BT reaches 800Mbps downstream speeds over copper in latest trial

Telecoms giant claims there could be no need for more 'expensive, disruptive and time consuming' FTTH

Telecoms giant BT has conducted some new trials using a combination of fibre and copper, achieving downstream speeds of about 800Mbps, and upstream speeds of more than 200Mbps.

The telco claims the speeds show that fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) technology or a dedicated business line through an Ethernet connection are not the only options to achieve high speeds, as many other network providers and FTTH advocates have suggested.

"Previously it was thought such speeds would require a dedicated business line or a fibre optic cable to be laid all the way from a telephone exchange to a premise, a relatively expensive, disruptive and time consuming process," BT said.

It calls the new technology "fibre to the distribution point" (FTTdp) "G.FAST" technology - where the fibre is instead rolled out to telephone poles or junction boxes located close to homes and businesses.

During the trials, FTTdp hit downstream/upstream speeds of 800Mbps/200Mbps over a 19m length of copper, and hit about 700/200Mbps over longer lines of 66m, a distance which BT claims encompasses around 80 per cent of such connections. BT claims that the technology offers the flexibility to tailor the allocation of the total 1Gbps speed according to a user's needs.

The most commonly deployed BT technology is fibre-to-the-cabinet (FTTC), which offers up to 80Mbps of downstream speeds. FTTH (which BT calls fibre-to-the-premise or FTTP), is "considerably more expensive to deploy" according to the telecoms giant. The firm has repeatedly suggested that there is not enough demand from consumers for FTTP.

With FTTdp, the fibre is closer to the premises than with FTTC, meaning the copper wire is much shorter.

Joe Gartner, CEO of BT's infrastructure arm Openreach, said: "Customer needs will continue to change, and that's why we're deploying a mix of current technologies as well as testing new ones."

BT suggested that FTTdp could be rolled out in the future if there is demand or pressure for such speeds. It adds that businesses can already access those speeds through dedicated business lines.

In a recent Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS)'s Digital Communications Infrastructure Strategy consultation document, the government raised the prospect of switching off the UK's copper network. Computing recently investigated whether such a drastic move was feasible or even desirable.