Any old Telecom blokes out there?

It would be an interesting exercise to calculate the tonnes of copper that would be returned to the pot, if the wires were to be replaced.

There is a possibility that we have exceeded "peak copper" worldwide. Who knows - that copper might make a small but useful contribution towards the cost of the new system.

- just a thought -

The article is suggesting is that we spend $20bn on wires to bring the Internet that last mile into the home. If this was an investment like building a port or a new rail line, then I would be in favour. But it isn't.

The most likely scenario is that in low density areas we won't be using wires to transport the Internet in 10 years time. Right now Telstra is trialling using its 3G network to go that last mile or two instead of installing wire in rural areas. It isn't a bad solution, as it runs as 1.6Mbps - faster than most ADSL lines, and has voice and fax as well. Anybody can right now buy from 3 a 2Gb Internet plan for $70/mo - using 3's 3G network only.

That doesn't sound like a huge threat to the wired network, but the 4G designs are already done. As 4G networks add another factor of 10 to the speed they will be in a position to replace wire for the last mile. This must be attractive to the other Telco's around - at last something to break Telstra's last mile monopoly. I bet they are itching to pour in the $billions required to do just that - and would if it weren't for the fact that 5G designs are working their way through the standardisation processes now.

To get a return on $20bn you have to recover $1000 from every man, woman and child in the country before you start to turn a profit. If you had 20 years to do that, then perhaps. In the current environment you might be lucky and get 10.

The cost of installing FttH for new developments is actually about $3-5,000 per lot for greenfield subdivision projects. FttN looks like a practical, cost-effective solution, not an unsatisfactory 'half-way house', under those circumstances.

OC16 is right of course and I believe that the advantages of high speed
internet are grossely exagerated.
Any company who needs really high speed, eg > 10 mbits can obtain it
without going near FTTN. 99.99% of users will not notice any improvement
with say 5 or 10 Mbit.
After all if you have to wait 1 Millisecond instead of 5 Milliseconds
would you notice it. About the only ones in that 99.99% of users who
might notice are the on line gamers !
Should we spend all that just to make them happy ?

Really, lets have a real value based enquiry.
Most delay in the internet will not be overcome by speeding up the
individual uses end, but the servers to which you connect at the
other end and the network in between.

Bazz, I didn't see anywhere in OC617's post that he thought there wasn't a benefit in speeding up the last mile. What he did say was that FttH is probably the best option for new estates - something I don't disagree with. I am not sure it is relevant though as I presume none of the $20bn figure mentioned was for new estates.

As for speeding up the last mile - if you want to start shipping everything across the Internet infrastructure (voice, video, www) you need a minimum of 10Mbs to the house, preferably more. Not just to houses within 1.5Km of the exchange - 10Mbs to everyone, with QoS guarantees so the real time traffic (voice and video) will work. If you get that working there is a presumption you get a lot of other new things piggybacking on top of it that will help pay for it. That seems like a big presumption to me - but its probably worth the gamble.

Yes, getting those things to work will require bigger servers and bigger pipes to them. But the cost of putting in those servers is dwarfed by the cost of getting the 10Mbps to the house in the first place. The gamble I guess is if you organise for the 10Mbps to happen then private investment will finance infrastructure need to make use of it.

OC617 did mean there was a benifit in a speed up.
Its just that I disagree that it needs to go above one or two megabits
to the average user with FTTN. It perhaps could be pushed to five
megabits but then you are up around 30 Mhz on the copper and into a real
problem area with radiation from the telephone line and interference problems.

I don't know what maximium length of copper is intended for FTTN and
I don't know what is possible, but I would have guessed at 100 metres,
perhaps 200 metres with nicely balanced lines.
With 100 metres you get about six to eight houses.
To go to 10 Mbits and above you are up around 60 Mhz and I just don't see it working at all.
I have not seen any real info on this and I must admit to being very
sceptical.