Bring On The Fiber Already!
May 25, 2004
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Posted by Aubrey Turner
Late last week I noticed that Verizon employees were in the neighborhood working at the new fiber optic boxes that have been put in near the street. This was the first time I noticed actual Verizon employees, though. All of the other work has been done by contractors. So I took this as a sign that they were nearing completion of the new fiber network.
The Verizon press release has a few more details about the FTTP rollout, including this tidbit about proposed service speeds.
Bob Ingalls, president of Verizon’s Retail Marketing Group, said some of the new broadband access products will feature download speeds of 5 megabits per second, 15 megabits per second and 30 megabits per second. Verizon expects to begin marketing these products in Keller and elsewhere later this year. The new network will also support video applications and other new services.
“These services will be provided at a substantial value over anything that’s in the market today – highly competitive pricing because we know that’s what customers will expect,” Ingalls said.
30 Mbps is certainly better than anything I can get today, but I’ll be a bit disappointed if this is all they’re going to offer. The equipment is capable of doing 100 Mbps (at least according to its specs). I’m also anxiously awaiting the publication of their offerings and the terms of service for those offerings. I want a symmetrical high-speed internet service that doesn’t have a significant penalty in cost for being symmetrical. Since I work from home these days, I find myself being hampered by the silly upload cap imposed by the cable modem provider. If you want symmetrical speeds with cable you have to pay for a business plan, which the last time I checked was around $100/month (unfortunately, they’ve removed their pricing information and replaced it with a contact form on the Charter website, so I can’t tell what their service costs now).
Verizon has a general information page for their new FTTP ‘DSL’ service here, including the ability to sign up to be notified when FTTP is available in your area.
Categories: Domestic Affairs
A bit disappointed? Have you lost your mind?
At the absolute highest rates of commercially viable equipment, 1Gb/second, that would would aggregate a grand total of a whopping ten symmetrical users. How many are inside 200 ft. of that pole, anyway?
They may be sticking gigabit ethernet on the pole, but far better to deliver 10mbps full-duplexed to 100 very extraordinarily happy users than 100 to 10.
You kids…
This is an underground fiber-based distribution system, with each house having its own fiber interface in the front yard (they just put in a box at my curb). The equipment is capable of 155Mbps down and 100Mbps up stream connections. This is for each house.
Of course, I can see how they wouldn’t necessarily advertise or sell the full bandwidth of the system. They would want to hold something back for future “upgrades.”
Not to get too goofily technical but you got a protocol mismatch there in your numbers. It’s either full-duplex ethernet @ 100, or it’s OC3 ATM @ 155. Those don’t work together on the same fiber, not very well anyway.
Either way it all aggregates back to one distribution point, and there’s your problem with getting your full, rated speed. Unless you have a provider with a heart of gold, he ain’t guaranteeing no 100mbps. I’m kind of shocked that he’s guaranteeing 30—that’s close to the edge of doable.
But it’s not likely anyone would be able to tell the difference between 30 and 25 anyway.
This holds new importance for me today, since I just got a job in Westlake and am now considering a move to Keller. Of course, I’d be looking for an apartment, not a house. Still, almost all of what I hear about Keller is positive.