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Technology Stocks : LAST MILE TECHNOLOGIES - Let's Discuss Them Here -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: MikeM54321 who wrote (4602)	7/13/1999 1:04:00 PM
From: Raymond Duray	Read Replies (5) \| Respond to of 12823

Re: DSL and Long Runs in UTP, 9 miles to the CO Hi Mike, A while back I made a 'trouble' call to US Worst regarding the single UTP to my place. The tech came out promptly and the "test" he applied to the phone line was to alligator clip his handset onto the line and declare "It sound good to me." Sheesh, I was such a naif not to know that when you request a line test, you must make a special request for them to actually bring the equipment necessary to produce a quantifiable result. The occasional static I get on the phone line was just par for the course, said the tech. With so many splices it's just hard to know where a bit of quirkiness might pop up, he said. He did indicate that the traffic from my neighborhood ran for about 2 miles on copper and that the signal was then muxed onto glass. I didn't catch the name of the equipment that is used for this translation, wished I had now. In conversation with a PR guy from USW, I was informed that USW has no current plans to bring residential xDSL to Central or Eastern Oregon in the foreseeable future. There are a few LADAs in the CO serving sone local ISPs and a few other businesses, but information about them is suppressed (I happened to learn about them from third parties) and the telco really doesn't want to be bothered with all this broadband stuff. So, technically, I don't know where I stand as far as xDSL service is concerned. From a purely business angle however, I know exactly where I stand regarding the delivery of broadband services from US West. That would be at the back of the bus. An alternative is ISDN service. It is available to all USW subscribers in Oregon due to an agreement with the state PUC. Here's a snipper of a conversation I had recently with a techie at my ISP. He said: "ISDN runs on a single pair, tip and ring. It uses an "NT1" box to terminate the two-wire ISDN interface ("ISDN U") and turn it into a four-wire ISDN interface ("S/T")... The phone company sends you a U connection, and it is up to your equipment to use it. Most equipment now comes with a built-in NT1 so you do not need to purchase one separately. Because ISDN is all digital, the phone company will need line boosters along your line to make it work. However, US West had to petition the State to even be able to offer ISDN in the first place. Because of agreements resulting of this, they are required in most every instance to provide ISDN service to ANYONE who asks, no matter how far away they are." The cost of the ISDN setup would be about $500 up front cost and $80 per month thereafter. Considering that I would boost my signal from a theoretical 56k on the v.90 to 64k with the single pair ISDN, it seemed hardly worth the expense. Not to mention, lord knows how long it might take to get those line boosters in place. Does anyone on the thread have any experience with this type of ISDN setup, and any opinion regarding it's efficacy? Somehow it all seems so retro and kludgy.... Ciao, Ray