Engineer did arrive (better late than never!)..

[#1]

Quote from: WWWombat

Those figures, if true, would mean that the cable doesn't actually cross the road - and might go down the road & back. Sometimes the discrepancy can be worked out if you know what order the various streets/estates are built in. We aren't on the closest cabinet - but that was installed after the house was built, so is kinda obvious. There is also a cabinet directly inline between us and the exchange, which would make the total line length shorter (but our house-cabinet length would be longer); we're not on that either. The cabinet we *are* on means that the full line takes a large extra loop on the way back to the exchange. Yet knowing when our estate was built, and the order it was done in, you can tell where the BT wiring goes out to the cabinet. The distance is then obvious, and very much matches the BT prediction. What does BT's DSL checker tell you? http://www.dslchecker.bt.com/adsl/adslchecker.welcome

Our test also indicates that your line currently supports an estimated ADSL2+ broadband line speed of 13Mbps; typically the line speed would range between 7.5Mbps and 17.5Mbps. Our test also indicates that your line could support an estimated ADSL 2+ Annex-M broadband upstream line speed of 1Mbps and downstream line speed of 8Mbps; typically the downstream speed would range between 7Mbps and 9Mbps.
Our test also indicates that your line currently supports a fibre technology with an estimated WBC FTTC Broadband where consumers have received downstream line speed of 30.9Mbps and upstream line speed of 6.2Mbps.

Is the exact copy paste, However upon installation of sky 3 years ago we originally were obtaining 15meg down. I know 30.9mb is a lot but I just hope for the most out of my upto 40mb thats all.
Must be pretty shoddy copper between my house and the green box.

Just for clarification the green box so constantly referred to, is it about 1 metre tall?
Or does the generalisation include the smaller ones too. Because we have a smaller green box just over the road and a larger one just down the street about 75m at the most.

[#2]

As I mentioned, the suggested speed thingy is often on the pessemistic side, from what most have said.
As others have pointed out, just because the cabinet is closed, doesn't mean the cable goes even vaguely directly there.
I think the only thing you can do is use the estimate as just that, if based on the estimate you don't think it's worth it, then I'd suggest not changing.  You may get better, you may not, that's why it's an estimate.
Don't forget PN currently cap the upload at 2MBps, to that part of the estimate is almost irrelevant.
BTW: it's the taller green cabinets, not the smaller ones, the even smaller ones are Virgin and not even BT.

[#3]

Quote from: phil4

As I mentioned, the suggested speed thingy is often on the pessemistic side, from what most have said. As others have pointed out, just because the cabinet is closed, doesn't mean the cable goes even vaguely directly there. I think the only thing you can do is use the estimate as just that, if based on the estimate you don't think it's worth it, then I'd suggest not changing.  You may get better, you may not, that's why it's an estimate. Don't forget PN currently cap the upload at 2MBps, to that part of the estimate is almost irrelevant. BTW: it's the taller green cabinets, not the smaller ones, the even smaller ones are Virgin and not even BT.

Well seen as Sky have no idea how my download sync has magically sunk to 9mb over the last 3 years, it caused me to switch. And tbh if 30Mb is conservative then i'm happy.
Sky were good customer support tried all they could but were short on the speed side sadly, still looking foward to this install wednesday may even learn a useful thing or too being a network engineer.
Thank:s for the cab note!

[#4]

Agree - that small cabinet isn't a BT one; it's probably a Virgin one - and possibly a subsidiary one. Around here the majority of Virgin (nee Cabletel) are small, but occasional ones are as large as BT's (I guess these are head-end points, where fibre switches to local coax). Those usually have a rectangular grid of 2, 3 or 4 manhole covers against them, and frequently labelled "CATV" or "Cabletel".
BT's cabinets are often numbered - either very scruffily painted on, or nicely stencilled. There is usually the same array of manhole covers, but labelled BT (not sure I've seen one labelled Openreach); the fibre twin seems to get the same set of manhole covers too.
I've attached some shots locally (from Google maps, so the fibre twins aren't captured on those pictures). For the cabinet labelled 27, the manholes are on the left-hand side of the photo, so not immediately by the cabinet's side.

[#5]

Bit random but i just noticed two massive o2 green cab any ideas what that is I'm assuming its something to do with LLU?
http://maps.google.co.uk/?ie=UTF8&ll=57.156314,-2.115576&spn=0.004795,0.016512&z=17&layer=c&cbll=57....

[#6]

Its probably more to do with their core business - look at the pole between them. That pole will probably be an antenna for their mobile network, although the immediate photo makes it look a bit short and there is often a thicker component at the top, or slightly silvered. On the other hand, they try hard to disguise mobile antenna (even as pine trees), so it wouldn't surprise me if they had a "telegraph pole" style of disguise.
The cabinet(s) will then be small base-station(s).
We have one here, though IIRC this is for Three: http://maps.google.co.uk/?ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Woking,+United+Kingdom&ll=51.318434,-0.616672&spn=0.0005...

[#7]

engineer arriving tomorrow confirmed, can't wait.