The original promise of the NBN – before the subsequent Liberal government screwed it – was near universal Fibre to the Premises which would – with upgrades – have enabled gigabit connections to most Australian homes in the very near future.
However, with the much less impressive NBN we have today, those dreams of gigabit speeds might feel a little further away. However, to its credit, NBN Co is still working on improving the quality and speed of its network, and this week, it’s cracked a new speed record in Victoria.
In a trial at an actual customer’s premises, NBN Co conducted a test over HFC (Hybrid Fibre Coax) achieving speeds just shy of 1Gbps. The connection in question – in Templestowe, Victoria – reached 994Mbps download speed in a real world test. The same HFC was being used at the time to deliver Foxtel and the customer’s actual Telstra connection, as well as the 1Gbps test traffic.
NBN Co’s chief technology officer Ray Owen had this to say of the test:
“This is an important day for the NBN. It shows how specific technology — HFC — is evolving to meet customer demand for greater capacity from their broadband connection over time.
As we work to complete our network rollout, we’re constantly looking at what’s over the horizon for all of our technology assets, and how we can evolve our network as demand grows.”
Unfortunately, for many Australians, the NBN remains more of a broken promise than a solution; NBN Co revised its own figures down this year – it had planned to have up to 11 million premises ready to connect, but it’s currently down at 9.9 million.
In the last few months, NBN Co has been refocusing its efforts on connecting areas caught up in its HFC pause, bringing those areas forward more quickly and onto the network.
In other NBN news, the company behind the network is contemplating a new speed tier offering – 100/20Mbps – to sit just below the premium 100/40Mbps plan as a slightly more affordable way for households to get fast download speeds, with lesser upload speeds. NBN Co believes that most consumers don’t need 40Mbps upload speeds, and wants to offer pricing incentives to make the faster download plans more appealing.
I’m pretty sure my headline was firmly tongue in cheek. No one thinks the NBN is fast.
I’d bet a signed dollar they couldn’t repeat those results if anyone independent was watching
Gawd I’m flat out getting 40mb. Used to get close to 60mb. (Sync speed). The connection is absolute garbage.
Dropped pin
Near Na Kaeo, Ko Kha District, Lampang, Thailand
https://maps.app.goo.gl/HnZZMTvfhc2tDF2U8
Went back to Thailand visit my relatives there. 100/50 mb/s they paid just around $30/month. 700km from Bangkok 30 km from Lampang city.
Living in Western suburb 40km from Melbourne CBD, No sign of NBN. Living with wireless internet sharing from my mobile. What a shame.
Think your NBN is quick?
No, no I do not. In fact my speed has been reduced by a third after a year.
1gbps should always have been the minimum not the possible maximum if you are lucky. It also would have been built now and probably for no difference in price to what it will now (likely less). I would think it would have been easier and cheaper to maintain or upgrade too. I am still waiting for my fttc connection after being on the original list to get fttp in 2016 and then hfc at the pause. And my parents who should be on hfc now are told another 6 months for someone to install a 5 port hfc tap the… Read more »
Barack Obama said in 2008 when asked about internet connections, “The future is wireless” and he’s right – wireless just keeps getting better and better.
And yes we could all have FTTH if everyone wanted it and everyone paid for it but that wasn’t going to happen – this is something a lot of people conveniently ignore when complaining about present NBN connections.
Wireless can never be the answer to fully take over as the dominant technology as there can never be enough bandwidth to carry it all. It will for sure get better and better but can only ever take about 30% of traffic at best. The only way wireless could fully take over would require at least 4 times the towers we have now which I don’t think would be economical.
Chris Rowland, no one in their right mind thinks nbn is quick.
Meanwhile all over the world Similar testing is producing 10gbs and you are bragging about 10% of that in a hypothetical situation using lab grade equipment not consumer grade. Mate you need to stop selling your sole to NBNCo
Perhaps my snark in the article wasn’t clear enough – our NBN is a joke. A national embarrassment. Our friends across in NZ have done NBN properly. Other countries have near ubiquitous fibre offering gigabit speeds and beyond … and we’re in the dark ages.