BT's superfast fibre broadband network: all you need to know

BT Openreach's very own fibre broadband network should reach two thirds of UK premises (about 18 million households) in 2014.

Many ISPs - including BT, Plusnet, Zen and Eclipse - are already offering deals which use the network, advertised as up to 40Mb or up to 100Mb broadband.

This guide takes a closer look into what makes BT's fibre network different from its old infrastructure and from Virgin Media fibre: is it really much better than either?

And, on a consumer level, does it make any difference which brand you buy from?

BT's £1.5 billion investment

Before that, though, let's take a quick look at the politics of BT's £1.5 billion fibre network investment.

As we'll see below, the main reason for that is really very simple: fibre broadband is the future of data communication and BT are falling behind.

It's faster, more efficient and it can be upgraded to offer even faster speeds which will, ultimately, boost the economy and help the UK meet its Digital Britain commitments.

Yet Virgin Media are offering faster average speeds than the UK's communications giant.

Greater competition should result in a better deal for the consumer, all the more so because BT has opened up its network on a wholesale basis (just like its existing phone line network) to other ISPs from which BT is entitled to make a profit.

However, it's interesting to note that BT aren't the only ones with pockets deep enough to fund their own fibre network.

Fujitsu recently announced that they'll be bidding for a slice of Government cash to fund a fibre network which covers the UK's most rural areas.

VDSL fibre vs ADSL copper broadband

Let's start from the beginning: fibre broadband delivers a connection through fibre optic cables which are made from glass or plastic, as opposed to copper.

Fibre optic cables carry light along an inner glass, or plastic core. Light is reflected within the core which allows for a much more efficient flow of data.

One problem with copper wires is that as the length of the wire increases signal attenuates and the speed of data transmission decreases significantly.

Because fibre is more efficient it can cover a much longer distance without experiencing the same degradation in speed.

That difference alone means that Very-high-bit-rate digital subscriber line (VDSL) will almost always be faster than an Asymmetrical digital subscriber line (ADSL) connection.

In addition, fibre is less prone to sources of interference which can decrease speeds.

For those that live in areas where such factors are a concern, then, the difference between A and VDSL is likely to be even greater.

BT fibre vs Virgin Media cable

Theoretically, a fibre optic line can reach data transmission speeds of a staggering 111 Gigabits (Gb) per second.

In Megabits (Mb) per second, the measure we'd usually use to refer to speeds, that's 113,664Mb, a bit better than the UK average of 7.2Mb!

The real world conspires to lower those speeds considerably, of course. We mention them here because they illustrate the extent to which UK fibre providers can go on improving speeds as they improve their networks.

Although congestion plays a part in slowing connections - many users sharing the same fibre cables will decrease the maximum speed a single user can get - resources and budget play a larger role.

The hardware used at junctions, in exchanges and on street level need upgrading for providers to be able to offer the higher speeds.

For example, BT's fibre broadband network uses copper cables to run the distance between the green street-level boxes and homes.

Virgin Media, on the other hand, uses a slightly more efficient coaxial cable to cover that 'last mile'.

That small difference means that BT advertise up to 40Mb broadband while Virgin Media advertise up to 50Mb speeds. You can read more about this in our guide to the technical differences between BT and Virgin fibre, we mention it here just to show that it's a close-run race.

The other major difference between the BT and Virgin Media networks is that the latter is closed to competing ISPs, they have a complete monopoly on their ex-NTL and Telewest fibre network despite the fact that they regularly pressure BT to open up their own ducts and pipes to other operators.

BT fibre: provider face-off

The major go ahead for BT's fibre network was released when Ofcom finally ruled that BT would be allowed to decide on the prices it charged to resellers - enabling BT to make a profit from the wholesale of the network to other ISPs.

That's meant that five providers can offer deals on BT's fibre network:

• BT Infinity
• Plusnet
• Zen internet
• Eclipse internet
• TalkTalk

None of these providers has distinguished itself in terms of the actual service it will provides by adding extra infrastructure into exchanges, at this point they're all just re-selling the BT product.

However, each has their own area of speciality to distinguish their service: Plusnet are offering deals slightly cheaper than any other provider, for example, and as business broadband providers, Zen and Eclipse offer a very high level of customer support

Fibre in rural areas?

Although the Government is trying to get mobile broadband operators to get broadband to the most remote parts of Britain, it seems unlikely that they'll push for the same blanket high-speed coverage when it comes to home connections.

Although Taffs Well and Calder Valley, near Halifax in West Yorkshire, have served as testing grounds for the roll out in rural areas and small towns and villages benefited from BT's 'race to infinity' project these are the exceptions.

In general, roll out of the new fibre network will be concentrated on densely populated rural areas.

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