Tag: Oxfordshire

Article

PM David Cameron Switches On Gigaclear’s 1Gbps Broadband in Northmoor | ISPReview.co.uk

From the horse’s mouth

Gigaclear

Press Release

Northmoor community page

My Comments

Another rural neighbourhood in West Oxfordshire has been enabled for Gigabit fibre broadhand courtesy of Gigaclear. This time, it is Northmoor where the British Prime Minister, David Cameron, officially switched on the new fibre-to-the-premises service which covers 500 premises in Northmoor, Moreton and Bablockhythe.

This is a non-BT scheme that is funded by DEFRA as part of a GBP£20m Rural Community Broadband Fund where there is financial assistance from the EU. This public-private project underwent a proper procurement procedure with Gigaclear being the winner of the contract.

Here, it was proven that the fibre-to-the-premises deal had a higher throughput and was more stable than the 80Mbps fibre-to-the-cabinet deal offered by BT.

But Gigaclear offers this service at GBP£37 per month for a 50Mbps to GBP£69 per month for a Gigabit connection, both with “clean feed” parental controls and a Gigabit hub. They also charge GBP£100 for installation. The users benefit form the connection being symmetric for both uploads and downloads along with not needing to pay for BT phone-line rental to have the Internet service.

The Gigaclear PR ran with a comment about a person who was working from home in the neighbourhood but having to go to London to transfer large multimedia files due to the woefully slow connection that existed before. But he is able to stay working in that area and transfer the multimedia very quickly. I also see this benefitting others who think of the country as a place to live or work because of the increase in online services that is taking place.

This is something that shows up that villages in some of the Home Counties could be appealing as places to move to for working from home or for that proverbial “tree-change” as they become wired up for real broadband, especially next-generation broadband.

Artilcle

Gigaclear announces next batch of Oxfordshire villages to get Gigabit | ThinkBroadband

From the horse’s mouth

Gigaclear

Rollout page – Otmoor

Press Release – Otmoor

My Comments

Gigaclear, whom I have featured on this Website, are working hard and fast on enabling more of the Oxfordshire villages for real broadband. Here, the Otmoor community which is the latest to be targeted with this technology is being set up with fibre-to-the-premises “next-generation broadband” technology.

Here, this community has its wetland and grasslands as its assets being a nature reserve, most likely being of touristic value in some way. But Gigaclear had put the broadband rollout on the map without government assistance and having this become the full symmetric broadband courtesy of the fibre-optic technology.

When I read the ThinkBroadband article, there was a comment about Gigaclear focusing their efforts on the small upmarket Oxfordshire villages rather than the “real” rural areas in the UK. But the “real” rural areas could approach Gigaclear to cover them by visiting this page and not “giving up” with them if they are turned down. There is still the issue of high-speed Internet being of importance for professionals working from home along with small businesses where online competitiveness is still valued.

Of course, a question that may be always raised with these broadband rollouts is catering to the larger properties be they estates with a large house and a handful of cottages or smaller houses or simply small or large farms that are colocated to the villages. Issues that may be raise include whether a fibre rollout may be extended to a cluster of neighbouring large properties or not.

Similarly, if Gigaclear “conquered” a larger area of Oxfordshire or a similar area, could they be seen to be in a position of influence by providing the high-speed broadband for that area?

At least the Gigaclear effort is taking place to make sure that rural communities, which are also being seen as urban outposts or venues for “tree-changes”, as viable locations for proper Internet service.

Article

thinkbroadband :: Fyfield and Tubney to get full fat fibre service from Gigaclear

Fyfield & Tubney Parish Council announcement

From the horse’s mouth

Gigaclear

Press Release

Fyfield & Tubney Community Page

My Comments

After Appleton & Eaton have taken on the next-generation fibre-optic broadband to address the rural Internet issue, two more villages in the same county of Oxfordshire have registered interest to become part of today’s real Internet.

Where are Fyfield and Tubney in Oxfordshire? These villages are located 4-4.5 miles (6-7 kms) west of Abingdon, a small Oxfordshire town that has a strong economy and a technology business park. Here, one of the major drivers for the fibre-optic broadband is to allow people who work in the Abingdon-based businesses like Sophos to telecommute or work from home.

Of course there would be some of the countryside and plenty of the small businesses existing in these villages which would benefit from the Gigaclear fibre-optic broadband. This would include many of the businesses offering accommodation wanting to service the “connected” community.

As far as these services are concerned, they will be mainly “Internet-only” single-play services with 1Gbps symmetrical bandwidth. The customers would then need to get IPTV or VoIP telephony through other providers in an “over-the-top” arrangement.

Of course, the equipment that will be supplied will include a router that has dual-stream 802.11g/n Wi-Fi wireless as well as four Gigabit Ethernet ports, which makes it up to the mark for the service.

From what I see of this, it could be a chance to get the rural communities in Oxfordshire and Berkshire online to real standards thus opening them up to the ability of competitive business opportunities and the ability for one to have a “tree-change” without suffering as far as Internet access is concerned/

Article

thinkbroadband :: Gigaclear announces completion of its Appleton and Eaton fibre network

Previous coverage on HomeNetworking01.info

Gigabit broadband now in Appleton, Oxfordshire

Two large Oxfordshire villages now to have fibre-optic broadband

From the horse’s mouth

Gigaclear press release

Gigaclear Web site – Appleton service

My Comments

After three months of hard work, the fibre-to-the-premises gigabit broadband rollout has been completed in Appleton and Eaton in Oxfordshire. This has passed 400 properties with 40% service take-up at the time of writing.

As previously mentioned in the coverage, this service is intended to be a symmetric network with equal bandwidth for upload and download. This feature will make it work well for telecommuters, Skype users and small businesses who synchronise data between home and the shopfront.

There is a desire by Gigaclear to cover more Oxfordshire rural communities. One of these is Watlington where the Watlington Community Broadband service wants to move from ADSL2 copper technology to the newer FTTP all-fibre-optic technology.  Anna Badcock who is representing Watlington on Oxfordshire District Council and formed Watlington Community Broadband with county councillor Caroline Newton is behind this concept as a service improvement effort.

Through the construction phase for this network, Gigaclear have hosted many demonstrations of what this technology can do. This included use of the smart-TVs’ Internet-enabled capabilities, VoIP-based telephony including the ability to retain one’s own number and handset, video telephony amongst others.

What is being emphasised here is the concept of a rural lifestyle but being able to still benefit from real broadband Internet. This concept underscores professionals working from home in a lot of the country villages and towns through country-based businesses being as competitive as city-based ones to country-based hotels and similar businesses offering Wi-Fi to attract the city-based business traffic.

A question still worth raising regarding these FTTP broadband rollouts that Gigaclear are undertaking is whether the farms, manors, and similar large properties on the outskirts of the villages are being given the option to have this broadband service delivered to them. The question that will often be raised by the owners of these properties is how much it would cost to roll out the fibre-optic infrastructure to the main building.

As we see more of these developments taking place around rural UK courtesy of Gigaclear and others, it could be a chance to prove that real broadband Internet, especially next-generation Internet can be a reality in the country.

Articles

Ultrafast Broadband…It’s A Yes | Appleton With Eaton Parish Website

From the horse’s mouth

Gigaclear

Press Release

My Comments

After success with Hambleton in Rutland which has been previously covered on HomeNetworking01.info, Gigaclear are to set up and service two Oxfordshire villages with real next-generation broadband.

The neighbouring villages, Appleton & Eaton will be using a fibre-to-the-premises setup with buried fibre infrastructure which is to pass 400 homes and businesses in the community. At the time of writing, there were 120 subscribers committed to the service.

The service will yield 10Mbps switched bandwidth but provide access to shared bandwidth at 1000Mbps on a “burst” process. But this allows for a continuous path of improvement and a sense of future-proof design as these villages either become larger or take on a significant employer. The costs for this service would run at £37 per month, with a total startup cost of £185 (£100 connection fee + £85 installation), and the prices include VAT at the current rate.

The main access driver in these villages are the small businesses which operate from home and are driven by one or two people. One of these businesses that put Appleton on the map is White’s Of Appleton who hang the church bells in many of the churches in the UK. How I see this is a way of making it more cost-effective for these businesses to communicate across the country, Europe and the world, thus being able to nail more business or deal competitively.

The key organisations who are behind this include the Appleton Broadband Group and the Appleton & Eaton Parish Council, which is an example of local public money going behind a next-generation broadband effort. It was part of an 18-month improvement effort by the council to keep both the towns on track, along with keeping the local bus service alive and establishing a new children’s playground in these areas.

This is another example of a proactive effort taking place to make sure that small rural communities do have a chance at real broadband Internet, especially next-generation broadband in order to afford them what urban dwellers take for granted.