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9th May 2024
03:16pm BST
The next lot of locations in the UK that will be moved over to the latest broadband technology has been announced.
BT Openreach, who supply broadband infrastructure across the UK, have confirmed that 84 new locations will be switched to Fibre to the Premises technology over the next twelve months.
The full list of locations is as follows:
Aberdeen Portlethen • Aberdeen • Addingham • Alderminster • Appleton Roebuck • Ashington (Northumberland) • Greater Manchester - Wigan • Sheffield • Greater London - Barking and Dagenham • Doncaster • Bishop Auckland • Bridgend • Burnham-on-Sea • Glasgow • Buxton (High Peak) • Carlisle • Gillingham (Kent) • Chesterfield • Trefor • Coalville • Heage • Rippingale • Saintfield • Rugby • Greater Manchester - Manchester • Leicester • Exeter • Flamborough • Ispwich • Grimsby • Rayleigh • Cannock • Houghton-le-Spring • Huddersfield • Ilkeston • Ilkley • Kidsgrove • Luton • Leven • Haywards Heath • Llanbrynmair • Cardiff • Wakefield • Mareham le Fen • Chatham • Moore • Greater Manchester - Tameside • Motherwell • Greater London - Southwark • New Mills • South Cave • North Kelsey • Greater Manchester - Oldham • Penistone • Pontardawe • Raunds • Rearsby • Craigavon • Ross-on-Wye • Rotherfield • Chelmsford • Rugby • Scotter • Scunthorpe • Sherburn (County Durham) • Skegness • Solihull • Blackpool • Southend-on-Sea • Stotfold • Stratford-upon-Avon • Antrim • Leicester • Torquay • Tregynon • Ellington (Northumberland) • Bradford • Greater London - Havering • Waltham on the Wolds • Rotherham • Brighton and Hove
Copper wires that have kept homes across the UK connected for decades have gradually been made redundant in recent years thanks to the advent of fibre technology.
The upgrade will equip more households with faster broadband speeds and of course, change the way we make phone calls.
Instead of using the ageing analog wires to call your grandmother, the plan is for all households in the UK to use something call VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol).
VOIP has much higher call quality than the old analog offering and included a range of new features including Multi Call and call diversion to any other phone number including mobile phones.
While "the humble copper wire has been the backbone of our telecommunications here in the UK and around the world for over a century", as the BT Openreach website admits, the fact of the matter is "it’s no longer as efficient as it could be. Replacement parts are hard to come by and, it fails more often than we’d like, meaning it doesn’t provide the world-class service that we need it to.
"This is why we'll be retiring the analogue phone network at the end of 2025." they add.
The BT Openreach website also offers a search engine where you can find out if you're home is ready for the switch over to ultrafast full fibre broadband.
Once the nationwide switchover is complete, Openreach will then halt the sale of legacy analogue products in more than 880,000 premises across the UK. This will affect suppliers including BT, Sky, TalkTalk, Vodafone and Plusnet who all use Openreach cables to supply homes with the web.
For many, this will seem like a long overdue initiative, but some of an older generation will be left worried about how they will keep in touch. Some homes remain unconnected to the internet whilst others have voiced worries about times when the internet goes offline.
VOIP needs the web to work so if there's an outage it's possible homes won't be able to stay in touch unless they also own a smartphone. This could leave more vulnerable Brits at risk in an emergency.
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