In response to: http://www.foxnews.com/tech/2013/11/20/fcc-announces-plans-to-upgrade-century-old-phone-system/?intcmp=obnetwork http://www.fcc.gov/blog/ip-transition-starting-now It's all conjecture on my part, but I'll take a stab. Deploying a next-generation telecom infrastructure is an interesting challenge - but one that is underway as we speak. Verizon chose Fiber to the Premises (FTTP) (FiOS). AT&T chose fiber to the node (FTTN) (U-verse) and is rolling out VDSL. CenturyLink (Qwest) has also picked FTTN and is rolling out VDSL as well. These rollouts are slow moving - but will continue to use copper for the foreseeable future - FTTP is the long term future still I think - but we keep being able cram more and more data over a pair - and with pair bonding that number keeps rising. For now at least, most voice will still be served over fairly long loops from the CO - AT&T is rolling out VoIP over U-verse - Verizon is doing the same over FiOS, CenturyLink has not yet marketed VoIP to residences - but I suspect it will come in a while (when more of their footprint is covered). Fiber to the Node has the advantage of having fiber near the customer when the cost of repairing the legacy copper exceeds the cost of putting fiber in to each house. Largely, based on my research - the new VoIP circuits are often being served off TDM offices that have upgraded been to packet switching. Both Lucent and Genband offer a way to upgrade their TDM switches to a packet based core (Lucent 7ESS or 7 R/E and Genband C15 Session Controller). In short - the article was full of hyperbole - If you look at the underlying blog post - it doesn't mention the removal of copper, copper will play a big part in last mile service delivery for likely another 20-30 years - in the end is about replacing the TDM based network core with packet switching - a process that has been going on for almost 20 years at this point. With proper engineering a packet based system is every bit as (if not more) reliable as TDM based one. That said, it raises some real questions - what of universal service? How about the CLEC market - will they be granted access to the new networks which are replacing the old? Only time will tell.

The backhaul (the point between the CO and the POP) is overloaded, call and ask for a backhaul change - keep calling till you can find someone who knows what that means.

Yes, this. My argument is, it doesnt matter, sustainability and the like should be the focus. As I said to a friend "The earth will be just fine, climate change or not, us however? we are screwed" The fact that my grandchildren might not have to wear a heavy coat in Seattle in Winter, is not a bad thing.

My Job is being Outsourced.

I would check out the General Dynamics GoBook or General Dynamics GD8000. Pricey new, but reasonable used, fully ruggedized. Though I bought a Lenovo T510, and its a very very durable machine.

RAM failures are some of the hardest things to diagnose, because they do not present consistent symptoms, its not unexpected that people can/would get confused by it.