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."

Interference problems...

Once again the interference point has to be brought up, the company uses 5 - 70 Mhz, which dumps inteference out on the following bands:

Several Amateur Radio bands (1.8, 3.5, 7.0, 10.0, 14.0, 18.068, 21.0, 24.9, 28.0, 50.0 Mhz)
shortwave radio (7-14 Mhz)
older cordless devices, such as phones (49 Mhz)
CB Radio (29Mhz)
Military communications (several)

And there's probably more, but i'm too lazy to dig them up...

Re:Interference problems...

the FCC will have to mandate retrofiting the powerlines with some sort of sheilding.

by the time this gets to most people, it will cost 70 bucks a month I bet.

Re:Interference problems...

Well here we go again, the same old argument : ham is old, Innurnet is shiny and better, so screw the hams. I'll sum up the arguments why hams should have their bands untouched by BPL (or any other interference for that matter):

- Hams are useful to the community : they do aviation security radio watches, can relay messages from people at sea, and are often the last communication medium when all else fail. You don't believe me and that's normal, because it's never happened to you (or me, I'm too young). But I bet resistant fighters during WW2 really did appreciate, for example.

- There are a lot of great technical advances that were made by hams, playing and experimenting on their allocated bands. To deny them the bands just so you can d/l pr0n in the middle of Alabama means to deprive the entire scientific and technical community of these discoveries.

- Hams have been using their slices of the spectrum for decades, and had to work and pay for the privilege. In short, if nothing else, I'll say we were here first, and so we do have some rights in the matter.

There are many other reasons why ham bands should be left alone, but this is /. and I don't want to bore you all.

73 de F8EJF

Re:Interference problems...

-The internet is useful to the community, and with widespread broadband, could be even more useful.

-There are lots of great technical advances made by internet users. To deprive people the bands so a tiny minority can putz around on it deprives the entire scientific and technical community of these discoveries.

-We, the people, own the spectrum, and let you use it. Your rights in the matter end at your right to vote.

There are many other reasons why ham bands should be given to more useful purposes.

Re:Interference problems...

That only implies direct interference, if you were to look at the even/odd harmonics for those frequencies then the "potential" for interference could be greater. I'm a geek and broadband kinda person, and enjoy my DSL. This might turn out to be a wonderful last mile solution, but the concern from a ham radio perspective is that if it does cause wide spread interference then there's the possiblity of impact to the emergency services provided by amateur radio. Just a thought from a "Ham"

-- w1rww

Re:Interference problems...

The electro magnetic spectrum is a natural treasure. A) its the only one we have and B) its finite - we cannot go out and get more.

the portion of the electro magnetic spectrum bpl wants to destroy is also very important because its the only section of the spectrum that bounces off the inosphere (allowing for long distance communications) and its also the part of the spectrum with the least amount of bandwidth.

Re:Interference problems...

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.

Comments?

de N5DH

Re:Interference problems...

Before they get to US airspace (12 miles) they'll be able to communicate via VHF (which has a range of 134 miles from 40k feet up).

Re:Interference problems...

For those who think HAM operators have no foundation behind their objections to BPL please visit this site [arrl.org] and see results of actual studies on interference.

There is a lot of additional issues surrounding BPL. Such as the fact that power market is regulated and comunications market is not. Utility companies are going to finance their excursion into broadband internet access out of your pocket even if you are not going to use it.

ouch

electrical internet is too dangerous for kids

Error in summary

The article says that after the first 3 months the price will be $39.95, which is about $40/month rather than $50/month.

In the projects?

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.

Yo man, here in the projects we can't even afford $10 for groceries, and yo want us to shell out $50 a month on broadband? I don think this is gunna fly, man!

Didn't we just hear about how dangerous this is?

Like how the combination of power lines and ethernet was supposed to grow cancerous tumors out of your eye sockets that develop into tentacles that molest japanese schoolgirls? I'm pretty sure there was just a story about that on slashdot just a bit ago.

Bandwidth Capping

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....

doesn't matter how

just get my packets-o-porn here fast!

Mpbs?

Mega promotional bull shit?

Won't the internet just go *down* more?

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!

Re:Won't the internet just go *down* more?

Oh, whoa is me.

Keanu is that you?

Tinfoil Hat^WSteel Helmet Time

Maybe I'm paranoid, or maybe I just read an article about certain magnetic fields damaging brain cell DNA. I don't remember though, because I just shaved with an electric razor. Damnit. Seriously, can we just get over this and invest in some Fiber to the Curb (FFTC) or Fiber to the Home (FTTH)?

Not as cool as AOL

They've been advertising some new broadband over automobile solution that looked pretty fast.

How long will it last?

Like most regular slashdotters, I've seen this come up a few times, and every time it's mentioned that Broadband over Power Lines (BPL) interferes with all kinds of radios and devices, including ham radios and military communications. My question is this: does anybody think that the military will actually let this happen? Especially given our current state of paranoia, I just can't see the FCC overruling the armed forces and saying, "Nah! Change all of your communication gear so we can speed up Billy Bob Hick's internet!"

Completely naive question...

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

Whenever I read 10 mbps

I add "...to Provider's nearest host".

In my town great most providers advertise like this. They just install ethernet lines between people's houses. And then say, 500 customers, each on 10 mbit line are all plugged into one 1mbit line connecting with the rest of the world.
Yeah, transfers like 1KB/s are quite common.

And of course....

I just moved from the very area they are test-marketing this in. Maybe it's not too late to move back...

/me calls his old boss

Power Supply NIC

So when am I going to be able to power my comptuer and get an internet connection with the same cable?

Audiophile rant

I know this is anal, but considering the lack of clear information about IP-over-powerlines, I will pose the following problem.

I am a sound freak. I replace components in store-bought devices, I spend hours adjusting proper placement of speakers and matching cable lengths to millimeter precision. Now if some big ignorant comms corporation starts pumping multi-mhz modulation on my power lines, that will most likely affect my hi-fi components due to high frequency aliasing componded by cheap cabling and long distances. Wouldn't that be VERY BAD for these multi-thousand-dollar amplifiers that rely on crystal-clean power to do their thing ? Conventional power conditioners are designed for filtering minor surges and dips in power, as well as light induced noise (interference). Now if the company injects 'noise' on purpose, with higher amplitude and reflections accumulated over hundreds of miles.. methinks it will seriously hinder the transient performance of my gear and that of many other, more wealthy and lawsuit-happy people.

Re:Audiophile rant

Well, I'm sure that the folks who sell cables for $500 a foot will come to the rescue with $15000 power filters. Nothing but the best, right?

Where is the Advanced Technology?

I'm tired of people competing for frequency bands. Where are all the super-antennae that allow you to focus in a signal that's only 0.00001 Hz different than another, different signal next to it?

Come on, technology! Figure it out! It's the 20-somethingth century for crying out loud. We should be able to have high-speed Internet connections and Morse code wonks. Why do we have to choose?

sev

I don't buy this article at all.

I work for IDACOMM [idacomm.com]. We are CURRENTLY doing testing with both Ambient (to the plug) and Amperion (wifi) and let me just say....Ambient doesn't work. The technology is just way to infant. We were lied to by their sales, president, and engineering departments about how far along their "techology trials" in New York were. We currently have about 50 people deployed on Amperion, and it works a lot better. We are working towards "to the plug" techology, but we know that it is going to be for a lot harder than these articles claim.

Also they fail to mention...

About how it has already caused 2 machines to become molten bricks of plastic. I know because I had to talk to one of the 2 customers.

Replacement list:
1. Wooden desk (burned)
2. Computer/Monitor (charred)
3. Everything that was in their office. (toasted)

The project will be beta for a long time. They just did all this because they wanted to get people talking and maybe buying stocks (which I have too much of). Why am I posting this...because when people from india show up around my cube all of a sudden, I know I am on the endangered outsource to do list.

Mpbs?

exceeding 10 Mpbs.

For when you need 10 Million PBS stations.

unfortunately Earthlink

It's a shame that this is being done with Earthlink, the company that cranks DSL and cable "inlimited users" news feed connection down to next to nothing if you dare use more that 1 gigabyte in a month.

Will 220 give me 20Mbps?

I think this came from a Scott Adams (he was the telco industry and not yet the famous comic strip writer that we know and love) book, or maybe I heard it from somewhere else but it made sense: The challenge for telco's doing HighSpeed (DSL) was that they had mastered two-way personal communication but only at very low speeds. The phone system was designed for calls averaging only 3 minutes long. The cable companies knew how to deliver media, but only in one direction.

My power company only delivers 3 things: high bills (like I will want to give them extra money), power and, my favorite, power spikes (I've gone through two coffee pots, 3 baby monitors and a dozen AC adapters for various things). Yes, the equipment is built by someone else but it will be installed and managed by people that are delivering the first and third things above. This does not have warm and fuzzy written all over it.

We'll for some, a 3rd choice will be welcomed to drive rates down. For other's at least a single choice will be welcomed. More power to them.

interference both ways

like someone else pointed out, the interference from the radiated signal will play havoc with radios, lets not forget it also goes both ways.. so being a Ham Radio operator I can only imagine that when I get on and key up with a kilowatt of SSB large sections of my neighborhood will suffer some serious packet loss :-), plus I have to wonder what my arc welder will do hehe

Security

Mhh how many informations will fly through the city on radio frequences? Isnt too easy to catch them? I mean the amount of credit card numbers flying isnt a problem as long as they are encrypted but there are still plain-text user/pass combinations, and especially e-mails are mostly sent plain-text (how many of you actually uses SSL for mails?) Maybe i didnt get exactly how it works but it looks to me pretty unsafe, i remember when i had one those little "walkie talkie", a very old one and i could catch many communications this way.

Hey!

Why does my o'scope show that all my AC power is now 10 million cycles second rather than 60?! ;-)

-psy

And another problem.

...and I'm sure this will screw up all that X10 stuff I purchased from thos pop-up ads.

Screw the traffic LED on the router, my lamps-a-blink'n.

What they're not telling about BPL

There are several factors that the BPL industry isn't mentioning:
- Even low-power, in-band transmissions can completely shut down BPL for a mile radius or more. Wonder what happens when I fire up my (FCC licensed) KW on 20 meters for a weekend-long contest?
- BPL is for overhead transmission lines. Burried lines don't have near the capacity but ARE better on interference.
- The bandwidth mentioned for BPL is STDM shared in the same way as cable modem service. YMWV
- Last, BPL operates as an unlicensed part 15 service. All part 15 users are liable to accept ANY and ALL interference from licensed services and must cease use of a part 15 device that causes interference to a licensed service. This passes ALL interference problems off to the end-user.
Turn it off NOW or go to jail...
WB1GOT

Gratuitous Technical Link

Many (international) BPL interference studies can be found on the ARRL Web site: http://www.arrl.org/tis/info/HTML/plc/

This is a Bad Thing (tm)

Great... Now when a thunderstorm makes a tree fall on a powerline, I will loose:

• Electricity
• Phone (VOIP)
• Cable TV
• Internet.

How is broadband over powerlines going to be affected by redundant power systems? My understanding is that unless you live in the sticks, there is supposed to be more than one path for electricity to reach your area...

Amperion not Ambient

I think the original post got it wrong. The Progress/Earthlink test is using Amperion not Ambient.
http://www.progress-energy.com/aboutus/n ews/articl e.asp?id=8362

Lamp-posts as antennae...

I believe this technology was first tried out right here in Manchester. Unfortunately, it was found that lamp-posts [google.co.uk] acted as very nice broadcast antennae. Now you could put RF filters on all their power connections, but how much else are you going to need to filter?

Matt...

sniffing

So, if this supposedly causes that much interference, wouldn't it be rather simple to sniff the traffic going across the wire with nothing more than an antenna, an amplifier, and whatever device they are sticking in people's homes? It's like wardriving, but with the ability to sniff a LOT more traffic.

Hmmmm

Better get a good surge protector :)

Introduced in Germany in 2001. Dead by now.

RWE, one of the big utility companies in Germany, introduced powerline internet in 2001. Read the announcement on Wired [wired.com].
From the article:

"RWE hopes to have 20,000 subscribers by July and grow that to 100,000 by the end of 2002. Beyond that, the growth potential is enormous."

Right. The last numbers were 15,000 subscribers early 2004 (compared to more than 2 million people using DSL, which by now is offered with 3Mbps).
Powerline internet had technical problems from the start on and came too late.

BPL too easy to sniff and DoS

The overwhelming problem with BPL is that not only does is radiate RF hash, but I could take a transmitter that puts out as little as 4 watts and completely disrupt a BPL signal. Other countries have tried BPL but have banned it (japan for one) because of the interference problems it produces on the HF bands.

But instead of accepting the facts, the power company is going to try it anyway because the people in charge are even more clueless than the most brain dead computer user. How long do you think the power company is going to put up with "My Internet service keeps going away!" complaints from their user base before they do the right thing and run fiber to the households.

Sure it may be fast and cheap, but it's suseptable to nearby radio transmitters and will be the most unreliable Internet connection out there. With the right radio equipment, packets could be sniffed, you could DoS the entire neighborhood with a CB radio or other low band or amateur HF transceiver. Not to mention all the RF hash that will be delivered to your house on a otherwise clean power line.

Hams: vote with your feet

If you are an amateur radio operatorand an earthlink customer, please consider switching providers to protest Earthlink's action here. Make sure they know why you are switching to a new provider.

Support L Ron Hubbard!

Earthlink is owned by Scientology.

No Luke Stewart

As long as Earthlink does not get involved with Luke Stewart and anybody else from Media Fusion of Dallas TX, this might work.

This is a scam for god's sake!

Dear Earthlink,

YHBT. YHL. HAND.

I just cannot believe this thing is still around. The only reason people started trying to use power lines for broadband in the first place was not because of the actual properties of power grid as we know it (most of the comments here talk about the obvious inefficiencies, so I won't talk about it), but a completely new theory invented by Luke Stewart who promised more than billion gigabits per second (sic) with his Media Fusion scam. I suppose Earthlink investors don't know how to use Google [google.com], so please let me quote a Wired article from 2001, by Evan Ratliff:

Luke Stewart boldly sold politicians, businesspeople, and financiers on his trillion-dollar idea: Use the electrical grid to carry data at speeds faster than we've ever seen. Never mind how.

Inventor William "Luke" Stewart is a genuine national treasure, the kind of person who comes along once, maybe twice, in a century. How do I know? Well, I heard it from business executives, congressmembers, academics, military leaders, journalists. These people met Luke Stewart, sized him up, and concluded that his scientific intellect was virtually unparalleled. His ideas, they said, could alter not only the future of the Internet but the fate of humanity itself.

But sometimes you have to go straight to the source. The real reason I know that Luke Stewart is a national treasure - and, I suspect, the reason that all those other people did, too - is that he told me so himself.

[...] The idea of sending information via the electrical grid, rather than over telephone copper or fiber-optic cable, has been around for decades. The field, known as power line communications, or PLC, is pockmarked with wasted investments and technical failures. Only within the past few months have several companies begun to deploy limited PLC ventures.

[...] Stewart, however, had a much grander vision, based on what he considered to be a dramatic discovery: Data could hitch a ride on the magnetic field created by electric currents running through power line wires. By piggybacking on this magnetic field, instead of on the electricity itself, he could obtain almost limitless speeds of transmission.

[...] Media Fusion promised to deliver, within two years, bandwidth at speeds thousands of times faster than what's possible with fiber. Stewart was company chair, while the board of directors included government heavyweights such as former Speaker of the House Robert Livingston; Terry McAullife, a leading Democratic fund-raiser and close friend of then-President Clinton; and Admiral James Carey, former chair of the Federal Maritime Commission. The firm's Web site declared that the ASCM technology would "impact every facet of our life," and the computing power of the network would be "exponentially more powerful than any supercomputer to date." [emphasis added]

[...] So Luke Stewart - self-proclaimed national treasure - carries on. Chances are, we haven't heard the last of him, [how true...] because Stewart sold his vision best to the one person who will never pull the plug: himself.

Read the whole article and Google around for more informations. It is a very interesting scam and quite a successful one at that. Maybe that's not homeopathy but it is impressive nonetheless.

Investors, repeat after me: Google [google.com] is your friend.

Some solution is REALLY needed

If BPL is going to cause too many problems then how are people who cant get dsl or cable supposed to get broadband? I'm extremely tired of 26.4kbps dialup! And no satellite is not an option it's way too expensive (and supposedly no good for mp gaming). There wouldn't be a need to try such controversial internet service techniques if someone would make something to provide rural broadband.

ok NC area hams...

Have at it! Let's find out now if there really are interference issues due to BPL. We've been bitching about BPL hosing up the airwaves for a year or so, and now it is time to put up or shut up. The FCC counts on us to be a self policing organization, and that means tracking down sources of interference. This is an excellent opportunity to do just that. In addition, if there are some issues with BPL now is the time to find them. That's what testing is all about.

--de kc2kth, 73

This may not be for real

Ambient Corporation [ambientcorp.com] seems to be more about hype than products. Their main product is a "coupler" that allows passing RF around transformers. Those have been around for years, although the Ambient one is easier to install than the usual capacitors.

Their new ideas revolve around ways to transmit data through underground power cables with multiple neutral wires. Big underground power cables are surrounded by multiple neutral wires, which has some shielding effect. The idea is to differentially drive those multiple neutral wires with RF. This is claimed to emit less external RF than driving the high voltage side of the line.

In cities with underground cable vaults, it's easier to wire fibre or coax. Either provides more bandwidth. Ambient only claims 10Mb/s, and that's per cable segment, not per end user.

This looks more like a specialized technology being overhyped than a major breakthrough.

Troublesome implementation

The way this is implemented bothers me a little bit. I could be wrong but it looks like they are just creating hot spots and using some 802.11 variant to get into the home.

I live in Raleigh and thought about getting more information until I saw this. Since they are doing it this way they can really limit how you can use the service. Most other broadband ISP's have an ethernet solution which allows you to use any of these routers that are on the market (linksys, netgear, linux using iptables, etc) but with this method you can really be screwed. First of all the can hide the WEP so that only machines that they approve of can even connect to the hot spot in the first place. So they could very easily support only Windows clients (or maybe Mac too). But Linux users would be screwed. And I have never heard of a wifi to wifi router or wifi to ethernet router so sharing inside you home without them knowing about it could be problematic. I just see all kinds of problems that this might cause.

I am all for choice but this really smells fishy to me.

--
Billwashere

Re:If there is one thing worse than Gates...

I agree 100%. When I first moved to Houston, I tried to get Earthlink DSL. I apply for the service online and confirmed my order with a person through their customer service number. I waited ... waited ... still waited. Three weeks later, when I had received no service, no modem, no nothing, I called them back and asked what the problem was. "I'm sorry, since you live in an apartment complex, you are not eligible for Earthlink DSL service." It certainly would have been nice to get that tidbit of information three weeks ago!!

And don't get me started about those commercials!! "An Earthlink address makes a good impression." My ass it does.

Re:If there is one thing worse than Gates...

if you say so. I like their service, and I have no bandwidth caps...I leave them alone and they leave me alone ;-)

Re:just one pipe

I'm hoping for power over cable line. The cable company isn't screwing me enough as it is.

Re:NC?? Why not MA!!!

Because just like DSL or cable modems, BPL requires some form of repeater every x000 feet or so along the line. So despite all the friendly talk by Big Power about how BPL will allow them to bring broadband net access to rural areas, the truth of the matter is that it won't be any more economical to roll out BPL in sparsely populated areas than it is to roll out cable or DSL. There's always satellite...