AT&T Begins Testing High-Speed Internet Over Power Lines (reuters.com)

AT&T has started trials to deliver high-speed internet over power lines. The company announced the news on Wednesday and said that trials have started in Georgia state and a non-U.S. location. Reuters reports: AT&T aims to eventually deliver speeds faster than the 1 gigabit per second consumers can currently get through fiber internet service using high-frequency airwaves that travel along power lines. While the Georgia trial is in a rural area, the service could potentially be deployed in suburbs and cities, the company said in a statement. AT&T said it had no timeline for commercial deployment and that it would look to expand trials as it develops the technology.

"We think this product is eventually one that could actually serve anywhere near a power line," said Marachel Knight, AT&T's senior vice president of wireless network architecture and design, in an interview. She added that AT&T chose an international trial location in part because the market opportunity extends beyond the United States.

Comments

Ham radio.

[Anonymous Coward]

Ham radio interference problem solved?

Or do we have to pay to fund for emergency communications now/screw Ham?

Re: Ham radio.

[bws111]

Radio is an obsolete technology? And this may surprise you, but the two ends of a ham conversation may be in different places, hundreds or thousands of miles apart as they were during the recent tragedy in Puerto Rico. The electric may not be out in both locations.

Re: Ham radio.

[rally2xs]

>The emergency communication issue is irrelevant because of mobile cell towers.

Remember Puerto Rico? No power whatever - well, almost - everything was out except for extremely limited areas with emergency generators. The American Red Cross asked the American Radio Relay League (ARRL) for help. The ARRL is ham radio. The ARRL was able to send 22 operators that went down to Puerto Rico and relayed health and welfare messages back to the USA.

Those messages came in chiefly on 7.000 - 7.300 megahertz bad, known as 40 meters. Broadband over Power Lines (BPL) of about 10 years ago would clobber the hell out of bands in this area of the spectrum. While there was no BPL or anything else in Puerto Rico to interfere, the USA hams on the other end would not be receiving these 40 meter signals with a power line going "Braaaaaappppp" in the backyard for the purpose of delivering internet signals over a power line.

This is an idea that deserved to die before it was formed. Hopefully this will be shot dead with a bazooka before anyone can deploy it.

What frequency? WIll ATT be tertiary use of freqs?

[Da w00t]

In the US, there's a swath of radio band that is reserved. First for the US government (e.g. military), then for licensed amateur radio operators. I think there's a tertiary option where if $user only uses less than some-small-number-of-miliwatts. But the higher precedence one trumps the lower ones.

If this is going to be on ham radio frequencies, hams are going to essentially be able to cite FCC regs and say "shut that shit off" due to interference. Hams are GOOD at triangulating interferance, and if they discover it's coming from *all around them* they're going to speak up *quick*.

Remember, Hams are folks who have spent their own money to get radio gear, and then use that radio gear to provide emergency communications in the event of a disaster. On 9/11 I took my handset to the local hospital in case land line phones and cell phones went down. Fortunately I wasn't needed, but ... you do not want to fuck with free emergency communications.