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Broadband over power lines alive and kicking.

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ShaolinTiger
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PostPosted: Sat Sep 21, 2002 10:42 pm    Post subject: Broadband over power lines alive and kicking. Reply with quote

I think this is a great idea as what do we all have? Power cables..

Anyway here's the news:

Remember the idea of using power cables as a medium to transmit high-speed Internet traffic?

The concept was all the rage in the late 1990s but then high-profile suppliers, such as Nortel/Norweb, Siemens and more recently RWE, pulled out the market citing regulatory issues and slow sales. As a result, ADSL cemented its position as the primary means to deliver broadband to consumers.

However the technology hasn't gone away; far from it.

A meeting of Plcforum, an industry group of suppliers and technology vendors to the industry, held in Edinburgh, Scotland last weekend reaffirmed their commitment to develop Power Line Communications (PLC) as a competitive broadband access and in-home LAN technology.

The Plcforum General Assembly meeting was hosted by Scottish & Southern Energy (SSE), which is currently trialling a commercial PLC system in Scotland supported by funding from DTI (Department of Trade and Industry) and the Scottish Executive.

It's hoped that the technology offers an economicall viable way of deploying broadband services in rural Scotland.

According to Antony Lole, a Telecom Infrastructure Manager at SSE, the trial is still in its early stages, with just a dozen or so customers connected in the Crieff and Campbeltown areas of Perthshire. However results so far are encouraging, and guinea pigs are seeing good throughputs, in some cases getting a symmetric connection delivering speeds in excess of 1Mbps.

"We're learning how to tweak the equipment to get throughput up and noise down," Lole told us.

The outcome of the trails, still at an early stage, will help SSE decide whether to make the service available commercially.

Elsewhere in Europe, particular in Germany, power utilities are further ahead in rolling out Net over power line services. Leading supplier include EnBW in Germany and Endesa in Spain.

Currently, there are more than 60 PLC sites in the world with thousands of paying customers connected, operating "without disturbing security services or any other broadcasting services", the Plcforum notes.

That last remark is telling because Norweb/Nortel decision to pull out of the powerline market in 1999 was made against the backdrop of fears that the technology could drown out other radio traffic and interfere with civil aviation and emergency service transmissions.

SSE's Lole said regulatory issues still exist but equipment has become "quieter" and lessons have been learned about how to install the equipment so it is less noisy.

During recent years, PLC technology has improved, and has reached "industrial maturity" as an alternative broadband access technology, according to the Plcforum. Current generations of power line technology can provide broadband access at speeds of up to 45Mbps. ®

Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/22/27221.html
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Ignition
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PostPosted: Thu Nov 07, 2002 12:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

In countries with somewhat more widespread fibre to door access, they actually piggyback some of the fibre to the power cables, saving having to dig as much and greatly reducing the cost of FTTD deployment.

Maybe at some point a bright spark in Britain will do the same?

Wow a flying pig just passed my window! Wink
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Mathis
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PostPosted: Thu Nov 07, 2002 12:36 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Energis already do this.
Their ATM fibre network run's over the power lines but you have to access it via a Leased line to a POP.
I think that the company planning to do broadband over the power cables has something to do with them, so we may see this in the near future if energis ever sort themselves out.
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Chozen1
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PostPosted: Thu Nov 07, 2002 5:30 pm    Post subject: hey all Reply with quote

Hi All,

Funny enough, I remember this well, I was working for Nortel at the time. I was on a College sponsorship deal and we all went working for Nortel in Wakefield and Harlow.

The emergency services excuss was the main reason as it would cause electromagnetic compatibility problems with stuff leaking out of the wires and interfering with other communications, as well as security issues on Streetlights.

H4X0rs - They r everywhere!

Wink

Chozen1
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hads
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PostPosted: Fri Nov 08, 2002 1:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

lol

I'm off to h4X0r a streetlight.
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second_coming
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PostPosted: Thu Nov 21, 2002 1:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

.. now wouldn't it be great if every streetlight was a wireless access point Very Happy
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