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Thread ID: 20910 2002-06-14 00:51:00 Is a phone a line?? Guest (0) Press F1
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54308 2002-06-14 00:51:00 As some of you are aware I have had a problem with my dial-up connection recently and have been trying to get it fixed. Things are not looking the best right now and I have had to dig into getting DSL to get any sort of useful connection speed back.

And thats when I realised that what we think of as a phoneline is in fact composed of 2 distinct and seperate pieces. I mean think about this. Every month all of us pay around $32 to Telecom for our phone service. Exactly what is it we pay for? To me it seems the cost is for rental of a wire and use of a phone system seperately. i.e. say $10 for the wire and $22 for the hardware that allows the device we call a phone to work the way it was designed to. Its hard to split the value correctly without all the facts but the idea we pay part of the charge for the wire and part for phone hardware makes sense given thats how you pay for your electricity.

So now we get to a DSL connection. $40 a month to your ISP and then 29.95 to telecom for what? The phoneline? But I pay $30 for the phoneline now! Ah but you are not paying for the phoneline you are paying for the DSL hardware. Fine I can understand that so heres what I would like to do. I will pay you the 29.95 for the DSL and say $10 for the line part of my phoneline. I do not want or need a phone thanks. Is that alright then? i.e all I want is the data connection not the phone.

Telecom: 'ha ha aha aha aha aha aha aha aha aha aha aha aha idiot!!!'

Am I an idiot??......or do they not trust me?? 		Guest (0)
54309 2002-06-14 01:20:00 Give up while your behind... and get cable ;-) Guest (0)
54310 2002-06-14 03:10:00 John

Without taking any sides, I would comment that what you want to do is utilise a network for incoming data. In order to do that the network owner must maintain that network and ensure that it meets their standards of service (granted, thats another issue).

You still require practically all the hardware except for the phone itself and there is no requirement that you rent this. The wire, PABX (where the DSL is phantomed to the line) power, accommodation, maintenance, administration etc. The DSL data utilises the base network capability as does the voice data.

Compare to DSL over the power line, even if you went to gas for all your needs (computer on gas??) the network would have to maintain everything except having to deal with volume (amps) and I dont see how you could justify less than a standard line charge.

The line charge reflects the whole asset base needed to provide the service, the actual line into your house is trivial in comparison, be it power or phone.

This is all assuming that network and traffic charges are correctly split, as network and power charges are (supposed to be) 		Guest (0)
54311 2002-06-14 05:24:00 You used to be able to rent a 'leased line' from Telecom.
That was a wire which was permanently connected between you and some other site. It was *not*1 cheap.

You *might* still be able to get one between you and your ISP. It still won't be cheap. Especially if you want DSL speed. 		Guest (0)
54312 2002-06-14 05:34:00 Hi. Having just finally finally got adsl installed at home today *YES, YES!* I feel compelled to make a response to this one - albeit a comment only... Remember that the dsl ability of a line came long after the event of a copper line that gave you telecommunications ability to speak from the comfort of your home to anywhere in the world.

Boy, I LOVE Jetstream!!! Even though my connection speed is mediocre, I get ave 4.2Mbps down - ahhhhhh :) 		Guest (0)
54313 2002-06-14 07:57:00 Alright lets for the sake of argument accept that Telecom has every right to charge me 29.95 extra for the ability to connect with DSL. So what the hell do I need an ISP for in the formula? Surely all the ISP is doing (lets forget the mailserver they provide for a moment) is issuing me with an identitiy acceptable to the Telecom system. I mean I am paying Telecom for DSL (29.95) so it must be possible for me to connect without the ISP. All I would have to do is get my own domain and then a router and a couple of servers would I not? and then I could generate my own identity just like my ISP does for me at the moment. That would save me $40 a month and as I happen to have a cisco router (2500) and 2 P2 Xeons lying around the house my personal ISP/identity establisher would cost me very little to set up.

Now surely thats fair and possible. I mean an ISP is an ISP - they all hook into what Telecom provides in the way of infrastructure in a pretty standard way. I can provide equipment to do it so can I? 		Guest (0)
54314 2002-06-14 08:20:00 Use the analogy on your electricity supplier.

You negotiate a line charge (100% fixed) with the Network, who own the lines. Fine, now you want energy down the line? You have to purchase it (bandwidth) all the way to where you want it to come from...its not a 'free resource', I recently sam a figure of $300/month for a 64kb (about 7 kB) international circuit. Then there are costs of national traffic. One of the main providers of fibre optic is a company that has no connection with Telecom or Clear, and does not sell anything but bulk bandwidth. You would have to negotiate interconects with such companies as these, with agreed bandwidth.
With the electricity analogy that would be TransPower, and then you would need agreements with the Generators, as an analogy for bandwidth.

So yes you are right, just negotiate all your bandwidth arrangements because you cannot steal that of others... then start doing the same overseas or making bilateral sharing arrangements for what you have...Ooops, now you are an ISP...its not cheap. 		Guest (0)
54315 2002-06-15 04:44:00 The deeper I dig the more I realise that I will probably never understand how Telecommunications in NZ works. What I know is nothing like what the reality is.

I have spent the last 10 hours finding and running every tool that could analyse my connection in some way. None of these tools could show anything that would be an obvious fault indicator that could be used to dig deeper (i.e. extra A.D converters in the chain etc etc).

I have spent hours reading the most arcane webpages I have ever seen. I understand now why what I see as a fault could be difficult to isolate if obscure enough.

It has become clear that telcos worldwide are rolling out tech similar to Telecom to aid the transition to pure IP networks. At some stage along the upgrade path it is inevitable modem users will start to see problems of various sorts.

Telecom is just a few years from full IP networking of the phones and I believe I may have run into a rare side effect to do with these new PCM's in the roadside cabinets and I may end up with no chance of ever seeing 53.3k again.

DSL is just to expensive at the moment and as my connection is only justified if it helps in my overall life I am considering just unhooking completely. I have been connected for quite some time and I am interested anyway to find out just how integrated the ability to get online is in my life now. I wonder if its going to be like giving up the fags?

I have prepaid my online account till Aug anyway so will not be offline immediately although I have found I spend far less time online anyway because its just so painfully slow.

I appreciate all the responses I have had re. my issue so far but I am done. Its just to difficult to fight a system as big as Telecom. 		Guest (0)
54316 2002-06-15 08:10:00 Obviously it is not as cheap as some may think to set up a telecommunications network or such companies as Telstra (Australia) and Clear (British Telecom) would have done it a long time ago with more success. Keep in mind these companies are way bigger than telecom NZ. Guest (0)
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