Bazz, Rache,

The industrial recommendation is 100/120m for CAT6 at 1GB/s. At lower speeds such as 100MB/s I have often run 250m with no problems. In the city this will allow a node to connect to about 20 houses, or even if repeaters are used the fibre node could cater for 50 houses.

Even simpler, one could re use the existing telephone wires at the local junction box as they have in the UK and got 80Mb/s for about 25% of the cost of fibre to the houses.

Then the fact that many households are migrating to wireless renders much of the NBN redundant, makes this yet another example of Labor's breathtaking incompetence and staggering waste of taxpayer's money.

It's the country as a whole, not just city's. Far to early to be talking about over budget.
How can anyone budget for houses that have not yet been built and where.
The carbon tax was a fizzer, so got to talk about something.

Come on SM,
Using CAT6 (or any twisted pair variant) to replace other copper cable is like replacing your old worn out cathode ray TV set with another brand new but slightly better cathode ray TV set.

It's OK within buildings but ridiculous to integrate it into existing worn out trunk cable infrastructure or even for the the last metres into the home. To convert a single pair of wires at the exchange into 4 pairs is not particularly efficient.

To make the vague generalisation that because "many households are migrating to wireless" is somehow a valid solution for the entire network is "yet another example" of your breathtaking, pointless and ceaseless criticism of the current government over a matter that has long since been legislated and already in progress. It's like me harping on about the unfairness of the GST or the poor economic decisions made by Peter Costello. It's all over.

I suggest you wait until there is a change of government and be prepared to defend their decisions rather than trawl over ones already made.

Rache,

Seriously you must know very little about the industry. Cat5 and Cat6 cabling accounts for over 95% of installations even today. Over 120m FO holds no advantages over copper either in speed or durability, and certainly not in cost. And in the suburbs, how many houses fall within a 100m radius 30 to 50. A repeater every 100m would cater for as many clients as FO boxes could. In the densely populated city apartments, the use of FO to apartments is idiotic.

For short distances, FO is the clunky cathode ray tube.

The only place where FO would have the advantage over copper would be in the country where blocks of land are several hectares. Which accounts for 10% of the population. However, wireless repeaters is vastly cheaper than either FO or copper here.

The carbon tax was a fizzer, so got to talk about something.

579, this type of statement is exactly why some people still support labor.

The damage is not here and now, never was going to be, it's the future that will suffer from the likes of the worlds largest carbon tax.

Somehow I think you already know that.

Now all this cat5 cat6, FO v copper is way over my head, as I am not savvy to computer talk, but, what I do know is that if you buy/live in the country, you shouldn't expect/demand super fast Internet.

What I also know is labor track record when it comes to implementation. Not the passing of legislation, but actually doing the job.

Lets face it, even the die hard, labor can do no wrong supporters like yourself, must have doubts about their ability to achieve positive outcomes by now.

Small fish mentality. You want the bush to live like hermits, no communication, one kilometer out of town.
Just as well our elected members don't think like that. Real time schooling, should be enough to see the benefits, without anything else.