INSTALLING NEW BROADBAND/TV

[Simon92]

Full fibre broadband via Openreach is now available for my property. I am currently with Virgin but am considering switching to Sky. I live in a three storey mid-terraced townhouse.

My concern about switching user is that  BT connects to the house overhead via a pole at the rear of the property and currently hits the rear wall at first floor level entering the house in a rear bedroom. A second line hits the property at the same place and runs down the wall to the ground floor entering at the back into the dining room. Neither of these phone lines have been "live" for years as our current landline is provided by Virgin. I have a feeling that the BT line on the ground floor was severed internally during home improvements as we did not think we would need it again.

The TV (and so any associated tv box) is situated in the living room at the front of the property on the ground floor.

We are after uninterrupted TV coverage with no buffering issues. Similarly "Smart" TV facilities that work speedily and smoothly. We also require fast internet usage across all three floors - particularly as my wife works at home for one of the world's top book publishers.

So that’s the background.

My query relates particularly to how Sky TV now operates. I understand that its packages largely rely on the internet rather than a dish and that in any event use of dishes is to be faded out completely in the not too distant. Following on from that am I right in my understanding that for Sky the router should ideally be situated close to the Sky box and perhaps even more ideally linked by ethernet? If that is the case I am struggling with how I will be able to arrive at that scenario tidily without a great deal of upheaval and/or visible ethernet cabling running between floors in the house.

Am I missing something? Am I misunderstanding the situation? Any help would be appreciated.

Ideally it would be good if I could have somebody who knows what they are talking about come round to look at the situation in person. Expertise I am prepared to pay for. Are there any folk that offer this service out there? I am very nervous about putting an order in with Sky and relying on any degree of help from their engineer. I have not seen any evidence that they offer a pre-visit service and that as a rule when installing they install the ONT and router with a relatively short length of ethernet and then leave the customer to try and sort out site specific issues thereafter.

As I say I will be very grateful for any help/advice anybody out there can offer.

[TimmyBGood]

@Simon92 

Sky television is online-only if you choose the online-only products (Glass/Stream), otherwise it's a satellite system with some online functionality (Sky Q) and requires a dish for reception.

For broadband, the current location of copper lines and sockets is irrelevant to FTTP, except as an indication of where the inbound optical cable may arrive at the property (essentially pole or duct)

Putting the address into the BT Wholesale Availability Checker should indicate which provisioning type is applicable.

https://www.broadbandchecker.btwholesale.com/#/ADSL/AddressHome 

It's the table and the two text lines below it which are most useful.

Remove any personal information (such as the address itself) if you post an image.

[TimmyBGood]

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@Simon92 wrote:

Ideally it would be good if I could have somebody who knows what they are talking about come round to look at the situation in person. Expertise I am prepared to pay for. 

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Neither Sky or Openreach will do that for a domestic connection, and anyone you pay to do so can't speak for either of them.  Private expertise is generally always available for AV and networking at a price, but unless we're talking oligarch money then whatever such an 'expert' suggests has to work with what Openreach/Sky provides by default in a £1.50 per day generic service.

[cuke]

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@TimmyBGood wrote:

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@Simon92 wrote:

Ideally it would be good if I could have somebody who knows what they are talking about come round to look at the situation in person. Expertise I am prepared to pay for. 

---

Neither Sky or Openreach will do that for a domestic connection, and anyone you pay to do so can't speak for either of them.  Private expertise is generally always available for AV and networking at a price, but unless we're talking oligarch money then whatever such an 'expert' suggests has to work with what Openreach/Sky provides by default in a £1.50 per day generic service.

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I've visted properties within our village to advise them on their needs in response to calls within the village Facebook group. If there is one for where @Simon92  lives it might be a good idea to put out a call for advice in there.