Powerline Broadband in Hong Kong

DBordello writes "After a successful two year trial run, Hutchison Global Communications (HGC) has commercially launched a broadband over power line service in selective areas in Hong Kong. According to CNET news, the service offers 1.5 megabit per second speeds at a monthly cost of HK$138 (US$17.70), but users are forced to sign a seven month contract."

Re:Seven months?

[doubtless]

Remember that $1 US is to almost $8 HK dollars, and average earning in HK is lower than in US. Having said that, 7-mo. contract is still a pretty good deal. =)

Dum-de-dum

[Dark Lord Seth]

Remember people, 1,5 megaBIT, not byte. Stop packing your stuff and forget about the 17 bucks T1 line. 1,5 megabit / 8 = 0,1875 megabyte per second or about 192 kb/sec. In other words, below common cable internet speeds.

So either this new powerline ISP is crap, the original author typoed or my math is fucked.

Re:Broadband over power lines?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is available in Iceland.... has been for about a year now. xdsl solutions are the most popular connection yet.

Re:Seven months?

[mferrare]

I guess there's not too many Hong Kong people on at the moment.

HK Salaries vary wildly. From around $US450/month to tens of thousands of $US per month. Most of the people I know even those making $HK10k/month ($US1200/month) can still afford broadband.

Next, tax is about 17T of your income. The first $US2500 (I think) is tax free. The tax base is all income tax - no sales tax or any other taxes worth mentioning

As for broadband, well it's pretty much the standard thing here. A good example is this. I'm currently typing this to you from a 3Mbit DSL connection. I Pay $HK198 == $US25/month for it. It's an _unlimited_ connection - no download limits, no connection limits. No disconnects either. I could have chosen between 1.5, 3 or 6Mbit DSL. I also had the choice of 10Mbit xDSL. There are (at least) 3 telcos (including HGC) that provide DSL. My deal is a pretty good one for DSL. A 'standard' deal would see me paying $HK300 ($US37.50) for a 3Mbit link with only (I think) 100 hours per month. Or I could have chosen an (up to) 10Mbit cable connection from the sole cable provider in Hong Kong (iCable). They wanted $HK260/month ($US35) but it was unlimited. But if there's too many people on cable you don't get anything like the 10Mbit they advertise. Or some telcos provide 10Mbit ethernet in my apartment complex. Some of them start at around $HK48 ($US6)/month. But again you take the risk re: bandwidth sharing.

So, the bandwidth and price on offer doesn't seem too hot when you look at it in context. Also, the trial is happening in an apartment complex owned by Li Ka Shing who's the same guy that owns Hutchison. Seems logical.

Finally, Hong Kong is a small place with 6.5 million people and we quite literally live on top of each other. It's easy to roll out a cheap broadband service as a result. Infrastructure costs per person reached would be much smaller than the US or Australia (my old home).

Hope this helps.

Re:Hong Kong is a very small island...

[odaiwai]

Umm, if you'd read the article you'd've know that they're doing this in Hung Hom, which is Kowloon side and not on Hong Kong Island at all.

Still very densely populated, but, Hong Kong is not the same as Hong Kong Island.

FCC Regulations

[Cyberllama]

If I recall correctly, the technology generated too much intereference to comply with existing FCC regulations. I don't recall the specifics. . .

Re:Something different about the H.K. power system

[odaiwai]

The HK power systems is 220v, same as the UK. There is nothing special about the HK power system as opposed to the UK power system.

However, because almost everyone lives in apartment blocks of 40 stories (average), converting one single building to powerline internet at construction time can result in 200+ flats with powerline. A typical large suburban development will be 10 towers, each of forty+ stories, with 6 or more flats per floor. If you own the company which builds the flats, you can build in your other company's internet, and lock those tenants into your services. Not only do they have to buy from you, they have to pay you a monthly access fee. Also, at build time, you can lock out cable and telecoms providers, so tenants have to pay extra to have those services.

dave "and you thought it was a free economy"

Also Wrong

[Snork Asaurus]

T1 is 1.54 megabits per second up and down

At the raw electrical level, a T1's bandwidth is 1.544 Mbps period. There is no "up and down". Perhaps you meant "up plus down" which would be closer.

At the higher (e.g., protocol) levels, you can divide that 1.544 Mbps (minus overhead) any way you want between up and down, but the sum of up + down + overhead cannot exceed 1.544 Mbps for a single T1.

You can, of course, get fractional and multiple T1's, T2's (6.312 Mbps), T3's (44.736 Mbps) and T4's (274.760 Mbps). All of those are nominal speeds (there's a small +/-). In Europe, and some other places, it's E1: 2.048 Mbps, E2: 8.448 Mbps, E3: 34.368 Mbps, E4: 139.264 Mbps, E5: 565.148 Mbps, all nominally.

The foregoing is a tremendously simplified representation, but you get the picture.