In my mailbox this week, I received an offer from Bell Canada which offered the Digital Home Bell Fibe TV for a discounted rate.

In a glossy brochure that accompanied the offer Bell Canada stated that Bell Feb TV was “a new TV service delivered through our new state-of-the-art fibre optic network.”

I'm getting tired of telling people that Fibe TV is not FTTH. I know it sounds like something Rogers is saying but I think its time consumers became better educated about what FTTH is and what FIBE TV and internet are.

Just to clarify. The fibre optic line has to get "to" your home, not "inside" your home for it to be called FTTH. This is often called "the last mile". I believe the distribution inside your home from this demarcation point is usually handled via RF-coax or Cat-5, not fibre optic cable.

The important part is this last mile. Without it, there is no huge increase in bandwidth. This last mile installation usually is estimated to cost about $1000 per home and that is why it has been relatively slow to develop outside totally new infrastructure (new areas or new providers), or specific smaller areas.

Since Rogers was mentioned in post 1, Rogers Ontario has had FTTN (fibre to the node) for many years in most areas. The cable node near your home typically serves about 1000 homes and the last mile is handled by RF-coax, typically higher bandwidth than twisted pair (phone)

I consider the demarcation point to be inside the home but to avoid any issue I have reworded it to say that it must reach to the entrance of your home. And yes the distribution inside the home is via Ethernet not twisted pair. (although at some point in the future, we may have fibre optic home networks)

So when the fibre is at least on the outside of your house they call it fibre op.When it's just to the pole outside your house then coax to the house that's not fibre-op.I suppose the coax to the house is what most people have anyway.

As mentioned in the article, it's twisted pair (telephone wires) to the house for Fibe. It's RF-coax for Cable.

FibreOP is NOT Fibe TV.

Fibe TV is the brand name of Bell's IPTV offering in Ontario and Quebec.
FibreOP is Bell Aliant's brandname for its Fibre-To-The-Home service in Atlantic Canada.

Fibe TV uses telephone wires to get signals into most single dwelling homes (i.e./ the last mile) while FibreOP uses fibre optic cable for the last mile.

Hugh are you saying that Bell is not upgrading to outside the home with Fiber optic cable for TV and internet giving that business to Rogers? You would think Bell would be looking at the long term as a required upgrade to stay competitive for the GTA.

No, I am not saying that. I'm saying that Bell Fibe TV is NOT a Fibre optic network and that Bell's marketing and advertising copy is inaccurate.

Inaccurate is a very kind word in this case. They are confusing their customers in their copy and by choosing a name - Fibe - that is also misleading. The average customer would assume that they're getting FTTH when they are not, and that is the point that Hugh is trying to convey.

The difference between Fibe and FTTH is not insignificant - it is quite significant.

I suppose you're right 57, but if the customer believes that Bell has installed Fibre Optic cable to their home, but didn't actually see anyone do that, then they likely don't care much about the difference between the two anyway. I'd bet Bell would deliver exactly the same television signal through the FTTN service as they do through their limited FTTH offering. Granted FTTH has the potential to greatly improve service.

Anyway, I agree it's misleading but it likely only matters to those that can understand what the difference really is. As long as Bell can deliver the service they advertise, the cabling isn't likely to interest very many (DHC being the exception of course).

-Mike

About 2 weeks ago, 2 Bell technicians rang my doorbell, asking permission to go into our backyard to check what needed to be replaced, as Bell was getting ready to upgrade our area.

I have Fibe12 internet, and due to a problem 12 months ago, I learned the copper wires for it go about 500 feet (as the crow flies) to some sort of hub outside a school across the road from us.

I have no idea what Bell stuff is in our backyard. But, I do know that Fibe-TV is scheduled for Oakville in early 2012, so I assumed they were looking at replacing the copper with optical.

No Mike that is not true. The reality is that Internet speeds are reduced if you also subscribe to Fibe TV due to bandwidth constraints. In addition, you are significantly limited in the number of streams you can watch / record.

Do people care. Damn right they do. Before they plunk down hundreds of dollars for new hardware and commit to a 2 or 3 year contract at $100 a month or so, they want the truth.

Rich, read the story.

I now have Fibe TV in my house but no fiber optic cable, just twisted pair.

One should call the Fibe network a hybrid network. It uses both fibre and copper. The fibre is terminated at the node (FTTN) or DSLAM. From there it's copper for the last few hundred metres.

Even though Bell only guarantees 25Mbs over their network, I have been told by techs that they can push it to 50Mbs with current hardware/software.
It's interesting to note that Lucent/Alcatel have been able to push 300Mbs over 400 metres on copper. see this link http://www.physorg.com/news191651616.html

However, more people should learn to use google... it is the 21st century. We have the world's largest reference library at our fingertips.

The confusion here is not the consumers fault.

Bell clearly states “a new TV service delivered through our new state-of-the-art fibre optic network.”

Bell does NOT say “a new TV service delivered through our hybrid copper and fibre optic network.”