
DOCSIS 3.1 gigabit class modem goes online in Philadelphia - chejazi
http://corporate.comcast.com/comcast-voices/worlds-first-live-docsis-3-1-gigabit-class-modem-goes-online-in-philadelphia
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edude03
I hate to be negative about progress but I wish companies would stop deploying
DOCSIS and other time division multiple access strategies like that. Because
DOCSIS is TDMA based its always going to have a problem with latency jitter
and performance consistency and yet cable companies like to pretend it's the
same as active Ethernet. Comparing 1gbit cable to 1gbit Ethernet is like
comparing a dslr and a smartphone based on their megapixels.

~~~
mikhailt
Progress isn't linear, they're working on all sorts of problems and they're
not just deploying DOCSIS for the sake of it. This is the next best solution
that Comcast and other ISPs can do with the _current_ infrastructure they
have. This is the right way of approaching the problem, deploy DOCSIS 3.1 as
the next step and figure out the replacement for DOCSIS in the future.
Customers want these bandwidth right now, not later.

Also, DOCSIS 3.1 has improvements for bufferbloat issue and it would stabilize
the current latency issues. They're not ignoring it completely.

If we do what you suggest, we'd be stuck at 10mbps for a long time and
instead, we're getting 100mbps bandwidth that does work for your typical usage
of netflix, gaming, and so on in a family household. There's a limit we'll
reach very soon where no one will care about more bandwidth but they will want
rather stability/latency improvements. Data caps is the next biggest issue.

A lot of execs from DOCSIS community agrees that 3.1 is the last upgrade to
DOCSIS standard and the next replacement would be a Fiber-based one, which
will take a few decades to even figure out. I rather have DOCSIS 3.1 now and
not in 10 years because you think we should not do this.

Our US congress had the chance to fix this back in 1990s and they screwed up
with enforcing it properly. We could've had a better pure fiber-based national
build out but it didn't work out.

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datashovel
"Our US congress had the chance to fix this back in 1990s and they screwed up
with enforcing it properly. We could've had a better pure fiber-based national
build out but it didn't work out."

I'm not familiar enough with the industry to have an opinion on this, but it
sounds very odd that a private corporation is so tied to government that it
can't innovate on its own? How does this work? And how did it end up like
this? I guess what I'm after is an ELI5 on this last part of your comment :)

~~~
rayiner
Nationwide private deployment of fiber within the required parameters (i.e.
universal service, network neutrality) is impossible without government
intervention. The cost is simply too high and the created value is too hard to
monetize.

~~~
Zigurd
Google Fiber?

~~~
rayiner
Google Fiber doesn't deploy in any city that imposes build-out requirements,
which compromises the universal service constraint. Build out requirements are
also why my building and a couple of others have FIOS but nobody else does
here in Baltimore. Verizon tried to build it, but the city wouldn't let it
pick and choose which neighborhoods.

Google has also stated that Fiber is a way to shame ISP's into building fiber.
It's not clear that an independent company that didn't have synergestic
internet businesses would undertake the same capital investment.

~~~
Zigurd
Nearly every SP has made investments in "synergistic internet businesses."
They appear to expect to extract the benefits of vertical integration in those
businesses without making Google's investment in access.

Also, Google has announced the intention to bring Google Fiber to several
major cities. It's not a demo, or hobby, anymore.

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0x0
So now you can blast through your monthly bandwidth quota in mere minutes? :P

~~~
5parks
I'm sure cable execs are kicking themselves for not implementing usage-based
billing two decades ago. Nearly every other service is usage-based but no one
complains, because they've always been usage-based.

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ju-st
Competition existed in the past.

~~~
5parks
From who? Dial-up SLIP/PPP and ISDN could hardly be considered competitive
with a DOCSIS product. The market is far more competitive now, with increased
FTTP deployments and advanced wireless.

~~~
nitrogen
Before the frequencies were reallocated to mobile usage, Sprint ran a cable-
modem-over-wireless product called Broadband Direct that was pretty nice for
its time. The system had a 30+ mile range to the towers, so lots of area could
be covered with few towers.

The DSL/cable discrepancy also used to be smaller, and there were more,
smaller cable providers.

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mrbill
I've had Comcast "Business Class" service (50/10, five statics, no caps or
blocked ports) for almost five years now, after I had to move my colo box home
when the ISP it was hosted at changed owners (lost a sweet discount I was
getting as an ex-employee/consultant).

As someone who spent years in the ISP industry (at multiple companies) and
does sysadmin/networking for a living, I _never_ thought I would say "I'm
happy with Comcast" \- but I do.

Then again, I pay $150/month, quite a bit more than their normal customers...
but every time I've had any sort of issue (usually on their end) it's been
resolved rather quickly, without having to jump through hoops or go through
scripts. I was told that the Business Class techs here in Houston are the
former 3rd-tier techs for Time Warner.

It was nice, for example, when I called in to get some reverse DNS done for my
static IPs, to be talking directly to the guy who was typing them in as I
spoke to him.

At one point about six months after I got everything set up, I wasn't getting
the full upstream that I paid for - even to Comcast's own internal systems
(which eliminates the "Internet congestion" factor). After a couple of phone
calls, I woke up on a Saturday to a knock on my door. Three techs, two
supervisors. "We're not leaving until this is fixed, and we brought a
completely unlocked modem to see just what your line will handle.."

They laughed and declined to "accidentally" leave that one for my account. :)

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Ecco
Numericable has been offering 800 Mbit cable in several cities in France for
over a year now :-) Oh, and unmetered BTW :)

~~~
quicksilver03
But not IPv6, which is a shame. Can't wait for Free to get their act together
and wire my apartment to a better fiber connection.

~~~
cptskippy
Is not being IPv6 really a problem? 90% of the world isn't. Comcast has the
largest IPv6 network but it's deployment is dual stack so most everyone is
still using IPv4.

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ksec
Has anyone experience DOCSIS services where you simply can not connect / renew
IP for a few hours, and then after some reseting and messing around you will
finally get your IP again.

Another concern I had is how much more complexity DOCSIS 3.1 is adding. The
chip to decode easily get overheat. While subsequent version of the chip
controller and devices will improve, most cable provider will use the first
generation for as long as possible.

Where is G.Fast? The DSL equivalent of DOCSIS 3.1?

~~~
toupeira
> Has anyone experience DOCSIS services where you simply can not connect /
> renew IP for a few hours, and then after some reseting and messing around
> you will finally get your IP again.

Sounds like the ISP doing maintenance, had that every few weeks late at night
when I was still on cable.

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steanne
ah, THAT explains why verizon finally rolled out fios to my section of philly
in the last month or so.

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pasbesoin
So, if you want to buy your own (quality and/or to avoid their "shared/public"
wifi/phone functionality), what are the current recommendations for this speed
level? For residential? For business class?

(Is it still the Motorola line?)

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FanaHOVA
Wonder if they activated at the Comcast Building too. Looking forward to test
it out next time.

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ck2
The problem in the USA is these announcements are more geared to train
consumers to accept prices to go up even further on every tier level.

However this announcement specifically says they don't have to make any
infrastructure changes so it will be hard for them to explain price increases.

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brianwawok
How could 10x the bandwidth not require backend changes? Would need at least
10 gb to each neighborhood which I doubt they have now.

~~~
mschuster91
> Would need at least 10 gb to each neighborhood which I doubt they have now

The backend connectivity is just a matter of exchanging the coax-fibre gateway
in the roadside boxes and at the fibre terminator. No need to dig up the
streets for that, and in most cases, each roadside box is connected with
multiple fibre pairs so additional capacity can be deployed with ease.

~~~
brianwawok
Sure no one said they need to dig up the street. But they do need to make
CHANGES.

