

I have real issues with the ComCom reporting, particularly around their use of the term "fixed wireless" which is both being used to describe those on FWA 3G/4G connections and those being delivered a wireless connection over 2.5GHz/5GHz/24GHz wireless. It's safe to say many of the issues reported are onlky affecting 3G/4G FWA access, and yet the ComCom are effectively tarnishing an entire local industry of WISPs, most of whom who go great lengths to deliver a great experience to their end users.

There has already been a massive lack of knowledge within the ComCom when it comes to the telco sector - I remember probably 3 or 4 years ago at Spark Xmas drinks meeting two ComCom analysts who had zero understanding of EUBA vs BUBA, the limitations of the ATM network, and didn't know what a Conklin was or how it differered to an ISAM.

Without this knowledge I'm really not sure how they're supposed to oversee the industry and accurately report on it.

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#2677761 20-Mar-2021 21:42

sbiddle:

I have real issues with the ComCom reporting, particularly around their use of the term "fixed wireless" which is both being used to describe those on FWA 3G/4G connections and those being delivered a wireless connection over 2.5GHz/5GHz/24GHz wireless. It's safe to say many of the issues reported are onlky affecting 3G/4G FWA access, and yet the ComCom are effectively tarnishing an entire local industry of WISPs, most of whom who go great lengths to deliver a great experience to their end users.

There has already been a massive lack of knowledge within the ComCom when it comes to the telco sector - I remember probably 3 or 4 years ago at Spark Xmas drinks meeting two ComCom analysts who had zero understanding of EUBA vs BUBA, the limitations of the ATM network, and didn't know what a Conklin was or how it differered to an ISAM.

Without this knowledge I'm really not sure how they're supposed to oversee the industry and accurately report on it.

100% agree.

I have probes that sit on a few wisps (PTMP 5ghz last mile) and honestly, covid had no real world impact or drop in speed.

if anything minor increases in latency at peak but that's all.

talking to the providers themselves clearly they have extra load on their network... but it's been within the buffer they already build their backhauls for anyway.

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#2677767 20-Mar-2021 22:50

@K8Toledo I wouldn't rule out competing RSP's - I understand that Chorus does provide data concerning Fibre availability and Addresses to RSPs.

For RSP's that don't have a Fixed Wireless offering, it can be compelling to win those customers over from Copper, even if it means paying Fibre input pricing.

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#2689885 9-Apr-2021 12:00

cokemaster:

@K8Toledo I wouldn't rule out competing RSP's - I understand that Chorus does provide data concerning Fibre availability and Addresses to RSPs.

For RSP's that don't have a Fixed Wireless offering, it can be compelling to win those customers over from Copper, even if it means paying Fibre input pricing.

Sorry - late reply, the RSP's were in every occasion the customers own provider. Appeared to be more about switching services than switching providers.

There are other factors too like a Chorus contractor I deal with on a semi-regular basis tells me the work is drying up with so many customers moving from copper to Fibre.

This particular contractor has been with Chorus since the Telecom days so I respect his opinion.