Distance from Exchange required for 10MB/s

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unwired

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I called up Telkom this morning to request that they upgrade my line to 10 Mb/s. I am currently on 6.

The tech I spoke to said that as I live more than 1.2kms from the exchange I cannot get more than 6Mb/s.

Is there any truth in that? By my estimation I am not more than 800m away.

Anyone hear a similar story? Can I force through a change?
 
It depends, mostly on distance, but other factors too. For example, I am on 10Mb/s straight, and the Telkom tech was like WAAAAAAT 0_0 when he saw I was on 10Mb/s yet 2.4km away from the DSLAM when complaining about exchange congestion.

That said, my line is stable, but just just enough. What helped improve my attenuation and snr was the fact that I forced telkom to install complete new cabling, all the way from the DSLAM to my house. Took the tech a whole day, but my adsl line is 100% solid stable, which is amazing for the distance I am on.
 
How do you force Telkom to install a new cable for you ?
 
Tinuva said:
It depends, mostly on distance, but other factors too. For example, I am on 10Mb/s straight, and the Telkom tech was like WAAAAAAT 0_0 when he saw I was on 10Mb/s yet 2.4km away from the DSLAM when complaining about exchange congestion.

That said, my line is stable, but just just enough. What helped improve my attenuation and snr was the fact that I forced telkom to install complete new cabling, all the way from the DSLAM to my house. Took the tech a whole day, but my adsl line is 100% solid stable, which is amazing for the distance I am on.
Click to expand...

Amazing. In my day replacing that cable would take at least a week for a ten man gang and only if all the pipes were clear.
 
What's you're SNR/Attenuation figures, are you on a G.DMT or ADSL2+ circuit?
 
unwired said:
I called up Telkom this morning to request that they upgrade my line to 10 Mb/s. I am currently on 6.

The tech I spoke to said that as I live more than 1.2kms from the exchange I cannot get more than 6Mb/s.

Is there any truth in that? By my estimation I am not more than 800m away.

Anyone hear a similar story? Can I force through a change?
Click to expand...

A guy up the road from me syncs at 10Mb and we're 3km from the exchange.
 
ponder said:
Yeah, someone is talking kuk.
Click to expand...
Yes I must be :P Then again, I really don't care what you think :)

HendrieV said:
Amazing. In my day replacing that cable would take at least a week for a ten man gang and only if all the pipes were clear.
Click to expand...
To be frank, the guy wasn't laying new fibre underground to my house. Seriously wtf were you smoking when you made that statement. It is only a copper line, and it is going over poles, hanging on them in fact. You really didn't think that one through.

viper2110 said:
How do you force Telkom to install a new cable for you ?
Click to expand...
It was simple, I wasn't getting anywhere with my original line, it was syncing G.DMT, bad attenuation and SNR, and simply put, I had enough and wanted it fixed. I ordered a second line, which when the guy pitched up here the one day said, there wasn't any extra lines, he need to lay extra lines before he can finish the install. I told him that is fine by me, I have the whole day. He drove off only to be seen later the day going into all the houses down the road asking for access to put the line on all the poles.

At the end of that day, I had a new line, new tel# and it was syncing at excellent SNR and Attenuation values AND ADSL2+. Cancelled the other line the next day, as it was the end of my problems with my line.
 
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I live about 2Km away from mine and get 10Mb. My upload kind of stops around .9Mb, but it's nothing to complain about. The quality of the copper around here is also a little poor - I doubt that 6Mb is the max attainable for you.
 
"To be frank, the guy wasn't laying new fibre underground to my house. Seriously wtf were you smoking when you made that statement. It is only a copper line, and it is going over poles, hanging on them in fact. You really didn't think that one through."


I am even more surprised. At 2.4 km the overhead line must be crossing streets. This was normally a big no no. We used to bring the copper underground to within each block and then distribute overhead. Things must have changed a lot since since I retired 8 years ago.
By the way I do not smoke.
 
Hi There,
It does seeem to depend on a number of factors as a number of different posts on this site will bear witness to. Yes you need to have a decent stretch of copper and the equipment at the exchange must be up to scratch as well. While you can do all the theoretical calculations you like at the end of the day the empirical test is always the best. As you have seen above, some people are lucky and can achieve it at distance that they should not and others cant at distances that they should.

Good Luck

TIm
 
HendrieV said:
I am even more surprised. At 2.4 km the overhead line must be crossing streets. This was normally a big no no. We used to bring the copper underground to within each block and then distribute overhead. Things must have changed a lot since since I retired 8 years ago.
Click to expand...
You know what they say about assumptions :)

HendrieV said:
By the way I do not smoke.
Click to expand...
If you not smoking...
 
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HendrieV said:
I am even more surprised. At 2.4 km the overhead line must be crossing streets. This was normally a big no no. We used to bring the copper underground to within each block and then distribute overhead. Things must have changed a lot since since I retired 8 years ago.
Click to expand...
It has not changed. What has changed is that Telkom are replacing some SDCs with MSAN units. So it's fibre from the central office (exchange) to the MSAN and then the copper distribution network...
 
Tinuva said:
It was simple, I wasn't getting anywhere with my original line, it was syncing G.DMT, bad attenuation and SNR, and simply put, I had enough and wanted it fixed. I ordered a second line, which when the guy pitched up here the one day said, there wasn't any extra lines, he need to lay extra lines before he can finish the install. I told him that is fine by me, I have the whole day. He drove off only to be seen later the day going into all the houses down the road asking for access to put the line on all the poles.

At the end of that day, I had a new line, new tel# and it was syncing at excellent SNR and Attenuation values AND ADSL2+. Cancelled the other line the next day, as it was the end of my problems with my line.
Click to expand...
I doubt if he ran a new cable. What he was probably doing is finding you a "clean/clear" pair of cables that he traced from the exchange to your distribution point. To do that he would have to check every connection (joint) along the route. You must have got lucky and were allocated an experienced techie!!
 
MickeyD said:
It has not changed. What has changed is that Telkom are replacing some SDCs with MSAN units. So it's fibre from the central office (exchange) to the MSAN and then the copper distribution network...
Click to expand...

That sort of explains my business line.

Attainable rates are around 25mbps down yet I am about 4km's away from the exchange. We on copper from the shop to the dslam but fibre from the dslam to the exchange.

Originally we were on copper all the way and could barely sustain a 384kbps line.

We were told there was fibre but no available ports.

There was one port but it was apparently faulty.

Just by chance one day a technician tried a port recreate on the faulty available port and it worked so he connected us to it and from a marginal 384kbps we went to a stable 10mb line!!
 
Quote Originally Posted by Tinuva View Post
It was simple, I wasn't getting anywhere with my original line, it was syncing G.DMT, bad attenuation and SNR, and simply put, I had enough and wanted it fixed. I ordered a second line, which when the guy pitched up here the one day said, there wasn't any extra lines, he need to lay extra lines before he can finish the install. I told him that is fine by me, I have the whole day. He drove off only to be seen later the day going into all the houses down the road asking for access to put the line on all the poles.

At the end of that day, I had a new line, new tel# and it was syncing at excellent SNR and Attenuation values AND ADSL2+. Cancelled the other line the next day, as it was the end of my problems with my line.


MickeyD said:
I doubt if he ran a new cable. What he was probably doing is finding you a "clean/clear" pair of cables that he traced from the exchange to your distribution point. To do that he would have to check every connection (joint) along the route. You must have got lucky and were allocated an experienced techie!!
Click to expand...

You know what they say about assumptions
:)
 
Yet while I was sipping on a beer looking at him working outside on the poles. I saw a new cable being hanged on to the poles. Guess I was making assumptions after all HendrieV. At least the last part was a new cable, I can see a few houses down as he was working. So seeing that, and the fact that the guy said in his own words, he need to lay a new cable...

Assumptions after all...

Maybe its a good thing you don't work for Telkom anymore. I am going to assume, you criticized people and what they say at work more, than any work you did over there.
 
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Tinuva said:
Yet while I was sipping on a beer looking at him working outside on the poles. I saw a new cable being hanged on to the poles. Guess I was making assumptions after all HendrieV. At least the last part was a new cable, I can see a few houses down as he was working. So seeing that, and the fact that the guy said in his own words, he need to lay a new cable...

Assumptions after all...

Maybe its a good thing you don't work for Telkom anymore. I am going to assume, you criticized people and what they say at work more, than any work you did over there.
Click to expand...

Then again maybe I was the guy laying the cables and being criticized. :)
 
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