Re: Dissecting Fluff - Enron, Blockbuster, and SwitchPoint PR
"The SwitchPoint network is designed using local area network (LAN) concepts. In a typical network design, a fiber optic network backbone or ring is constructed, or leased from existing capacity, to surround and segment a metropolitan community."
ftth and Thread-- Well easier said than done. The leasing part is relatively painless, but the 'construct' part is painful and the reason DSL and CM access technologies are rolling out today.
__________
"A standard Ethernet or other coaxial cable is then installed, as well as SwitchPoint cable, which reaches to neighborhood hubs and to distributed switches located at each subscriber's curb."
Huh...are they saying the metro fiber rings runs through either cable headends or COs. So that fiber goes into the SwitchPoint equipment and feeds out via cat 5 neigborhood hubs or remote terminal neigborhood telco cabinets. OR are the SwitchPoint switches only in the neighborhood hubs or remote terminals from which either a twisted pair or coaxial drop is run to the home. If it's the latter, there is first a heck of a lot more work to be done than the PR implies.
__________
"Common Cat5e wiring schemes can then connect the network to a subscriber's home or business. This strategy enables the SwitchPoint network to deliver the performance of fiber-to-the-home without the considerable added cost of actually installing new optical fiber."
Okay now this is easy to understand except where is this Cat5e wired already installed? Today it's either twisted pairs or coaxial used for a telco/cableco drops. I guess the word "schemes" must mean something I don't understand? They don't really mean Cat5e but just Cat5e scheme over currently installed drops. Right?
_________
"The SwitchPoint switches provide the broadband application capabilities as well as load-balancing, and the result is a self-healing and efficient last-mile network architecture. The SwitchPoint technology is thus a true, dedicated digital network specifically designed to provide a single, unified, and scalable high-speed resource for the transmission of data, voice, video, and all other telecommunications services."
Well I guess they are simply saying that they will use exsisting wired infrastrture, install these new switches and software and then they have a 'true, dedicated digital network?' Sounds like a huge oversimplification to me.
_________
"By contrast, competing DSL and cable modem companies have retrofitted existing analog, last-mile copper plant and cable systems that were not originally designed for broadband digital applications. Because of the design limitations inherent in these retrofit implementations, modern broadband applications too often overtax the networks. They remain only temporary solutions. Clearly, telecommunications and cable-based systems will have to be rebuilt to provide the level of service the SwitchPoint digital network provides from the very outset."
Well thanks to ftth, justone, Denver, Frank, and others, who have covered this topic on this thread I understand this on a first read.
**************
As I do my normal scruntizing of the details and try to remove the MASSIVE amount of fluff in the PRs, isn't SwitchPoint simply saying, "Here's some equipment that will convert your current twisted pair or coaxial HFC access network to all IP."
But SwitchPoint conveniently fails to say how we would make phone(voice), fax, data connections over the twisted pair and watch simple cable TV while the old network that 'clearly must be re-built' is being converted over to their mind-blowing equipment. Keep in mind this 'clearly must be re-built' USA network generates some $130 billion per year in revenues today.
Can anyone who knows better verify if I cut through the fluff correctly. Thanks. -MikeM(From Florida) |
