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Earthlink Invests In Broadband Over Power Lines
prostoalex writes "Earthlink dedicated $500,000 to delivering broadband connections over power lines by launching a test drive of the technology with Progress Energy in North Carolina. 500 homes involved in the projects can sign up for promotional pricing of $20/month, which after 3 months will be changed to $50/month. No word on bandwidth provided, but Ambient Corp., which provides technology for the project and accpeted EarthLink investment, claims data rates exceeding 10 Mpbs."
claims data rates exceeding 10 Mpbs
You know that you won't actually get 10Mbps for this, because the ISP's end bill and equipment needs would be to much. That's why all of the DSL/Cable companies have started sending acceptable usage warnings to their customers because they used up all of their unlimited bandwidth (God I love irony) (God I love being an agnostic who says God alot). Any who, as far as I know, this tech was meant more for giving broadband to them crazy country foke who ain't got them thar new digitized lines.... Right? Anyway, what is the range of these lines? How far away can you live from a "hub" or how exactly does that work....
Pun intended. High winds or storms can knock out power lines, causing people to lose power, but if the ethernet connection is hooked up to said poles, we'll lose internet as well. Oh, whoa is me. Then again, I suppose that unless you keep a generator to run your computers in case of a power outage, it wouldn't really matter if the internet is not working while you're power is out. It's the principle that matters though!
Forecast for tomorrow: A few sprinklings of genius with a chance of DOOM!
Not knowing much about how broadband really works, can someone explain to me why this wouldn't have the same limitations as DSL? So, with DSL there's a restriction on how far someone can be from a main telco box. Intuitively it would seem that broadband over power lines would hve the same issues, thus making it no more appealing to deliver broadband to the boonies than DSL, which the telcos have balked at due to cost. Thanks
At least one thing will come of this. When the equipment begins blacking out HF spectrum, the furor should put this half-baked technology out to pasture once and for all. Imagine overseas flights using 10MHz HF SSB communications not able to get clearance to enter US airspace because their comms are blacked out by this garbage?
If this gets to the point that it's deployed in my area, I plan to become *extremely* active on the HF Amateur Radio bands with *full* legal power. If it means fighting fire with fire, then by all means I'm prepared. They operate under the part 15 "non interference" rules. I operate under full FCC license to transmit. IOTW, I win. Hmm... when is the next DX contest???
To quote Part 15: "must not interfere" means that they legally cannot interfere with my operation, and "must accept any interference" means that if I kill an entire neighborhood's internet feed, that's just the breaks. They cant stop my transmissions as long as I am complying with the rules and regs.
But, being a realist, I suppose that once "big business" gets involved, then all they have to do is throw money, and they have plenty, at lobbyists and get congress to pressure the FCC to toss us hams off the air. Sadly, amateur radio does not have the status it once had.
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de N5DH