Just a hypothetical question.

If a customer wanted to downgrade from BT Infinity to their standard broadband product, does anyone know if BT would physically transfer the line back to ADSL or just reduce the "fibre" line speed down to 17Mbps and leave everything physically alone?

FTTC cabinets in some areas are running at 100% capacity, and no further customers can have the service until a second cab is installed, so I'd say BT would release the connection to the next person waiting, and put the downgrader back on vanilla ADSL

They physically remove the FTTC connection. They have to, as it filters out any ADSL signal coming from the exchange.

What about for FTTP connections?

For me I don't think I could go back to normal broadband as I was only getting 3.5mb at best 99% of the time and HD viewing would sometimes buffer for a second or two halfway though what I was watching on the PC.
I now get just under 65mb 98% of the time with Infinity 2.
I also in the last 16 months also now have BT TV with Youview.
I also now use Netflix and normal broadband at the speeds I was getting would not always be good for watching some HD stuff on Netflix.

Darren

BT is doing ADSL2+ from FTTC cabinets now, but I don't think it's for this reason - more to do with trying to squeeze more speed to those people on longer lines who suffer from BT's short sighted decision to use a crappier technology


Same thing. They don't remove the copper line to the premises AFAIK as it can still be used for voice (but very likely won't remove the FTTP equipment or cabling either).

I suspect that if you were serious about it, BT might offer you some sort of discount so that they don't have to go through the hassle and cost. But I'd also suspect that given BT's love of long contracts and how better the service is, there aren't many people who have asked to move back

We were getting around 12Mbps on the standard broadband, now on BT Infinity 1 and getting 37.9Mbps! To me (and the wife), due to how we use the internet, we can't see any real benefit from he speed increase!

You don't have any teenagers in your household then ?

No kids here and because we use the Sky box for catch up TV, buffering was never an issue due to the progressive downloading instead of streaming.

I cant help but ask why you upgraded in the first place?

Combination of a good deal and an expectation that general browsing would be faster. The wife is talking about dropping Sky Movies and trying Netflix, so it could still be worth staying on Infinity!

I get about 17mb on adsl at £11 a month Inc evenings and weekend calls. So fibre for me seems pricey for the upgrade I'd get. I would like bt sport via youview tho.

If you are getting 17Mbps and don't do any online gaming, then I would stay on ADSL, based on my experience.

Yeah, it would feel very weird going from superfast broadband to just fast broadband. So many things are "reachable" with fibre.