The Home Broadband Journey

THE HOME BROADBAND JOURNEY How different cables adfect your speed SPEED HOME CABINET EXCHANGE NETWORK BT Exchange (LLU) 76+ Mb .... FTTP FTTC вТ 38+ Mb TalkTalk Copper FTTC sky TESCO Max Copper Copper 6-16 Mb 30+ Mb Coax FTTC media UNTANGLING THE INTERNET CABLE JARGON COAX Coax is short for 'coaxial cable'. It is used by Virgin Media to take your broadband and television signals on the last leg of their trip; from the street cabinet to your home. It's cheaper than fibre, but great for transferring a variety of services (voice, broadband, television) over short distances. FTTP FTTC Fibre broadband is the fastest around right now. FTTP, or fibre to the premises (sometimes FTTH, to the home), goes all the way from the exchange to your house. FTTC (fibre to the cabinet) only goes to the street cabinet, and then either coax or copper go that last leg; if it's copper, this can really compromise broadband speed. COPPER (ADSL/ADSL2+ ) The original broadband, sent down old school telephone lines. Unfortunately copper isn't equipped to deal well with transferring data – hence the original ADSL speeds being below 10Mb. ADSL2+ improved this to something close to 20Mb, and is now available in many areas, but the further from your telephone exchange you are the slower it will be. LLU LLU (local loop unbundling) allows BT Openreach to open up parts of its telephone exchanges to other internet providers (ISPS) who have their own networks, such as Sky and TalkTalk. This may make for a better experience, as network issues will be dealt with by Sky, for example, rather than BT – but this is a personal preference. Broadband DESIGNED BY GENIE WWW.BROADBANDGENIE.CO.UK