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FCC Preparing Transition To VoIP Telephone Network

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the only-a-matter-of-time dept.

mantis2009 writes "The US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) published a request for public comment (PDF) on an upcoming transition from the decades-old circuit-based Public Switched Telephone Network to a new system run entirely with Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology. This is perhaps the most serious indication to date that the legacy telephone system will, in the near future, reach the end of its life. This public commenting phase represents a very early stage in what will undoubtedly be a very complex transition that makes this year's bumpy switch from analog to digital television look relatively easy."

49 of 250 comments (clear)

  1. Dial-up is all there is some places... by BubbaDave · · Score: 5, Informative

    The death of dial-up has been greatly exaggerated. No broadband available where I am in NY, within 50 miles of Syracuse.

    Dave

    1. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Well, I guess we know where the opposition to this plan will come from...

      --
      Palm trees and 8
    2. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by jibster · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't think you need to have BB to do VOIP, afterall if you have enough bandwidth to do voice, you have enough bandwidth to do voice (over ip.) I think your mistake is in assuming they mean any change in the physical infrastructure when in actual fact they only intend to change the protocall operating on that infrastructure.

    3. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by TimeElf1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      With only 60% of the US having access to broadband I'm thinking opposition is going to come from everywhere.

      --
      Cannot find REALITY.SYS. Universe halted.
    4. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by _xeno_ · · Score: 4, Insightful

      But can you do dial-up over VOIP?

      I mean, sure, you'd think that if the phone network was IP-based, you'd be able to get general Internet access through it, too. Is that really the case, though?

      First issue, is this VOIP-to-the-home, or just VOIP-to-the-switch-box? A logical first step would be to switch over to VOIP just before the last-mile, to allow people to keep their existing phones - which (I think) would kill dial-up and faxes. A later second step would be to move the final transition point to the telephone box at the house.

      And even if it is running VOIP all the way to the home, you have to assume that the telco will allow people to connect to the Internet via their network. This is something regulation can solve (by forcing the issue), but still, that means new equipment. And most likely new fees. And quite possibly a loss of choice over ISP.

      So there will have to be some concession to people still using dial-up - especially if they're not planning on moving the entire network to VOIP all at once.

      --
      You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
    5. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by tverbeek · · Score: 3, Interesting

      DSL isn't IP over voice. Your typical ADSL configuration is IP running on the same copper alongside voice (or more properly, POTS). It can also be run on copper without POTS (sometimes called "naked DSL"), but the Bells don't like that because it means letting people drop their landlines.

      --
      http://alternatives.rzero.com/
    6. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by natehoy · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Paragraph 1 of the attached PDF:

      In the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (“Recovery Act”), Congress directed
      the Commission to create a national broadband plan by February 17, 2010, that seeks to “ensure that all
      people of the United States have access to broadband capability and establish[es] benchmarks for
      meeting that goal.”1 Among other things, the Commission is to provide “an analysis of the most effective
      and efficient mechanism for ensuring broadband access by all people of the United States”2 and “a
      detailed strategy for achieving affordability of such service and maximum utilization of broadband
      infrastructure and service by the public.”

      In other words, they are looking to take your "no broadband available" location and make it a "broadband available" location. At the same time, they are looking to make the transition as cost-effective as possible so they will run whatever wires it takes to give you broadband but at the same time they are looking to eliminate duplicate services (running a nationwide-to-every-American PSTN network *AND* a nationwide-to-every-American Broadband Internet connection). They may even be able to use your existing copper to give you a good Internet connection.

      Needless to say, but I'll say it anyway, any conversion of your actual home telephone to VoIP would occur (if it ever did at all) well AFTER you had sufficient high-speed Internet to support it. The FCC isn't going to convert everyone to VoIP today, disconnect massive numbers of remote customers who lack broadband, then figure out how to connect to all the outlying areas later.

      In fact, I imagine a lot of what they are going to do is sponsor/mandate DSL implementations, including some sort of repeater technology to break the "local loop distance" barrier and give every American household that has a POTS phone line today access to DSL tomorrow.

      There's a very good chance your existing telco will still be allowed to use the voice portion of your copper to send you POTS telephone service just like you are used to today, though many of them will probably want to become pure-play Internet/DSL providers and give you a VoIP box for your phone (but most will probably make that an Analog adapter so you can still use your existing phone) - that way they can use the entire available frequency band on your copper wires to give you the best Internet speed possible, rather than having to have data in one set of frequencies and voice in another. It also greatly simplifies the gear they have to maintain.

      --
      "This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
    7. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by jibster · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Look, its a simple question of bandwidth. If you can squeeze 56kbs of data down a phone line then it MUST take 56kbs to transmit voice in analogue. It does not matter about the encoding. If fact it does not take 56kbs to transmit analogue voice but something closer to 28k will get reasonable quality if I remember my shannon equations from college. Now you do have a point that there is extra overhead in the packetizing the headers but not an unreasonable amount. No you could not trasmit "internet traffic" at the same time, but who is proposing that you would do that? Your phone doesn't do it now does it?

    8. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by BubbaDave · · Score: 2, Informative

      DSL does not have a 56K limit, but trades higher frequencies and wider bandwidth for

      a) much shorter runs from the central office
      b) polluting the other copper pairs near the DSL pair, rendering those pairs useless for DSL.

      VOIP voice is a fair bit less than 56kbps in many cases.

      Dave

    9. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by DrPepper · · Score: 5, Informative

      I think a lot of people have missed the point on this. As I read it, the proposal is to replace the core infrastructure with VoIP based technology - ie. the circuits between exchanges. Existing POTS lines will still be used back to users to terminate calls. This is already in progress in the UK - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BT_21CN.

    10. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by commodore64_love · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I have broadband but I oppose disconnecting the old phone system for the following reasons:

      - When my DSL stopped working a few weeks ago (DSLAM needed replacement) I then used dialup to access the internet. 50k is slow but still useful for emailing, listening to online radio, or even watching youtube.

      - Dialup is portable. I can use it any place and any hotel that has a phone line. No need to pay the outrageous $5-10/night the hotel charges for wireless or wired access.

      - If a three strike law happens, my DSL or Cable ISP might pull the plug, but my dialup will still be there for backup.

      - This morning when the electricity died, the wired phone was the only thing that still worked. Good to have for emergency.

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
    11. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by datapharmer · · Score: 3, Insightful

      That is fine and all... but why? Isn't that just more crap to break? What happened to the kiss principle? I'm fine with the telcos doing this on their end, but going digital all the way makes no sense unless you are upgrading the last mile in the process and providing some sort of SLA. POTS used to be very reliable, VOIP definitely is not. Is it cheaper to run and maintain and have better features? yes! Do I use it? yes! Do I think it is fair to make grandma add an electricity-eating privacy stealing converter box for every friggin thing she uses in her house without providing any benefit to her? Hell no!

      This sounds like the Clipper Chip all over again.

      --
      Get a web developer
    12. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by Cimexus · · Score: 2, Interesting

      It can also be run on copper without POTS (sometimes called "naked DSL"), but the Bells don't like that because it means letting people drop their landlines.

      You're right, and it's a terrible shame ... I went 'naked' a year ago and I love it (I live in Australia, telco regulations here have forced our equivalent of the US 'bells' to allow competitors to offer ULL, i.e. naked-DSL, links). Beats paying line rental on a phone line I made about 2 call on per year, and my ISP offers a high quality VoIP product for cheap calls worldwide. Love it :)

    13. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by raddan · · Score: 2, Informative

      Oh certainly, it is ironic, particularly when you consider that the development of packet-switched networks was largely motivated by a desire to break out of the extremely limited network model that the phone company used.

      But it's also not that simple. The available bandwidth is extremely dependent on the distance from the CO. This is why you can't always get DSL even though you can get POTS-- the further you go, the more the impedance of the wire attenuates the signal. The frequency characteristics of the POTS network were chosen so that all POTS wiring would meet those specs, but that means that short wires have loads of extra bandwidth, and long wires do not. Tannenbaum has a nice graph for this in his Computer Networks book. Telephones include filtering circuitry to keep the signal's frequency within the proscribed range; DSL is taking advantage of the fact that much of this bandwidth is not utilized.

      Modern modem protocols do not attenuate their signals-- they first shoot for as much bandwidth as possible, and then choose an encoding scheme to take advantage of that. This is why very rural phone customers still can't get high-speed modem connections. Because VOIP is, like POTS, attenuated to match the requirements of the human voice, modem connections over VOIP are problematic. Not to mention-- there's essentially no latency on an analog line; packet-switching is mostly appropriate when latency is not an issue.

      So for long runs of POTS wiring, VOIP may not be a good thing, unless that POTS wiring is replaced. I don't know what the minimum bandwidth requirements are for VOIP-- they may in fact be less than POTS-- but VOIP also adds a lot of protocol overhead, since with POTS, there is no protocol. The phone company may even be running their VOIP service on top of some other network/transport software; TCP/IP is probably not a good choice here, particularly when it comes to QoS.

    14. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by Jarik+C-Bol · · Score: 2, Interesting

      you make a good point here. wire phones often work when everything else has collapsed into burning rubble. power can be out, cell towers down, and you can still pick up a corded handset and make a call. that level of reliability is just not matched in VoIP systems. In the area where i live, they transitioned a lot of rural customers over to a satellite relay for phone service (it had been microwave relays before that) what sucks is the satellite systems go down far more often than the old microwave system.
      I'm all for new tech, but wide scale implementation of it needs to be only after it is not going to be a downgrade in reliability.

      --
      I've decided to Diversify my Holdings. I've divided my cash between my left and right pockets, instead of all in one.
    15. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by Chyeld · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Except that in many places, you really are already on a VOIP network, you just have POTS on the last mile.

      Plus, this isn't a plan to force the networks to go to VOIP, they are already pushing for that on their own due to the lowered costs of running them. This is the "how do we let them do this without letting them screw the customer over by removing services or reducing quality of service" plan.

    16. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by kheldan · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I am also 44, and I 100% agree with you.
      VoIP requires broadband internet connectivity. We can't even manage to get decent dialup internet service to everywhere in this country (the USA), let alone 100% broadband penetration. We might get some form of wireless broadband sooner (like WiMax), but even then I'd think that we'll have 100% cellphone coverage before we have 100% broadband coverage. Also, I haven't been too impressed with VoIP thusfar, I think there needs to be improvements to it before you can expect 100% adoption of the technology.

      --
      Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
    17. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by commodore64_love · · Score: 2, Informative

      >>>They sell those 3G USB dongles and pre-paid access at pretty competitive prices now

      My dialup costs $7 per month. Are they competitive with that? I see Verizon charges $50 for every 500 megabytes. That 500 MB is equivalent to only 22 hours of dialup downloading.

      --
      "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
    18. Re:Dial-up is all there is some places... by Chyeld · · Score: 2, Interesting

      The majority of many telco's backbones are already converted to packet switched (IP) networks vs circuit switched (POTS) networks. Packet switching has a huge cost saving vs circuit switching. And yes, it works with any sort of data that is already being sent over the lines. We aren't talking Skype or SIP here, we are talking lower level type of hardware/interfacing.

      What the real question is (the one the FCC is asking), what sort of measures should be taken to ensure that as the network goes full IP (and potentially to full VOIP) the quality of service isn't degraded. Do they need to demand a certain level of latency, lack of jitter, vocal quality (i.e. mandate a specific codec or bit rate).

      VOIP at the same level of quality as what we consider POTS to have is quite doable, the reason it isn't done is that part of the cost savings in VOIP is the 'doing more with less' mantra it's currently being implemented under by most people. But is it necessary to mandate that quality and if so, how?

      PS For specific information concerning your actual concern, you can start by reading this article.

  2. Come on Google, Give us wi-fi Now! by 140Mandak262Jamuna · · Score: 2, Funny

    By the time FCC gets around to rule making and enforcement about POTS, Google would have deployed a coast-to-coast Wi-Fi for free. It would still be called Beta though. All the telephone companies pumping voice through a pair of copper wires would go the way the companies that shipped freight over a pair iron rails. And the cell phone companies would be huddling in a corner, dazed, seeing stars wondering what hit them. They will just be joining others in the same corner newspapers, Rupert Murdoch, Yahoo, eBay and Microsoft.

    --
    sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
    1. Re:Come on Google, Give us wi-fi Now! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You do realize that shipping things by rail is WAY more efficient that doing it by truck don't you?

    2. Re:Come on Google, Give us wi-fi Now! by don+depresor · · Score: 2, Informative

      You know that EEUU among many other countries still has a notably huge rail freight traffic, right? With trains as long as 3 Km composed exclusively by standard freight containers...

    3. Re:Come on Google, Give us wi-fi Now! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Freight rail is still in use, and is a hell of a lot more efficient than trucking. And if it weren't for the boondoggle called the Interstate system, we'd still be shipping most freight by rail.

    4. Re:Come on Google, Give us wi-fi Now! by Trepidity · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Indeed--- as a result, even the poster children of truck shipping, UPS/FedEx, have moved much of their cross-country shipping to rail. If you order something FedEx to Texas from the Northeast, for example, chances are it'll make a stop in Hutchins, Texas.

      --
      10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
    5. Re:Come on Google, Give us wi-fi Now! by natehoy · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Google would be well-served by implementing WiFi now, and I think it would be fun if they did it in the same sort of participatory manner that they do everything else - they ship you a cheap or free GoogleRepeater, you put an antenna on your rooftop, and in certain areas Google pays for an Internet connection that they can connect to the GoogleRepeaterGrid. The network spreads as people are willing to install and run GoogleRepeaters, and remains fast based on them adding fiber connections at strategic points along the GoogleRepeaterGrid.

      If they can find a channel, the long-haul connection between GoogleRepeaters could be handled on a longer-distance higher-bandwidth frequency or range of frequencies, and the local repeaters could output standard WiFi. But they wouldn't have to pay to put up towers, because there are a good number of people who would be more than happy to install the repeater gear at our houses and help spread the signal. Google? Are you listening? You can ship it to me now. I've got a primo spot on my rooftop antenna tower with your name on it.

      As to the rail thing, it's still used for a lot of transportation of goods. It's amazingly efficient compared to any other way of moving product (except maybe floating it downstream on barges, but rail doesn't have to worry about river flow directions). You might be surprised at how much of the stuff you use every day was hauled at least part of the way by rail. It's more efficient than barging it, and almost ten times more efficient than hauling by the next-most-efficient method that's not dependent on current (trucks).

      --
      "This post contains words, known to the State of California to cause thought. Wash brain thoroughly after reading."
  3. Re:Here's a comment by Kylock · · Score: 2, Interesting

    This could easily lead toward government subsidized data infrastructure. By moving away from pots, this would be the next logical step.

  4. How unfortunate... by Cornwallis · · Score: 3, Interesting

    POTS is and has been stable and secure.

    VOIP... not and never will be.

    1. Re:How unfortunate... by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 4, Informative

      POTS is pretty reliable; but secure? Really?

      You can tap a POTS line with a couple of alligator clips and a speaker, and almost no standard telephones have even the most primitive encryption or obfuscation support, much less anything standardized.

    2. Re:How unfortunate... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      POTS is already VOIP. You're just not aware of it. Ever make a long distance call? Guess what, it's transmitted via IP packets along the whole way except for the two endpoints (your phone line and the other parties line).

      Now, those packets aren't traveling on the public internet, but the whole backbone infrastructure went to IP years ago.

    3. Re:How unfortunate... by bth · · Score: 2, Funny

      We leave DOS attack on POTS to telemarketers, charity solicitations, and pollsters.

    4. Re:How unfortunate... by Sandbags · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Do NOT confuse Voice over internet with Voice over IP. They are not necessarily the same.

      Your existing POTS lines today ARE running VOIP under the covers. The last mile is all that's really still a traditional POTS service in most cities. Once the calls hit central hubs, most of it is packetized traffic.

      Your home VoIP service likely sucks because either your internet connection is spotty, you're too far from reasonable servers, your VoIP modem is not properly installed and QoS (likely because it;s begind a router in your home instead of being directly connected to your modem), your modem is old and doesn't properly recognize and prioritize VoIP traffic, your ISP is purposefully degrading your ViOP service, or your VoIP provider (Vonage likely) is using a poor protocol and providing poor service quality themselves.

      I've been installing VoIP systems since 2001. MAJOR firms use tens of throusands of VoIP lines between offices worldwide with far superior call quality, routing capabilities, and redundancy, and for less money, than using PRIs and POTS lines.

      Having your local telcom switch to VOIP as a core solution has NOTHING TO DO with the VOIP service you are used to over the internet ala Centrex style.

      --
      There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
    5. Re:How unfortunate... by Sandbags · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Please do not confuse provider based VoIP services as a replacement for POTS with VOInternet services. These are seperate things that happen to use the same call letters. It is entirely possible for a local phone company (not an ISP) to offer VoIP services direct to a compatible SIP device. This can be on a dedicated connection or chanel from internet exactly the same way a cable company can seperate analog, digital, and internet traffic on the same cable line.

      --
      There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
  5. Bear in mind where we're at on the timeline by SlappyBastard · · Score: 2, Insightful

    At this stage, we're about where the FCC was at in deciding what format DTV was going to be. We're around 1992 if we're comparing the VOIP timeline against the DTV timeline. It's gonna be a few years.

    --
    I scream. You scream. I assume that means we're both acquainted with the problem. We proceed.
  6. The nice thing about POTS... by Peter+Simpson · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...is that the user terminal (the phone) is totally passive - no power needed, it's a totally dumb terminal, and very robust (at least, if it's a Western Electric product!). The POTS system is the result of some careful design and decades of improvements to increase reliability. That's not to say that there aren't benefits to be had from VOIP, just that we should think carefully before deciding that everyone will be converted to VOIP.

    Disclaimer: In addition to my nifty 2.4G multiple handset cordless phones with built-in caller ID and voicemail, I have two POTS phones which work fine when the power goes out.

    1. Re:The nice thing about POTS... by tverbeek · · Score: 5, Insightful

      POTS is a mature, robust technology that provides remarkably clear and reliable voice service throughout the country (nearly the globe) at an affordable cost.

      Of course we're going to replace it.

      --
      http://alternatives.rzero.com/
    2. Re:The nice thing about POTS... by daveywest · · Score: 2, Informative

      Full Disclosure: I work for a small POTS provider.

      In my city, Mesquite, Nevada, there are two telecom providers. The traditional phone company that has operated here for over 100 years, and the new VOIP provider. One works even when the power goes out; one has a working E-911 system; and one allows you to get telephone service without requiring other bundled services.

      Its amazing what a little bit of copper wire can do.

  7. Accepting lower quality by PuddleBoy · · Score: 3, Insightful

    VoIP, while an interesting and disruptive technology, is not quite ready for ALL voice applications. Some thoughts;

    It is frequently easy to tell when you are speaking to someone using VoIP. Clipped high and low tones, often choppy like a bad cell call. Most businesses will not want their customers having that experience talking to them. Residential is fine - those customers are just looking for cheap, cheap, cheap. Many businesses are concerned with appearances, and a bad call experience can sour a sale in a competitive marketplace.

    Many (most?) alarm companies cannot successfully run alarms (fire, elevator, burglar) over VoIP lines. Not sure if it's latency, compression or what, but I have heard this complaint MANY times from various security (alarm) company people. In some states, doing so is actually against the law.

    911 routinng - have all the 911 PSAP routing issues been resolved with VoIP? This is a biggie that most people switching to VoIP don't consider.

    Your Internet connection goes down, your voice is gone. One thing you can say about the PSTN is that it is pretty dependable. In all my years (I have some gray hair) it has been rare that I have trouble with a POTS line.

    VoIP has its uses - I'm not denying that. But the landline network will not disappear overnight, this year, or even this decade.

  8. I'm No ure VO p is Rea y by sycodon · · Score: 5, Funny

    My compa y has VOIP an it see t have pro le wit cu out.

    --
    When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
  9. Re:So we don't anticipate any blackouts, ever? by WillAdams · · Score: 2, Informative

    The current system doesn't require that a home have power --- a VOIP installation needs power there at the home ---granted a backup battery is a standard part of the installation (at least for Verizon's) but I don't believe that having a home's 911 service require a good and charged battery there in the home is appropriate for public safety.

    William

    --
    Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
  10. Network neutrality by vvaduva · · Score: 2, Insightful

    I wonder if their providers will apply the true "network neutrality" principles to whatever sip trunks they have serving them, or will the fcc traffic get priority, since they are the fcc and everything?

  11. Re:So we don't anticipate any blackouts, ever? by nate_in_ME · · Score: 2, Interesting
    Ideally, a nationwide VOIP transition would be done at the backbone level, such that the end users would not see a difference in their equipment - essentially keeping the last mile a standard POTS system. However, if they decide not to go that route, I think it's important that the service be a separate entity from a person's choice of broadband service - i.e., not dependent on one having existing broadband service as VOIP is today.

    As far as the power issues go, that could be handled one of two ways, in the event that the last mile is switched over as well:

    • PoE - much like the current phone handsets are, it should be simple enough for the providers to inject power into the wires much like the current system does. This way, new phones could simply pull power off the wire like current phones do. Under this type of setup, it would be assumed that whatever equipment was providing the power injection would be connected to the same backup systems(UPS, generators, etc) as the switching equipment
    • Battery backup locally - it would also be feasible, in the event that phones under this new system required a separate power source at the user equipment, simply to provide a means to install a backup battery, similar to how hard wired smoke detectors still want you to install a 9-volt in the event of a power loss. Based on my experiences as far as how often I've lost power, if the equipment was designed to use as little energy as possible, one battery should be able to last for quite some time. Obviously, YMMV depending on where you live, but there could be an indicator on the phone that would let you know when the battery needed to be replaced.
  12. ONLY if they set stricter ISP service standards! by plasmacutter · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Right now, when internet goes down, even in corporate settings, it can take up to a freakin WEEK to get it back.. and that's just in every-day non-disaster type situations.

    If the phone service goes out (that's a BIG if, i've only seen it happen 3 times in my entire life) it's never down for more than 3 hours.

    Until they bring internet up to this level of reliability, I don't want to see it behind the one device in my whole house which is capable of summoning paramedics.

    --
    VLC FOR MAC IS DYING! IF YOU DEVELOP, PLEASE SAVE IT!!
  13. POTS is Powered! by mcrbids · · Score: 4, Insightful

    POTS works over low voltage DC. As I recall, it's somewhere in the vicinity of 48 volts, but don't quote me on that. It's entirely feasible to have a cheap, dedicated VOIP chip that runs on 48 volts and draws perhaps 50 to 100 miliamps of current - well within the normal range of today's POTS power draw.

    VOIP doesn't have to be VOInternet. They coul just as easily have a dedicated IP network for telephony, then run something like PPPOÈ or VPN to gateway to the public Internet and do away with separate SL MODEMs.

    You'd still probably need a long distance plan, even though the point of one is technically idiotic.

    --
    I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
    1. Re:POTS is Powered! by norminator · · Score: 2, Insightful

      If separate long distance service blows your mind, then wait 'till you hear about "local toll". That would normally be a call that's within the same state, so your LD service doesn't cover it, but it's not in your metropolitan area, so your local phone provider charges you by the minute... but usually at a higher rate than an actual long distance call.

      I remember running into that in college and being totally pissed at the phone company (Qwest). For the next few years, Qwest gave me tons more reasons to hate them. I switched to Vonage (now I'm on T-Mobile's @Home service for $10/month), and I'll never go back to crappy Qwest again.

    2. Re:POTS is Powered! by unitron · · Score: 2, Insightful

      My cell phone always works when the electricity goes out...

      ...provided that the cell phone towers near you are still powered. Most of them don't have their very own generator to keep them going after the UPS battery is dead and the power company's people are still 2 days away from getting service restored in that area because some severe weather event took out several counties worth of transmission lines and transformers.

      --

      I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.

  14. Re:So we don't anticipate any blackouts, ever? by rickb928 · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Most of Maine suffered a massive ice storm in 1998. I was without power in Souther Maine for 11 days. My sister in Coastal Maine was without power for 17 days.

    Verizon succeded in maintaining telephone service wherever there were wires up by swapping batteries in the SLCs and recharging them as needed.I wrote about this here.

    Even a VOIP system requires wiring. Battery *could* be provided, since PoE is used successfully, but frankly the telephone company is probably glad to get rid of battery. Hey, if you're devious, this would be a way to take advantage of that battery voltage, another reason for telcos to get out of the DC business. ps- If you're thinking of converting your datacenter to DC voltage, ask the telcos how large-scale DC voltage service works. pps- I wonder how hard it would be to rig a cell phone charger like that? Not too hard, I think.

    But VOIP could be supported during power outages. It would take cooperation and better hardware from the telco, and they would need to be prodded. Is the FCC considering this as a solution to lost 911 service in outages? Is the FCC considering this at all?

    Me, I think I could keep a VOIP phone going for a while with a decent UPS. A 600VA unit should do for a while. Might be a nice business to get into.

    --
    deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
  15. Re:So we don't anticipate any blackouts, ever? by ByOhTek · · Score: 4, Informative

    It doesn't specify that the IP based service has to start in home. As far as I can tell, it could be a standard RJ11/single-twisted pair to the base station where it then gets routed via IP.

    A home user wouldn't notice the difference.

    --
    Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
  16. In short? Yes by brunes69 · · Score: 2, Informative

    I have Vonage service and have an alarm system with a modem and it works fine. Vonage in fact supports up to 56K modems AFAIK.

  17. Wonder what bit rate? by chrysrobyn · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I wonder what bit rate we can push through the copper at most houses in rural America? My father-in-law's old house used to get very bad static on the line when it rained, but voice was still audible. Would this VOIP be capable of service, or does that house require new wiring? Anything requiring a lot of people to change the wires in their walls is going to face some serious problems. I bet new hardware in the field could get 64kbit or maybe 128kbit digital without much problem. If you're not worried about a computer talking on the line at the same time, that is way more than sufficient. Since the FCC solicitation seems to suggest they're using this as a way to force wider broadband deployment, 256kbit might be the minimum for a connection intended to share with a computer, although I'd hesitate to call that "broadband".

    I bet we could help with the reliability of VOIP by putting cheap NiMH batteries in each VOIP device (one per house, at the pedestal? or each device needs its own?). Enough capacity to last a few hours on standby and maybe 15 or 20 minutes of talk time would cover emergencies.

    I think it would be very interesting to be on a technical committee to write a new standard to cover bidirectional communication on low quality twisted pair. There would be interesting coupling challenges with using one wire for send and the other for receive, but using a current sense methodology on a differential signal has its own ugliness too. It would be cheating to take turns every 10-100ms using a training sequence, but there would be power and signal benefits to weigh against the increase in latency and cut in available bandwidth (and if each device gets its own CODEC, having more than 3 people on the phone may have ludicrous latencies).