Alright, bit of a time-out this Tuesday. While this article might be short and relatively specific, it has at least a tangential relation to gaming, so I’m going to run with it. Today, I’d like to talk about switching to Fibre Optic Broadband.

Some caveats first: everything I write is limited to a UK perspective. I have no idea how internet works over the pond. You lot and your cable everything… what’s wrong with good old ADSL? Specifically, this article relates to an upgrade from ADSL2+ to FTTC. While I was looking into upgrading my own connection, I came across a ton of scattered information, most of it incomplete and a lot of it contradictory. For anyone considering the switch, this article is for you. I hope it can act as a beacon of sense amongst the billions of forum posts across the vast expanse of the internet.

So I’ve had ADSL2+ for some time now. For those of you not in the know, this is basically what the UK providers call “up to 24Meg” broadband. Some ISPs put a bow on it and call it something different, but the speeds all average out about the same, regardless of who you go with. The deciding factor when it comes to ADSL2+ speed is distance. By this, I mean both the distance between your local BT exchange and your green “cabinet”, and the distance between said cabinet and your BT master socket.

Go to this website and plug in your postcode. It’ll give you information about which exchange you are served by and give you a pretty accurate idea of its location. My specific exchange is actually a little ways off where the map says it should be, but that should be the exception as opposed to the rule. This map should give you an idea of how far you are from your exchange – the further you are, the worse your ADSL2+ broadband is going to be.

But that’s not all, because your telephone line doesn’t run directly to this building. It first goes through those big green cabinets you see dotted around neighbourhoods. There’s no real way of deciphering which of these you’re served by, but as a rule, it tends to be the one that’s closest to you. Again, the further you are from the cabinet, the worse your speed is going to be. The reason distance matters in both cases is because the lines running between these fixtures are copper (or aluminium, if you’re unlucky like us sods up here). Suffice it to say, copper isn’t great at carrying broadband over long distances.

Thankfully, we’re starting to see a widespread roll out of what’s known as FTTC, or “Fibre to the Cabinet”. What this means is that BT come along, dig up roads and pavements, pissing everybody off while they lay delicious fibre optic cable between your exchange and your cabinet. This is usually the longer of the two distances involved, meaning that a good chunk of the slow-down you get from copper cable is removed from the equation. Fibre optic cable uses pulses of light along specially constructed glass cables that utilise something called total internal reflection. All this means is that virtually no loss of quality happens over the longer distances involved.

The net result (ahahaha do you see what I did there)? You end up with faster broadband. A lot faster. While ADSL2+ had me at speeds of around 16Mbps / 1Mbps (around 1.8 MB/s download and 256KB/s upload), my newly installed FTTC connection has me sitting pretty at 73Mbps / 19Mbps (almost 9MB/s download, over 2MB/s upload). This means I can download games and patches faster. It means I can stream at higher qualities reliably. Hell, it means I can do my own streams now – finally, the Share button on my PS4 controller isn’t useless! But how did I get here? What’s actually involved in getting Fibre set up? What do you need to do, what equipment do you need?

Fortunately, it’s a lot simpler than a lot of people make it out to be.

First up, do some checking around online to find the best deal. You’ll often find that BT aren’t the ones giving the best value in your area, especially if you live in a competitive neighbourhood (i.e. one served by more than 3 ISPs). Once you’ve got your provider in mind, get in touch with them. With me, it was a case of using my existing ISP’s online tool to customise my package. Be careful that you don’t opt for the half-rate 38Mb Fibre packages – unless you specifically want to limit yourself in this way, you want to go the whole hog and get the 76Mb deal.

Two things will happen regardless of which provider you choose: some equipment will be sent to you and you’ll need to schedule a BT engineer visit. It’s very likely that your old router doesn’t have the functionality required to connect at FTTC speeds, but ISPs (aside from BT) aren’t willing to spend money on similar all-in-one devices. What this means is that, if you’re not with BT, you might get sent a new router that looks awfully similar to your existing one.

Even if you’re using your own equipment (like I was), you need to make sure that it can tolerate FTTC connections before you go telling your ISP that you don’t need it. In my case, my old router wasn’t capable of supporting speeds above 46Mbps in a stable manner, so I opted to accept the one my ISP sent me. If you’re with BT, this new “BT Infinity” router will be the only thing you need to plug in and it’s likely that the BT engineer will bring it with him when he comes to your house (more on that in a second). If you’re with another provider, you’ll need another device – the BT OpenReach Modem. This is a separate box, just as big as a normal router, that is needed to bridge the connection between your wall socket and your router.

The practical upshot of all of this? Chances are good that you’re going to need to have space for two “routers” instead of one, including adequate power sockets, so bear this in mind before you make any order.

If this was all that needed doing, then there would be no need for a BT engineer to visit. Unfortunately, you need to schedule some time off work and wait for one to arrive, since they need to play about in the cabinet you’re connected to and install a new faceplate on your master socket. This new plate will perform the actions of a broadband splitter, except right at the source – this means you can ditch any broadband splitters you’ve needed throughout the rest of the house.

The BT engineer will also help you get things connected and test the line, but won’t go as far as to troubleshoot any issues with non-BT equipment. All going well, your new FTTC broadband should be up and running by the time he’s gone. However, even if I’d read all of this when I was researching fibre myself, I would still have had some questions. I’ll try and answer some of the more pressing ones I came across during my online hunts, as well as some more common questions that might be of relevance to gamers.

Q. Someone told me that I need to change the cable I use from my faceplate to the OpenReach Modem. Is this true?

A. No – you can (and should) continue to use your existing RJ11 cable, especially if you’ve already got it pinned to walls or skirting boards, or running under carpet. The only time you need to replace it is if you need to move where the Modem and Router will be placed.

Q. What about this “Data Extension Kit” that I’ve been offered? Do I need that?

A. All this kit consists of is a long ethernet cable – the same one you’d use to connect your PC to your router. There’s no reason you’d need this unless you can’t physically have your OpenReach Modem and your new Router in the same place. In all honesty, you’d probably be better using a power extension lead as opposed to this.

Q. Can I use my own networking equipment for FTTC?

A. This is dependent on your ISP, but most will allow you to use your own router. You’ll still need the BT OpenReach Modem, but the router can be anything that supports the speeds involved. Look for routers than support “WAN over Ethernet” to start with, but always check user reviews to see if others have had success or any issues. You will need to contact your ISP to ask them for any relevant connection details, since the new router won’t be automatically configured for your connection.

Q. Will this improve my latency / ping?

A. Probably not by much, but this depends on how long the connection between your cabinet and the exchange is. If it was very long, then you may well see a great improvement, since the worst segment of your connection was upgraded. Otherwise, don’t expect too much of a change.

Q. I’ve been told that I shouldn’t use wireless if I can help it – why?

A. This is likely due to the limitations of your wifi devices. Most of them will be using what’s called Wireless G, which means that they can only support a maximum bandwidth of 54Mbps. There’s a good chance that, for the first time, your broadband connection will be faster than your wifi. If your router AND your device support Wireless N, however, you should be fine, since this can handle speeds of up to 600Mbps. Just in case you were wondering, a standard ethernet connection will typically support 100Mbps, unless you have a high-spec router and network card on your PC. That said, to limit any possible lag, always connect your console and PC using ethernet if you can.

Q. Anything else?

A. Remember that your wifi connections on all your consoles will have to be re-input for your new connection. I highly advise going into your router’s configuration page and editing things to your liking, if you’re comfortable with that. I can’t stand the default names they give the wireless networks on ISP-provided routers. Make sure that both the OpenReach Modem and your Router are in well-ventilated areas. If you encounter any problems with your broadband, try turning the router off and on again – you’d be surprised how many times this will fix common issues.

That’s about all I can think of. If you have any other queries, feel free to leave a comment.

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