‘Something Somewhere'.…?

Not sure what to make of the Everything Everywhere (‘EE’) 4G launch yesterday.   Apart from the hoop-la over 4G itself,  the company more quietly announced it will also launch a fibre broadband service to homes and businesses with fixed-line internet speeds ‘typically ten times faster’ than today’s average broadband speeds: “Our Fibre Broadband will be available to over 11 million homes, representing around half of the population. We will be adding more homes all the time… EE is the only place where you will be able to get superfast internet - home and away”.

 So is this a new fixed network for the UK?  Well, not quite.  Dig a bit deeper and the T-Mobile website offers some additional clues:

 “Fibre speed may vary depending on distance from street cabinet and how many people are using the network at the same time as you…10 times faster based on 58.5 Mbps average speed on EE Fibre compared to the average speed of 5.9Mbits/s on ADSL broadband…”  All of this seems to confirm the story in ISP Review that EE “will make use of BT’s latest Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC) technology and should offer speeds of up to almost 80Mbps…  It will also offer standard broadband via ADSL in non-fibre areas”.

Ten times faster?  80 Mbps? Not according to our good friends at Br0ken Teleph0n3:

“Br0ken Teleph0n3 has received reports that even 24Mbps is the top end of what BT’s Infinity fibre to the cabinet service will deliver. It appears that some councils are being told to plan for the average speed delivered from an Infinity cabinet to be just 15Mbps….Users who live close to the cabinet and have good quality copper will enjoy the top speed, but most will not”.

 
One to watch…