[lug] Linux with ISDN

[Michael Deck]

At 11:09 AM 4/27/00 -0600, you wrote:

>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Chris M" <chrism at peakpeak.com>
> >
> > This is not true.  ISDN has much wider coverage, and can use repeaters to
> > extend the distance even further.  It's also more reliable and is
> > circuit-switched, not cloud-switched, which has tremendous reliability
> > implications.
> >
>
>Ok, I'm confused.  RADSL as practiced by USWorst has a range of
>15,000 line-ft, and ISDN isn't a whole lot further.  Furthermore,  ISDN is
>dramatically slower, and being circuit switched, uses more resources,
>hence the higher price.  And while repeaters aren't yet available (or
>at least widely deployed) for DSL, they are coming.  The range
>will be extended, because if it isn't the Telcos know they are going
>to get slaughtered on broadband by the CATV people.

Conjecture and generalization. If you happen to live in the right location,
you'll have people falling all over themselves to provide you service.
Otherwise, you may not have anyone interested in calling you back. In
our neighborhood, we have physical wiring for Cable and our neighbors have
CATV but there's no sign that the CATV provider wants to provide Internet.
When they do, they may place limits on the line such as not being able to
have a static IP or not being able to connect 24x7. While ISDN may be
more expensive and USWorst one of the poorest-managed companies in
Colorado, they have placed no limits on my connect time and they don't
even meter it. Indeed, they have separated the ISP from the Telco part
so I don't have to use uswest.net as my provider if I don't want to
(and I don't).


>As for qualifying the line, remember that USWorst doesn't do a line
>quality test unless you really bug them.  They look up your line in a
>database.  If you ever had a mux on your line they will claim you don't
>qualify even if you're 200' from the CO.   So you need to get a distance
>measurement first, and once you've confirmed you are within area you
>have to really bug them until they fix they fix the database.  Its a chore,
>but I get 600+Kbps and believe me, its worth it!

I'm well over 15,000 feet from the CO that serves me. I was told by USWest that
they couldn't tell me how much it would cost for ISDN until I placed my order.
Then they told me that it would be 2x normal installation and 2x normal
monthly because there would be a repeater. But when the bill finally came,
there was no 2x in it. I don't know if they overlooked it, or if they found
another technical solution or if they ate the cost of the repeater because
there were other customers needing it.

>And as for reliability, there are occaisionaly problems.  I've had to
>reset my router twice since I got it last July, and once my ISP
>(not USWorst) had to reset me.  I don't know if this is worse than
>ISDN or not.  I do know that even using an ISP other than USWorst
>it is less expensive than two pegged B-channels.

In my case, the ISDN was going down whenever there was rain or wind. Then
a couple weeks ago USWest replaced all the pedestals in my neighborhood
and since then it has been up all the time as far as I can tell.
(The current router log says it's been up for 3 days but it could be
my ISP dropped their end or there was a momentary glitch.)

As far as cost, I'm paying $74.00/month for 2 B channels but US West doesn't
meter (so pegged or not doesn't matter) and only using one of them for
Internet (costs $160/mo from my ISP for dedicated unrestricted IP address
subnet with 2 usable addresses). It's the ISP's charges that double when
you go to 2 channels, not USWest's.

Michael Deck
Cleanroom Software Engineering, Inc.   
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.lug.boulder.co.us/pipermail/lug/attachments/20000427/266dd376/attachment.html>