G.INP has finally been enabled on all FTTC lines (including ECI) in Feb 2024!

[g67575]

So, I don't know how relevant this will be to lots of you, who doubtless will want to upgrade to a FTTP line if you haven't already.

For those of us still on a FTTC line, you might be able to benefit from this:

Openreach Deploy G.INP to Boost UK ECI FTTC Broadband Lines

Openreach (BT) has finally succeeded in deploying ReTransmission (ReTx / G.INP) across their ECI (Ribbon) based UK estate of Fibre-to-the-Cabinet (FTTC / VDSL2)

www.ispreview.co.uk

G.INP has apparently been enabled on all ECI cabinets in Feb 2024 by Openreach, after years of trials and testing.

I'm kind of amazed actually, I really thought they'd given up.

As a reminder, G.INP was originally rolled out on Huawei FTTC lines beginning in early 2015:
https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.p...etransmission-g-inp-fttc-broadband-lines.html

 

[g67575]

I've just tested it and confirmed it works, after switching to a FTTC (Broadcom) modem that supports G.INP.

Line stats here, showing G.INP enabled for the first time on my line:

Realistically, I think the line is about as good as it's ever going to be - I think it should help with reliability / line errors because my line is made out of aluminium.

Speed is much the same (~48mbps downstream), I imagine it may improve slightly in the next week or so.

 

[g67575]

Anyone else noticed that G.INP is now enabled on your line in Feb?

If so, how is it working out for you?

 

[g67575]

I wonder if my line speed will be increased by the DLM over time, with G.INP enabled?

Not seeing any CRC or errored seconds on the downstream part of the line anymore. But the upstream part still has a few (G.INP doesn't work on the upstream on ECI cabinets I heard).

There's still significant problems with crosstalk on many lines, you can occasionally see the effect of this when your line syncs after a powercut... It syncs higher presumably because the modem has synced before other modems have. Vectoring is the only way to solve issues with crosstalk, but I think it was ever rolled out anywhere.

 

[g67575]

The DLM seems to be slowly increasing the downstream speed, it's now syncing at 49 mbps (after a manual line resync).

If it can sync the downstream at 50 mbps or above, at least that will be close to the average FTTC speed reported by Ofcom in March 2023 (55.7 mbps).

Apparently, over 83% of England can now support connections capable of 100mbps or above.

By 2023 Q1, according to speed test results on thinkbroadband, the average download rate increased from 112mbps, to 136mbps in Q4 (and that includes tests done over WI-FI):
https://labs.thinkbroadband.com/local/england

 

[g67575]

In theory, Openreach might be able to eke a little more speed out of some ECI FTTC lines, by allowing the DLM to train 3DB profiles (for the downstream only), so far this was only enabled on Huawei lines (only 1.6 million lines were apparently able to benefit):

https://www.ispreview.co.uk/index.p...st-xdb-boost-uk-eci-fttc-broadband-lines.html

I remember testing this a couple of years ago (by forcing an SNR margin of 3DB via the router / modem I was using), and it is possible to get a noticeable boost (5-9mbps).