High-speed Internet Access: Power Lines For Real

securitas writes "ID reports that German utilities started offering high speed Internet access via power lines last month, and Sweden and the Netherlands are not far behind. The companies claim to have resolved problems of interference and line noise. US trials are taking place in secret with Reston VA based PowerLine Technologies. Nortel and Siemens abandoned the technology in 1999 but if this is for real DSL and cable may have a new competitor."

Comments

What about CA with its power crisis?

[antdude]

Assuming California is in a heat wave and the power reserve is small, then how will this high-speed Internet access supposed to work during a rolling black out? I assume both Internet access and electricity would go out. Double whammies. :(

That's kinda dumb

[gvonk]

What good would internet access be without power, dude?

some actual links...

[Kraft]

Hmm... no links in the news? Dodgy, if you ask me...

Germany:
Provider: RWE
- Power line internet access launched by Germany's RWE - Quote: "The power line technology will mean that RWE PowerNet can deliver data at a rate of two million bytes per second."
- Shocking Concept: Internet Over Electrical Lines

Sweden:
Provider: Sydkraft Bredbånd - provides up to 8mbit/s downstream.
- Sweden Using Electricity For High-Speed Connections

continue list at will. I just know it will take forever before I can get anything but forced AOL crap connections where I live in France :(

Not as great as /. makes out

[anticypher]

There are two companies who have announced plans to offer internet over power lines, and only one has received a license and started a very limited offering in one city only (Essen). I think the link is www.rwe-powerline.de.

The service is quite limited. In order for a neighborhood to get access, they have to wait until the company wires up the local substation. There can be no transformers between the substation and the house. Once a neighborhood has access, a technician comes out and installs a box at the meter junction, and then connects the modem to an internal power socket. The powerline modems communicate with the box outside, which in turn communicates with the router at the substation, and everything after that is normal internet. There is no communication across most of the power system, the signals can't pass transformers or switching stations. The signals have an effective limit of 350 meters, which is much shorter than DSL or cable.

The 2Mbps limit is for an entire neighborhood, and is shared by all the other connections in the area. There is a cap at 250Mb per month, sometime later they will offer a 10Gb cap, but only to businesses and at a rate equal to leased line. The companies both are targeting high-density cities, and have no plans to offer this to any rural areas or small towns, because of the 350 meter limit on distance from substation to home.

For the trials last year, the modems had only a serial connection, and had to be "dialed" just like a regular analog modem, and the speed was limited to 115kbps. Their website claims they now have ethernet and USB connections as well. The last I saw, every customer gets a private 10.0.0.0 IP address, and the company doesn't allow servers of any kind.

The truly sad thing is, in Germany this really is competition and an improvement for the market.

the AC
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