"Jack Twilley" wrote


The idea of buried fiber along every two-lane road in the
country may
be a fantasy, but laying cable along every Interstate is
certainly
doable with the resources available. Of course, who will run
this
true "information superhighway" is the next debate...


Ten-twelve years ago I was up in northern Minnesota deer hunting.
Got up to my stand way back down a township road, 5 miles from
the nearest dwelling, at zero-dark-thirty and waited for Bambi's
dad to show up with the sunrise. Just in time for morning colors
(0800) I start hearing this awful racket off in the distance,
like a farmer might be buring drainage tiles or something, except
this part of Minnesota hasn't seen an agricultural plow since the
depression. Finally got curious (and cold) enough to go
investigate. Here, out in the middle of absolute nowhere, is a
contract crew burying a 144-fiber cable big as your wrist, and
another spare alonside of it. Every half-mile they put in an
above-ground service loop, and the next day another crew came
behind and plonked down a splice-and-access pedestal at each loop
waiting for the subscribers to show up. The pedestals are still
there, some kinda shot up, but no customers on the horizon. I
bet the local Podunk Power Cooperative is getting ready to roll
out BPL in the same manner!

73, de Hans, K0HB

"KØHB" wrote in message
link.net...

"Jack Twilley" wrote


The idea of buried fiber along every two-lane road in the
country may
be a fantasy, but laying cable along every Interstate is
certainly
doable with the resources available. Of course, who will run
this
true "information superhighway" is the next debate...


Ten-twelve years ago I was up in northern Minnesota deer hunting.
Got up to my stand way back down a township road, 5 miles from
the nearest dwelling, at zero-dark-thirty and waited for Bambi's
dad to show up with the sunrise. Just in time for morning colors
(0800) I start hearing this awful racket off in the distance,
like a farmer might be buring drainage tiles or something, except
this part of Minnesota hasn't seen an agricultural plow since the
depression. Finally got curious (and cold) enough to go
investigate. Here, out in the middle of absolute nowhere, is a
contract crew burying a 144-fiber cable big as your wrist, and
another spare alonside of it. Every half-mile they put in an
above-ground service loop, and the next day another crew came
behind and plonked down a splice-and-access pedestal at each loop
waiting for the subscribers to show up. The pedestals are still
there, some kinda shot up, but no customers on the horizon. I
bet the local Podunk Power Cooperative is getting ready to roll
out BPL in the same manner!

73, de Hans, K0HB

Hello, Hans

My gut feeling is that if someone is out in the boonies and they *really*
want high speed internet, they could go for satellite and have a decent
system. Yes, $50.00 per month is not as cheap as you can get cable or DSL
(at least in some areas), but it is doable and I doubt too many ISPs are
going to try high speed service where, even if they could subscribe
everyone, the average population density is 10 per square mile or less

I suspect that BPL will go the same route; they'll try, perhaps, but it will
be in the cities and suburbs where they can make money (and they will have
competition *and* cause a lot of qrm). The low population density areas
will *still* not be served (except by satellite or, perhaps, dial-up).

As for president, I *still* like Ike!!!

73 from Rochester, NY
Jim AA2QA



---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.669 / Virus Database: 431 - Release Date: 4/26/04

Jim Hampton wrote:
... stuff deleted ...
I suspect that BPL will go the same route; they'll try, perhaps, but it will
be in the cities and suburbs where they can make money (and they will have
competition *and* cause a lot of qrm). The low population density areas
will *still* not be served (except by satellite or, perhaps, dial-up).

I agree with this, except that a satellite link has too much latency to
support
VPN, so some of us rural folk are still stuck with only dialup (and
I$DN). There
is an outfit in town that's putting up terrestrial microwave links in
the area,
but they claim the County is stalling on the approval for the tower they
need
to service my area. Grrrr!

I give BPL little chance of success in my neighborhood - the PG&E lines
around here
generate so much hash that it would never fly. Had PG&E come out once
to look at
it aan it went away for awhile, but now that the hot weather's back so's
the noise.

73 from Rochester, NY
Jim AA2QA

73,
L

Jim Hampton wrote:
... stuff deleted ...
I suspect that BPL will go the same route; they'll try, perhaps, but it will
be in the cities and suburbs where they can make money (and they will have
competition *and* cause a lot of qrm). The low population density areas
will *still* not be served (except by satellite or, perhaps, dial-up).

I agree with this, except that a satellite link has too much latency to
support
VPN, so some of us rural folk are still stuck with only dialup (and
I$DN). There
is an outfit in town that's putting up terrestrial microwave links in
the area,
but they claim the County is stalling on the approval for the tower they
need
to service my area. Grrrr!

I give BPL little chance of success in my neighborhood - the PG&E lines
around here
generate so much hash that it would never fly. Had PG&E come out once
to look at
it aan it went away for awhile, but now that the hot weather's back so's
the noise.

73 from Rochester, NY
Jim AA2QA

73,
L

On Tue, 27 Apr 2004 21:32:30 GMT, "Jim Hampton"
wrote (with possible editing):

....snip


My gut feeling is that if someone is out in the boonies and they *really*
want high speed internet, they could go for satellite and have a decent
system. Yes, $50.00 per month is not as cheap as you can get cable or DSL
(at least in some areas), but it is doable and I doubt too many ISPs are
going to try high speed service where, even if they could subscribe
everyone, the average population density is 10 per square mile or less

FWIW, I'm actively involved with developing broadband in the three
northern counties of New Hampshire. In addition, I run a small (7
engineer) computer consulting firm - we write software for mostly
European clients. We've used satellite since before it was available
from the normal providers, and in a word, it stinks. Latency is
awful. When we ran private links over Intelsat, we had reasonable up
and download rates, but the pricing was incredible - $12,000 per
month. When we used Starband (two-way satellite), the uplink speed
was atrocious (at 19k), and, again, latency has always been a major
problem.

We now have dsl and here we use sdsl. It's available from two
carriers, NCIA and Verizon. We think the pricing is quite high.

For this part of the State, we are considering a combination of both
fiber and radio. Third Rail, Terrabeam, and Motorola all offer fairly
reasonable prices on broadband radio systems, all the way up to
several gbps. Fiber is a natural on high voltage transmission towers
as it isn't affected by electrical transients and it isn't a conductor
to start with. We've obtained some funding so far for some
feasibility, marketing and engineering studies and are now looking for
money for a demonstration project.

To put things into perspective, realize that in Korea "broadband"
means 26 meg at less than $50/month, in Japan it's 20 meg at the same
price. Our goal is 100 meg at less than $50/month and that's in a
mostly rural area.
--

73,
Larry W1HJF


I suspect that BPL will go the same route; they'll try, perhaps, but it will
be in the cities and suburbs where they can make money (and they will have
competition *and* cause a lot of qrm). The low population density areas
will *still* not be served (except by satellite or, perhaps, dial-up).

As for president, I *still* like Ike!!!

73 from Rochester, NY
Jim AA2QA



---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.669 / Virus Database: 431 - Release Date: 4/26/04

On Tue, 27 Apr 2004 21:32:30 GMT, "Jim Hampton"
wrote (with possible editing):

....snip


My gut feeling is that if someone is out in the boonies and they *really*
want high speed internet, they could go for satellite and have a decent
system. Yes, $50.00 per month is not as cheap as you can get cable or DSL
(at least in some areas), but it is doable and I doubt too many ISPs are
going to try high speed service where, even if they could subscribe
everyone, the average population density is 10 per square mile or less

FWIW, I'm actively involved with developing broadband in the three
northern counties of New Hampshire. In addition, I run a small (7
engineer) computer consulting firm - we write software for mostly
European clients. We've used satellite since before it was available
from the normal providers, and in a word, it stinks. Latency is
awful. When we ran private links over Intelsat, we had reasonable up
and download rates, but the pricing was incredible - $12,000 per
month. When we used Starband (two-way satellite), the uplink speed
was atrocious (at 19k), and, again, latency has always been a major
problem.

We now have dsl and here we use sdsl. It's available from two
carriers, NCIA and Verizon. We think the pricing is quite high.

For this part of the State, we are considering a combination of both
fiber and radio. Third Rail, Terrabeam, and Motorola all offer fairly
reasonable prices on broadband radio systems, all the way up to
several gbps. Fiber is a natural on high voltage transmission towers
as it isn't affected by electrical transients and it isn't a conductor
to start with. We've obtained some funding so far for some
feasibility, marketing and engineering studies and are now looking for
money for a demonstration project.

To put things into perspective, realize that in Korea "broadband"
means 26 meg at less than $50/month, in Japan it's 20 meg at the same
price. Our goal is 100 meg at less than $50/month and that's in a
mostly rural area.
--

73,
Larry W1HJF


I suspect that BPL will go the same route; they'll try, perhaps, but it will
be in the cities and suburbs where they can make money (and they will have
competition *and* cause a lot of qrm). The low population density areas
will *still* not be served (except by satellite or, perhaps, dial-up).

As for president, I *still* like Ike!!!

73 from Rochester, NY
Jim AA2QA



---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.669 / Virus Database: 431 - Release Date: 4/26/04

"KØHB" wrote in message
link.net...

"Jack Twilley" wrote


The idea of buried fiber along every two-lane road in the
country may
be a fantasy, but laying cable along every Interstate is
certainly
doable with the resources available. Of course, who will run
this
true "information superhighway" is the next debate...


Ten-twelve years ago I was up in northern Minnesota deer hunting.
Got up to my stand way back down a township road, 5 miles from
the nearest dwelling, at zero-dark-thirty and waited for Bambi's
dad to show up with the sunrise. Just in time for morning colors
(0800) I start hearing this awful racket off in the distance,
like a farmer might be buring drainage tiles or something, except
this part of Minnesota hasn't seen an agricultural plow since the
depression. Finally got curious (and cold) enough to go
investigate. Here, out in the middle of absolute nowhere, is a
contract crew burying a 144-fiber cable big as your wrist, and
another spare alonside of it. Every half-mile they put in an
above-ground service loop, and the next day another crew came
behind and plonked down a splice-and-access pedestal at each loop
waiting for the subscribers to show up. The pedestals are still
there, some kinda shot up, but no customers on the horizon. I
bet the local Podunk Power Cooperative is getting ready to roll
out BPL in the same manner!

73, de Hans, K0HB

Hello, Hans

My gut feeling is that if someone is out in the boonies and they *really*
want high speed internet, they could go for satellite and have a decent
system. Yes, $50.00 per month is not as cheap as you can get cable or DSL
(at least in some areas), but it is doable and I doubt too many ISPs are
going to try high speed service where, even if they could subscribe
everyone, the average population density is 10 per square mile or less

I suspect that BPL will go the same route; they'll try, perhaps, but it will
be in the cities and suburbs where they can make money (and they will have
competition *and* cause a lot of qrm). The low population density areas
will *still* not be served (except by satellite or, perhaps, dial-up).

As for president, I *still* like Ike!!!

73 from Rochester, NY
Jim AA2QA



---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.669 / Virus Database: 431 - Release Date: 4/26/04