2020 - A cyberspace commodity???

[Striek]

Standard telephone wire is 24 gauge. It does carry quite a voltage on it. If you've ever been splicing wires and had the phone ring you'd remember. It gives quite a tingling sensation in your fingers. I had one poke me in the eyeball when the phone was ringing once when I was rewiring the house. Not fun. The wires already get pretty warm when you're on the phone for a while. As far as I know, telephone rings are in the 50 volt range. That's half the voltage of 12 or 14 gauge electrical wire on wires 1/10th the diameter. I don't know exactly how data rates translate into voltage, but I imagine junction boxes would heat up pretty good if we used faster rates.

Telephone wires can't really get much bigger than what we have now for the simple reason that if they did, they'd be near impossible to splice. Junction boxes have hardware in them specifically designed for 24 gauge wire. Thicker wire would mean upgrading every junction box in existence. In a lot of cases the telco doesn't even know where these are. The one for my house is in a forest in the back (it wasn't a forest when the box was placed; it grew around the box). I have to tell the Bell techs were to find it every time they come around here.

The wires are thin specifically to make them easy to splice and connect to existing hardware. I don't think it really has anything to do with older technology.

And Alexander Bell was Canadian. That would make Canadians the pioneers of phone tech, although he did most of his work in the US.

Damn traitor.

[memyshukis]

So that still leaves out the answer to the question: Is this regulation exclusive to the US?

I haven't found anything that confirms or contradicts it without doubt either way, yet.

[nihil]

This is interesting:

http://www.adsl4u.net/en/

It seems that there is a technological limit to analogue modems using the twisted pair copper phone lines, and this is around 57K

The 53K FCC regulation is actually a power limit, that happens to translate into 53K with certain modem tecnologies. The K56flex modem does not have this restriction and still complies with the regulation, so it can in theory, go a little faster.

There has been talk of lifting (raising) the regulation, presumably because there is only a very small difference between it and the technological barrier. This has been going on since 1998 AFAIK although the regulation goes back to 1976 (yes...........remember it is a power limit )

I have not found anything on other countries actually legislating, but I have been looking at modem retrictions not power ones.

The actual limit is imposed by the ISP/Telco not the modem per se. I think that the modem manufacturers have not bothered to try to squeeze the last few K out of the system, because redundancy, poor quality lines and connections and other factors make this unattainable anyway.

An example is my friend who lives about 500 yards away...........he gets around 44kbps on a good day, whilst I get 49.3

I am pretty sure that even where there is no specific legislation, the Telcos will limit the power to protect their equipment.

[memyshukis]

This thread is starting to resemble the game of 'chinese whispers', if we keep it open long enough it will be really interesting to see where it goes.

Who knows - it may eventually circle back around to the original topic lol


Nihil - your flag is the Union Jack, so is it safe to assume that that restriction is in place in the UK as well???

[nihil]

memyshukis

I am not certain, but I suspect not. There is a reason for this

Up until relatively recently, our telephone service (apart from Kingston-upon-Hull) was in "public ownership" that means it was "nationalised" or owned by the people and run by the government.

There was legislation on accountability etc, but no need for any on technical matters. Although the ownwership has since passed into the private sector, the basic management and structure are the same. Also, we have a lot of old kit here, so the company (BT) will have an incentive to protect it. What I am saying is that the restriction is effective, just not legislated............remember we do not even have a written constitution, it has just sort of "evolved".

They were badly hit by the "dot com" collapse and lost a lot of venture capital. This slowed up the spread of broadband, and they started to lose business to cable................who also provide telco services. That is why they were looking at that "redundant cable" solution that I mentioned.

It has now transpired that they have had a successful launch of broadband, and that this is supporting their traditional core telco business. They now promise to get broadband to 98% of the country by the end of this year.

Actually we are not at a tangent to the original thread, just running parallel? after all the OP's subject would require an infrastructure would it not. When you undertake a business transformation project you look at existing processes and procedures, then at where you want to be, and then at how to get there.

We are actually following a structured methodology

[memyshukis]

I actually lived in the UK and went to school there years ago - I did not know alot of what you just said ........ interesting - its so easy to assimilate everyplace with your own place

Actually we are not at a tangent to the original thread, just running parallel? after all the OP's subject would require an infrastructure would it not. When you undertake a business transformation project you look at existing processes and procedures, then at where you want to be, and then at how to get there.

We are actually following a structured methodology

I am convinced that if you got out of the securities and IT field you would make a great attorney (or barrister as you would say )