Free upgrade from Fibre 65 to Full Fibre 150 with Digital Voice - questions......

[Poole6]

We had an email from TT yesterday giving an appointment in just 13 days time (which I realise I can reschedule if I do decide to go ahead) for a 'free upgrade' from my fibre connection to full fibre with Digital Voice.

As the standard info available is woeful, I have spent the day looking into what this entails and wonder if someone can please answer the following (I'm not a huge tech-head, but have happily used and adapted my current system for years and therefore don't want a lot of complications arising if I upgrade!) -

1 - The existing phone line runs along the side of our bungalow, through a hole above the only outside door, along the picture rail in the hallway and then down the side of an internal doorframe and into the BT master socket - this internal cabling being approx. 6 metres and bending at right-angles several times. All the info online seems to show the new fibre cable being drilled directly from a box on the outside wall to one (the ONT) on the immediate inside wall and then a cable from this to the router - this is not suitable for us, so if we wish it would the ONT be able to be put where the BT socket used to be?

2 - Which router would the package come with? We are extremely limited with power sockets (yes, we already have *many* extension leads) and if I've read correctly with a Digital Voice install if I have an eero router I will need 5 sockets (ONT, eero, VOIP adapter, my landline phone and an ethernet switch as the eero has only 2 ports) which is very problematic. I understand the TalkTalk Sagemcom FAST5464-2 T4 Wireless Router has a built-in phone socket and 4 ethernet ports which would need (only!) three power sockets. Can I choose which one to have? Or maybe purchase a Sagecom on eBay and use that if we can't accommodate the eero?

3 - eero uses wifi6 - most of the tech in my house is at least 5 years old - does that mean they won't connect?

4 - a lot of my tech is 2.4ghz only (I've got my 2.4 and 5ghz bands under separate names) - would I be able to separate them with both the eero and sagem routers?

There may be more questions later....but these are the major ones I've thought of so far! Thanks.

[Richard_Ch]

Hello

I have just today has my Fibre150 + Digital Voice installed. Here are some thoughts based on my experience.

You're correct - information about the implications from TalkTalk is limited. I phoned TT about it and they were not especially helpful. They said that a few days before the install an engineer would come 'on-site' and I could speak to him. As it happens I never saw this engineer and I discovered later that the 'site visit' is simply to check the fibre installation in your street.

My installation was by CityFibre and I guess yours will be. The engineer was pleasant enough and tried to be helpful but had little understanding about TT beyond getting the fibre installed. 

Location is really important. Fibre cannot be easily 'bent' and 90 degree angles are out. In addition it seems the outside and inside boxes must be at the same point on the wall, so I cannot see how your ONT can be where you suggest you'd like it. The ONT does indeed need power. Our house is not especially standard box shape so the engineer found it hard to find a location to drill through the wall which I was happy wouldn't look unsightly; we didn't entirely succeed!

Our street has telegraph poles, so we do not have fibre under the street! The engineer had to try four drop wires from pole to house before he got one to work!

The expectation is for your (main) phone to plug straight into the new router. This doesn't work for us as we need the phone in a room the other side of the house. I had spoken to TT about this and they said an adapter could solve this problem, but none has arrived and the engineer had no idea. I've asked the question on this forum.

Overall, the installation took just over 4 hours, 2 van-based engineers and a cherry-picker.

Hope that helps 🙂