Cracking the code: Jargon unravelled

by The Wessex Internet Team

At Wessex Internet, we are committed to keeping our communication clear and accessible to all. While we make every effort to simplify our language, we understand that you may still encounter unfamiliar phrases or acronyms. To help you better understand our industry, we have put together the following jargon busting table:

Acronym or Phrase	Definition	In plain English
Cabinet (CAB)	Fully enclosed cabinets that organize and manage rack-mountable hardware and protect it from weather conditions.	Cabinets are like secure storage units that hold important equipment and keep it safe from rain, heat, and other outdoor elements.
FTTC	Fibre to the cabinet	FTTC means that fibre optic cables bring high-speed internet to a green cabinet in your neighbourhood. Here, the signal is boosted and pushed into your home. With FTTC, the quality of your broadband is seriously affected by your proximity to your nearest street cabinet.
FTTP	Fibre to the Premises	FTTP means that fibre optic cables bring high-speed internet directly to your home. This allows for faster and more reliable internet compared to FTTC. Be wary though; some broadband providers claim they offer a fibre connection, but only use fibre part of the way.
MB	Megabyte	A Megabyte is a measurement of size for a digital file, whether on a storage device or streaming from the internet. A picture file on average is approx. 3MB, a film file can be anything from 1000MB (1GB) to over 10,000MB (10GB).
GB	Gigabyte	A Gigabyte is a larger measurement of digital size, 1000MB is equal to 1GB. 100GB would allow you to stream approx. 50hr of high definition of video or listen to 20,000 hours of music.
Mbps	Megabits per second	Mbps measures the speed of your internet connection. It determines how quickly data can be sent and received. The higher the Mbps, the faster your internet connection is.
ISP	Internet Service Provider	An ISP is a company that provides you with internet access.
Router	A device that manages the internet traffic and provides wired and wireless connections.	A router controls your home network and is the gateway to the internet for your wireless and wired devices. It manages what information goes where and to which device that requested it.

Additional context for customers:

Gigabytes (GB) vs. Megabytes (MB): A gigabyte is much larger than a megabyte. To give you an idea, streaming a film typically requires several gigabytes, while downloading a small file or photo usually takes a few megabytes.
Mbps for streaming and video calls: To stream videos smoothly or have a clear video call, you generally need an internet connection with at least 10 megabits per second (Mbps). Higher Mbps can provide better quality and faster streaming.
Router as the connection: The router acts as the bridge between your home devices, like phones and computers, and the internet. It allows you to use the internet on your devices by connecting them to the outside network. It’s like the gateway that brings the internet to your home and lets you browse websites and online services.

We hope that the above table and additional context will assist you in navigating our industry as well as helping you to understand the world of internet connectivity.

Full fibre Full fibre broadband jargon buster FTTC FTTP

24/08/2023