NBN Connections Explained: What They Tell Us About Internet Connectivity

As a piece of national infrastructure, Australia’s NBN is a good example of how to use a mixture of technologies to deliver broadband services to almost all of Australia. Australia is a big, geographically challenging nation, but the Internet is a critical component of that. The only way services would have ever been able to blanket the nation is if they were handled by a government, and that is what happened.

But because there was a mix of technologies involved, not every household has access to the exact same quality of service, so the NBN also is a useful way of highlighting the effectiveness of various Internet-bearing technologies.

The main types of NBN available to Australians include:

Fibre to the Premises (FTTP)

About one-in-five Australians have access to a FTTP connection, and they’re the lucky ones. This is effectively the “premium” form of connection, in which a fibre cable delivers Internet from its source, all the way to the actual home where the family is. The unbroken line of fibre optics mean that there isn’t a theoretical ceiling on the speed of the Internet available. Most home plans are capped at 100/40 (100mbps download/40mbps upload), but for people that need it, there are ISPs that offer speeds of up to 1000/1000 on FTTP, if you’re willing to pay for an enterprise plan.

Fibre to the Node (FTTN)

This was a common choice when the NBN was first being rolled out to households across Australia. It is relatively cheap to install. Basically, there’s a fibre connection that runs all the way up to a “node” (a box that could be anywhere from next to the house or a few KM away), and from that node, copper wires take the Internet signal to all the nearby houses.

The problem with this connection is that it’s much slower than FTTN, with 50mbps about the most it can handle, and that speed drops off quickly – the more copper, the slower the maximum speed. People who are unlucky to be on FTTN have a silver lining to look forward to though – it will almost certainly be upgraded to FTTP as nbnco can find the time for it, now the NBN itself has been completely rolled out.

Fibre to the Building (FTTB)

This is the common approach for people that live in apartment buildings or are accessing the Internet from an office block. The fibre runs to the building itself, and is then distributed through the existing copper wiring inside the property. This is a good compromise from rewiring the entire building (which would have been monumentally disruptive and expensive in most buildings), and because the copper doesn’t have to travel far, physically, the speed losses over the distance are not too significant.

Hybrid Fibre-Coaxial (HFC cable)

With this connection, nbnco utilised the existing cable TV network wiring installed on the property – as many Australians already had pay TV, this was an efficient way to upgrade their Internet connection.

HFC is capable of delivering the 100/40 connection that is typically the fastest available over consumer Internet connections. But there were no new HFC connections laid down. This solution was exclusively there for existing infrastructure, and newer projects would involve installing FTTP connections instead.

Fixed Wireless

Fixed Wireless is undoubtedly an inferior technology for the delivery of NBN services. The maximum speed available is 50mbps, and even then it will rarely get that high. It uses 4G cell technology to broadcast a wireless connection to a network of 2,600 towers across Australia, and unless you happen to be very close to those towers, the signal is prone to slowdowns and disruption. However, it is the only solution available to the most remote communities in Australia, and for many of them it was the first time broadband services were available at all. Before then, they were generally the last Australians still using dial-up Internet.

Satellite

The last form of NBN connection is used for even more remote areas than Fixed Wireless. Satellite is essentially only available in places like Christmas, Lord Howe and Norfolk Islands. It involves a satellite signal being beamed directly from the heavens to satellite dishes, which need to be installed on homes and offer a top speed of 25mbps. Again, however, that is a big lift on the top speeds that were previously available to these communities.

The NBN’s modular approach to technology means that it is highly upgradable and effectively future-proof. As new, more efficient, and faster technologies become available, nbnco will be able to continue to update the network and, in doing so, continue to provide consumers with fast and reliable Internet. The only downside to the network is that it eliminates choice, as consumers can’t generally choose what NBN connection they opt into, but this is also the cheapest way of ensuring that everyone has equal access to broadband.