British Telecom Plans to Ditch POTS Network 138
Samurai Cat! writes "Yahoo news has a story up regarding British Telecom's plans to scrap their traditional circuit-switched telecom network in favor of an IP-based system." Their press release has more information.
this is a dupe (Score:3, Informative)
Re:this is a dupe (Score:2)
super-DUPEr (Score:3, Informative)
Only 2 days ago!
Re:super-DUPEr (Score:5, Funny)
Re:super-DUPEr (Score:5, Funny)
Dupe of URL (Score:2, Funny)
Dupe of URL.
Dupe, dupe, dupe of URL.
Dupe, dupe, dupe of URL.
Dupe, dupe, dupe of URL.
(Think Duke of Earl)
Be nice when modding me. I know it's lame.
Re:Dupe of URL (Score:1)
H
Re:super-DUPEr (Score:1)
Re:super-DUPEr (Score:1)
Or if the editors ever, oh, I dunno... READ SLASHDOT!?
Dupes are such a simple problem... as any of us lowly readers know: we recognize them immediately, because we read
Sigh.
- Peter
Re:clone (Score:5, Funny)
Re:clone (Score:1)
Hey Pot, you're black!
Kettle [dragonflylodge.org]
Hope they're using QoS (Score:5, Insightful)
Even with QoS, ip-tel is over rated. "It should do that"... yeah, right!
Re:Hope they're using QoS (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Hope they're using QoS (Score:1)
Re:Hope they're using QoS (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Hope they're using QoS (Score:2, Insightful)
VoIP is great when things are configured correctly... problem is QoS is like a chain - one weak link in the path of a packet and the whole thing is useless. Priority queueing doesn't help much if you have serialization delays or duplex misconfigurations - there are an awful lot of components to ensuring good QoS.
Just like with network security, you don't w
Re:Hope they're using QoS (Score:2)
After all, Saddam Hussein put is entire military C3I aparatus onto his dedicated POTS telephone network. American spy planes just followed the cables... and we all know how that ended.
TCP/IP has automatic route around capability built into that layer, so why not use it? You might even get a bigger discount buying
IPv6 I hope... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:2)
The network is internal, not part of the Internet, so IPv4 should do - but the way Britain seems to change phone-numbering in order to cram a few more million phone users in...maybe IPv6 isn't that unreasonable!
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:5, Informative)
i just received the APNIC (asia pacific) address report for this week. here's a few fun numbers:
60% of the allocated ipv4 space has been allocated (yes you hear it right, 60%). that leaves us with 40% still to allocate. 40% of 32 bits. now:
2**32 = 4 294 967 296
4 294 967 296 * 0.4 = 1717986920
that's 1.7 billions address NOT ALLOCATED
but here's the kick, only 50% of that allocated 60% (30% of the total) are advertised (that means routable on the internet), which in turn mean much less than that are actually used (advertised does not mean it is in use)
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:2)
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:2)
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:2)
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:5, Informative)
That's the greatest promise of IPv6 - ISPs will no longer have to divide their customers over a couple of hundred individual address blocks spread over distant areas of the IPv4 space - it's kinda like running defrag over the address space, only that this time it won't become fragmented again after just a little extra use.
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:2)
according to ARIN, under ipv6 you can no longer get allocated addresses for your own use. unless you're a big isp (tier 1) that plan to allocate addresses yourself (and lots of them).
that means the small isp that currently has a
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:1)
Customers need to renumber when moving ISPs, but ISPs themselves get their own static space.
And renumbering for endusers isn't that complicated either - only the subnet changes, you can keep the address in the
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:2)
i currently work for an "ISP" that is too small to ever need to do sub allocations, but big enough that renumbering would involve about 2 months of work (with appropriate notifications to customers)
here's the appropriate entry in the policy:
5.1.1. Initial allocation criteria
a) be an LIR;
b) not be an end site;
c) plan to provide IPv6 connectivity to organizati
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:2)
1. ipv6 has qos built in. it will be needed for them to prioritize voice calls.
/8 will give you 16.8m possible addresses.
2. it will be much easier to subnet the network by assigning an ip address for each device and a subnet for each part of the network. assinging it in ipv4 will be much difficult. for example, a
Re:IPv6 I hope... (Score:1, Interesting)
Running out of addresses is not one of the things that is going to be a problem. The addresses used by circuit-switched digital tele
Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:2, Interesting)
1. What are the odds of this actually being pulled off?
2. How much will this effect me, a regular dialup and telephone user of British Telecom?
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:2)
The Brits are behind?
BLAME CANADA! BLAME CANADA!
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:5, Informative)
Its quite possible. Major long distance carriers already do this. There are some technical issues, but they can be addressed, and VoIP uses bandwidth way more efficiently than a circuit switched network, so long term, the cost benefits do appear to be there.
>2. How much will this effect me, a regular dialup and telephone user of British Telecom?
As a voice user, there may be initial problems with echo, garbled voice, and delay if BT doesn't do their homework. Those problems can usually be quickly alieviated in most cases by properly employing the QoS features typically provided by high end routers.
A bigger issue is high speed modem use over VoIP, particularly if low bitrate codecs are used. Its possible that they could effectively cripple dialup ISPs without affecting voice quality in any perceptable way.. I don't know how the british communications regulations work, but here in the US, telcos can (with very few exceptions) do whatever they want to the lines so long as voice quality isn't affected (although they do have to support 9600bps data rates, who wants to surf at that speed.) Hopefully, they will keep in mind modem users, but they may decide this is a good time to force customers into broadband.
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:3, Interesting)
"Force" users onto broadband? Ha! I have a few relatives in the UK who would love to get broadband, and who would pay for it if it could be got for any reasonable price, but BT has dragged their heels and imposed ridiculous trigger levels for exchanges (sometimes requiring almost as many signatures as there are households). Their recent announcement that all exchanges will be converted to support DSL is way over-due; they have dragge
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:1)
I think it only has to be 2400bps here (UK), at least thats what I remember being told and what this suggests on page 11 (pdf) [ofcom.org.uk], but I didnt read all of it
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:3, Informative)
Some comment about this, ETSI SS7 ISUP (it's probably similar in the U.S) has basically three bearer capabilities:
- Circuit switched data: bits exactly the same in both ends
- 3.1 Khz: spectrum quality in this band is not affected by transit and processing in the network.
- Speech: voice inteligibility guaranteed.
The central office asks for 3.1K when a POTS line calls and the ne
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:2)
Believe me, there isn't a *single* low bit-rate speech codec that would allow 9600 bps rate rate. The reason is simple. Low bit-rate codecs are in the order of 8000 bps, so handling 9600 bps signals would be like being able to compress any type of signal/data. That's mathematically impossible. Even then, I'd even doubt one of these codecs would even be able to carry 300 bps modem
modem speeds (Score:4, Interesting)
BT switch detects modem/fax carrier.
BT switch toggles from rather-compressed g.723 to uncompressed 64kbps g.711 . g.711 is is either aLaw or uLaw, depending on pond-sidedness, just like ISDN, and also just like things are switched "normally" today.
Modem communication happens normally; BT writes off increased bandwidth (vs. g.723 voice) by saying to themselves "Well, at least that one g.711 modem call didn't cost us any more line capacity than it did before, and we got to packet-switch it instead of channelize it. Cool."
Everyone's happy. And your modem doesn't even know the difference.
Re:modem speeds (Score:2)
BT detects modem/fax carrier after dial.
BT connects one modem from a modem pool at each side's local office.
Modem demodulates incoming data and sends it over IP (this is VoIP, after all). Modem on other end modulates IP data and sends it over a short, more reliable connection.
Data can be compressed over the IP network, and the modem gets a high-quality line to the local office instead of the longer loop to the other modem. BT has decreased bandwith use, since it's sending raw data, not encoded
Re:modem speeds (Score:2)
You're paying BT to complete a phone call for you, not act as an ISP. When I dial a modem, I want to talk to the fucking modem that I dialed, not some reasonable-facsimile-thereof. Maybe I intend to whistle a Bell 212a carrier as part of an art project and record it with my nifty voice modem, maybe I want to yell at a housemate through the modem speaker, maybe I want my credit card transaction to happen as fast as possible rather than waiting for two handshakes to complete instead of ju
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:1)
if the gain increase does nothing we offer the customer an engineer out to check the line from the pole to their house, their sockets, junctionboxes and the rest
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:4, Informative)
VoIP isn't as exotic as people may think--you've been using it for several years on most long-distance calls for at least part of the circuit. And all of this traffic is H.323 and not SIP.
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:1)
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Ignoring the fact that this is a dupe... (Score:5, Informative)
It shouldn't be that difficult. BT's telephone network is based on System X (and it's competitor System Y). The national network is completely digital. Each customer line would be analog (unless you have ISDN) until the local exchange, where the signal would be converted into 64 Kbits digital. Advances in technology allowed a single circuit board (A4 sized) to handle up to 4 customer lines, so the entire telephone exchange for a small village could be inside a shed. BT would probably start with upgrading the national network, then do a local exchange trial in London, and then roll out across the country.
2. How much will this effect me, a regular dialup and telephone user of British Telecom?
You probably wouldn't notice anything. For each exchange, they would do a gradual switch over. They'd start by adding the new links using IP packets, test them, then allow customer calls to use them, and finally disable the old system.
Fresh Meat! (Score:5, Funny)
Bring it on, BT! The power of a national telephone monopoly is insignificant compared to the power of the Slashdot effect!
Re:Fresh Meat! (Score:2)
Re:Fresh Meat! (Score:2)
And in America... (Score:2, Funny)
self-mod: -2 for flamebait, +2 anti-M$, result mod=0
Re:And in America... (Score:2)
cereal box (Score:5, Funny)
yeah, it's a dupe. (Score:2, Informative)
unfortunately they will not be moving already laid lines to fiber for any time in the forseeable future.
Re:yeah, it's a dupe. (Score:1)
Re:yeah, it's a dupe. (Score:2)
Re:Good idea but (Score:1)
That will be difficult. As another poster pointed out, this will be a private IP network disconnected from the Internet.
What would the virus infect? Aside from some network management workstations (typically running some flavour of *NIX), almost all of the equipment on the network will be either dedicated VOIP hardware or routers,
Re:Good idea but (Score:1)
Every time I see this I read it as (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Every time I see this I read it as (Score:2)
The funny thing is we DID just see this and read it.
Re:Every time I see this I read it as (Score:1)
Good.. (Score:1)
POTS or......POTUS? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:POTS or......POTUS? (Score:2)
(And I'm not referring to POTS.)
Re:POTS or......POTUS? (Score:1)
POTUS = President Of The United States
I learned this from the first episode of "The West Wing." Is this common knowledge outside of that show?
Re:POTS or......POTUS? (Score:2)
Holy Shit Batman (Score:1)
If the exchanges are going to be rebuilt then.. (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:If the exchanges are going to be rebuilt then.. (Score:1)
And even when they where funded by our taxes, they still wouldn't give us a decent service. Granted, it was better, but still not any good.
Re:If the exchanges are going to be rebuilt then.. (Score:2)
Actually that would work for the trains too: "Hey bitches, you best be fixin up them rails good, you think yo got an easy ride just because you're private? fuck that hoe, you still working for queen and country and you best buck up your ideas and stop slacking! else ER gonna come round and b
Break-up of ATT (Score:1, Interesting)
our Telco industry has ground to a halt.
I'm glad at least some country is reaping the benefits of technology.
Re: Break-up of AT&T (Score:2)
Here are some counter-examples to your claim:
Re: Break-up of AT&T (Score:1)
1. Cellphones, the US cellphone technology lags the rest of the world by 5-10 years.
2. Widely-available DSL?, only in Urban and some suburban areas. Other technologies exist with better range.
3. Collect calls without human-operator assistance.
Okay.
4. Modem speeds? When was the last time they changed 10 years ago?
Prior to the break of AT&T they had proposed a nationwide rollout of Fiber, think where we would be with that.
Yes, but ... (Score:1)
I was simply pointing out that innovation has occured since the breakup.
As to your particular points:
Cellphones did not exist prior to the breakup, IIRC.
Neither did DSL (or, if it did, it was not available to individuals. I don't think that even the now-largely-obsolete ISDN was available to ordinary households).
Modem speeds at the time of the breakup (in the late '70s/early '80s, much more than 10 years ago)
Damn tokers (Score:2, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
new recording... (Score:2, Funny)
Even worse if you were calling 911 or 999 or similar number...
on an aside if you want to know the emergency numbers for different countries check out:
http://www.911dispatch.com/web_graphic/graphic1
nice graphic shows emergency numbers from around the world.
BT = British Telecom (Score:1)
Its probably just me tho =).
Re:BT = British Telecom (Score:1)
Re:BT = British Telecom (Score:2)
I thought ICT changed its name to ICL in the late 1960's
I think they're trying to avoid using the name (Score:2)
Re:I think they're trying to avoid using the name (Score:2)
ping (Score:1)
Re:ping (Score:1)
actually sorta on-topic... ok, it's a stretch (Score:5, Funny)
He climbed a nearby telephone pole, hooked in his test set, and dialed the subscriber's house. The phone didn't ring right away, but then the dog moaned loudly and the telephone began to ring.
Climbing down from the pole, the telephone repairman found:
1. The dog was tied to the telephone system's ground wire via a steel chain and collar.
2. The wire connection to the ground rod was loose.
3. The dog was receiving 90 volts of signaling current when the phone number was called.
4. After a couple of such jolts, the dog would start moaning and then urinate on himself and the ground.
5. The wet ground would complete the circuit, thus causing the phone to ring.
Re:actually sorta on-topic... ok, it's a stretch (Score:2)
Yeah, I know. What a spoilsport.
Re:actually sorta on-topic... ok, it's a stretch (Score:2)
Re:actually sorta on-topic... ok, it's a stretch (Score:2)
Lifeline POTS (Score:4, Insightful)
I live in a rural area where the power co-op often doesn't know about outages until someone reports them. I'm at the end of a line, and I've had outages that have only affected me.
It's also nice to know that in an emergency, someone can come into my house and make an emergency call. It's also nice to know that I could probably make a call from another farmhouse too.
Cell phone coverage is awful here. We have three competiting technologies with very few towers each. Hooray for lack of standards in rual America! Thankfully we do have 1 MBit "Reach" (Paradyne Hotwire MVL) SDSL!
Now, I don't mind if telcos upgrade their aging first-generation DS1 and DS3 gear for the longhaul trunks. But where I live that's already been done. Lots of fibre connecting the hick towns, gotta love RTC grants!
-1, Try Harder (Score:1, Troll)
That's a pathetic attempt at a troll, maybe you should take a nap, have a meal, and try again. You'll get it eventually.
Re:Lifeline POTS (Score:2)
Insider corrections (Score:2, Insightful)
The links in question are completely internal within the PSTN, and the change will be invisible to ordinary home or business subscribers - the same provision for the last mile to subscribers (POTS, Centrex, CAS or ISDN T1/E1, whatever) will remain in service fo
So why VoIP? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:So why VoIP? (Score:2)
Dammit (Score:2)
Telcos and Broadband (Score:1)
Since we are discussing BT
what is the situation in worldwide,as in US,Canada,Japan,S Korea and Europe.What are the usual charges per month and how good is the service?
What's BT doing with there current network.. (Score:2)
Naturally it would be more efficient to off-load that data onto the internet before routing it accross there networks, definately could be a plus for P2P applications if they started using hop-count as a way of discriminating against peers, but the removal of low latancy circuit switched technology might cause more pro
Re:Duh-dupe, duh-dupe, duh-dupe-duh-dupe-duh-dupe! (Score:1, Funny)
Am I the only one to see the irony?