Understanding broadband speeds on fixed networks
Filed under: ADSL, broadband, networks, technology
It’s fair to say that many of us would find it difficult to live without broadband connections nowadays.
As a network engineer I have seen internet technology evolve in leaps and bounds over the past years. While networks get smarter and faster, there are some factors that may influence the general customer experience that are useful to know and I’d like to share them with you.
Fixed, or wireline, networks operate over copper or fibre cables that are either laid underground or aerially across telegraph poles in some areas.
In all cases, on the ADSL, ADSL2+ or BigPond Cable broadband networks, the customer’s equipment is a key factor affecting the speeds they will experience with their service.
- The specifications and configuration of a customer’s PC and modem will affect connection speeds.
The customer’s location is also a key factor in the speeds that they will experience in all cases.
- With a terrestrial technology such as ADSL, the speeds will vary based on the customer’s distance from the exchange, the type and length of the copper cable connecting the customer to the exchange, and prevailing line noise (signal interference) conditions at the time.
- For the ADSL2+ product, availability also depends on whether the customer’s exchange is enabled with ADSL2+ technology.
- BigPond Cable capability is only available in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide, Gold Coast and Perth, and the service speeds may vary between cities based on Telstra’s roll-out plans.
- For example, the BigPond Cable Extreme® product can provide maximum download speeds up to 17Mbps in Brisbane, Adelaide, Gold Coast and Perth, and maximum download speeds up to 30Mbps in Sydney and Melbourne only.
There are a number of other factors that affect speed:
- The number of people using a network at the one time and what they are doing on the network and the source of their content, especially when it is content sourced beyond Telstra’s network. For example, downloading movies will use more bandwidth than sending emails.
- Factors outside the Telstra network, such as content server delays.
- The source of the data being downloaded can also affect download speeds. For example, data being downloaded from international websites must travel a lot further and through many more network elements than data being downloaded from websites in Australia.
Note: ‘Mbps’ means megabits per second.
Next week, my Telstra Wireless colleague will write about the factors that affect our wireless networks, such as the Next G™ network. In the meantime, I’d like to hear your views and opinion on this story, or feel free to delve into some of the content at Whirlpool’s network forum.
I live in a rural area on forty acres, namely Tunba Court. Cooroy Mountain. From time to time I attempt to upgrade to ADSL+2 but always informed that my local exchange is not equipped. That is, until a couple of months ago ,I received congratulations and information that I was now connected. But I discovered that this was not so.
Another strange circumstance occurs with my download speeds,
as a dedicated Linux user my download speeds reach into the 800s, but with my occasional use of WinXP between 1.5 and 70.
Why?.
Best Wishes : Stan Lawson ( a dedicated Telstra user)
Hi Michael,
I’d like to take this opportunity to introduce myself and ask a few questions if i may.
My name is Karl Tait and I’m a concerned Telstra employee. I currently extend Telstra HFC network on a commercial basis to MDU in Sydney and I’m concerned about the governments proposed ledgislation,Given that Telstra may have to divest it’s intrests in Foxtel and the HFC network.
1/Could Telstra HFC network provide up to 1GBPS download speeds like Portugal’s Zon Multimedia cable company?.
http://www.telecompaper.com/news/article.aspx?cid=684849
2/Will Telstra rollout HFC 100mbps to all other HFC metro area’s?.
3/Could Commscopes Bright path technology be utisled to upgrade HFC to FTTP?.
http://www.commscope.com/broadband/eng/solutions/fttx/index.html
4/Why is a FTTP network considered a better network than a HFC network?.
5/ Does VOIP currently meet the USO?.
Thanks and Regards Karl
As I don’t watch much tv, I would love to be able to download movies in an impulsive flash but my ADSL connection inhibits me from instant satisfaction as it takes HOURS, not seconds, hence, I don’t bother. So, I have to live with the postal service via bigpond movies, which is better than actually having to take the dog all the way to the store. But we are in the 21st century, aren’t we?
As a shareholder/customer, when will I be able to achieve my aim?
I use bigpond broadband ADSL 256/1500 I pay $69.00 per month for this service & aon a busy usage month I would only use no more than 5Gb. I believe that it would be better for Telstra to offer a plan that is cheaper for people such as myself or at least reduce the cost so that Telstra is competative, I hear a lot of comment from friends & colleagues who say thet Telstra is to expensive for fixed broadband.
I also use when I travel pre paid broadband using the 3G network, I believe that there should be a long life option on pre paid broadband as there is with Telstra’s pre-paid mobile phone service.
When, will Brisbane customers who have broadband cable extreme get maximum speeds up to 30mbs like Sydney and Melbourne?
I am in metro Brisbane and I have broadband cable extreme. This is what happens everytime my cable goes down. I ring Bigpond tech support and I get through to a tech in the Phillipines. They go through their standard checks on my computer and the modem and find nothing wrong. Their computer tells them there are no outages in my area. OK now’s it’s time to handball the problem so they offer to send out a technician to my house. I am informed that I will have to pay if the tech deems my computer to be the fault. In the beginning I used to arrange for a tech to come out, now I just wait a few hours or sometimes the next day and the cable connection just comes back by itself. It gets fixed by another tech somewhere else. Every time it happens the problem is simply that the cable is down somewhere in my area but the information that the tech has about outages in my area is not accurate, so they offer to arrange a tech. Why isn’t the information that these guys get about outages more up to date and accurate?
If we get as really fast Adsl service, lets say 20MB/s our little plans will be used up in no time at all.
Imagine the NBN service, if they really want speeds up to 100MB/s that might be for local DNS sites, but the Telstra ifrastructure surely won’t be able to match these speeds.
has Telstra provided gateways that will cater for these speeds?
Also how will this compete on the limited bandwidth available on existing routes from Australia to the world.
As a loyal Telstra “Bigpond” customer since 2004 I started with a dialup connection. For over two years now I’ve had ADSL at 256/64 kbps. I read the information about, “factors that affect speed”. From my research into ISP Internet plans, in Australia, it seems a very expensive undertaking to go into a higher “speed” plan. I contrast this to friends / aquaintances, and colleagues in the U.S., Europe, and Asia who enjoy almost unlimited download quota’s, i.e. Usage, and speeds in the; “Note: ‘Mbps’ means megabits per second.” range . I find simply that we are very under provided for in comparison to the other users of The World Wide Web (WWW) . Understandably we have a very large area to cover in comparison to small European and Asian countries with high density populations, and small areas to service . The U.S. does have a very large area to cover and ISP’s provide high speed connections with large Usage quota’s . Basically I’m outlining that if I have to pay by the MegaByte for a faster connection, any plan as far as I’ve seen will cost me a lot of money. I presently use the Bigpond Liberty plan which offers 12 GB’s of usage, at the aforementioned speed. I can’t see cable and optic fibre infrastructure being built any time soon to the satisfaction of the general user, and suspect we will be a WiFi nation. Affordability is paramount to Australia being a useful part of the Internet, and the higher range software mainly in MultiMedia, and basic communications, and Business.
Will there come a time when these issues are resolved, as I predict we are looking at a ten year wait before affordable high speed Broadband is a service similar to that in most other countries in the world who are offering fair dinkum deals to their customers, not these shackled 400 MB usage at per megabyte charges for a decent speed. I consider 256/64 kbps as a joke. FTP is useless with such an upload speed, and 256 kbps is barely enough to browse Online without too much delay . A lot of issues: and as an Australian I’m embarrassed as I do know we have a terribly expensive and slow general range of plans for the large amount of users struggling to stay online .
My main point would be that $60 per month is a reasonable price for a Broadband Internet connection, looking overseas as a guide, however I see we’d need to spend more like $300 per month to enjoy speeds in the ‘Mbps’ Broadband range, as general users worlwide enjoy . What is being done to let Australians join the rest of the world with the functionality they enjoy online ? Will the answer be a WiFi network ?
My primary access to the Internet at home is provided by Telstra BigPond Cable. I also use HSDPA wireless from Virgin Broadband (Sorry, telstra, yours is just too expensive and Virgin don’t charge me $250/GB if I go over my allowance).
From a quality of service and stability point of view my cable connection is second to none. Very occasionally (perhaps two or three times a year) something goes wrong for a few hours. Other than that it is virtually perfect. “Always on” is most definitely the way to go.
In my opinion, “always on” is the key enabler of most of the benefit promised by the “NBN”. Given suitable upgrades I believe the Telstra cable network could easily provide (for domestic users at least) the vast majority of the productivity benefits being promised of the NBN. And it allready passes several million homes.
I live on the Gold Coast where we enjoy a maximum of 17 Mb per second down and 250 kb per second up. Although it frustrates me when I think about the extra download speed that similar users get in Sydney and Melbourne get for the same cost that I pay, my main complaint is about upload speeds. 256 KB/S just isn’t enough.
There are very few occasions indeed when I need faster downloads. It really doesn’t make much difference to be able to download a TV episode in six minutes instead of eight. What is frustrating however is the artificial limit of 256 kb per second upload when my peers in Sydney and Melbourne enjoy four times that (1 Mb per second).
I don’t really need faster downloads, and I suspect very few other people do either. I would really love to have faster upload speeds. At least a 1 Mb per second, but if possible 2 or 3 Mb per second. That would enable me to do really great quality videoconferencing, at the same time as uploading website updates, using VoIP for phone calls, etc.
I can’t say this enough – 256 kB per second just isn’t quite enough and as I understand it there aren’t any major technical reasons why it has to be limited to such a low value.
Give us a bit more speed now and there won’t be any rush for the NBN, at least not for many years.
There is a circumstance in which ‘the customers equipment’ is not the main determining factor in speed, and thats in the increasing number of locations where Telstra artificially constrains maximum download speed to 3 megabits per second on ‘up to 24 megabit’ services due to an apparent lack of sufficient backhaul capacity to those parts of the ADSL network.
I’m aware of people who have been subject to this ‘temporary’ issue for more than a year, and the number of people subjected to it seems to rise in nett terms by the month.
This impacts both wholesale and retail customers of Telstra ADSL ports equally.
When do you intend to devote more technical resources within Telstra to providing the speed that customer ports and modems are truly capable of, without artificially constraining that speed in this way, with no recompense to the customer for doing so?
The comments about the network by Michael Lawrey really show the state of the internet in general and where problems can start.
Everyone should read it at the start. Some issues were new to me.
Sharing resources with fly by night ISP’s who offer products like Hi-Def film downloads will be an issue if not watched. People need to understand the affect they will have on the general network. The network next has to be built to combat this problem.
Thanks Michael, keep up your work.
I refer to Simon Hacketts post above. I have just found myself to be in the situation that he describes. My internet access is provisioned by one company, who then in turn utilize a Telstra wholesale port for the user. At the start of this month I changed to a plan offering ‘up to 20MBits/sec’. Imagine my delight when my modem said that my line speed was now 16MBits/sec. This meant I could now download data at a rate of over 1MB/sec. This lasted for a couple of weeks before Telstra ‘capped’ the users on my exchange to 1.5MBits/sec. This equates to less than 10% of what I was just getting used to.
I’m not concerned that ‘we’ users have been capped. What I am concerned about is, as ‘Simon’ says above, there is no indication of if and/or when the issue of capping the ports will be removed/relaxed. This is what is so frustrating for users who are affected by this problem.
Water rationing, Petrol rationing and price hikes, sharemarket swindles, food price hikes, … we all should be aware the “NBN” has already factored in the profit margins, and the limitations of a finite Bandwidth . No one is running Australia, it’s a free for all Circus of witty rip off’s. He who laughs louder laughs longer.
@Allen Broomhead says:
“I’m not concerned that ‘we’ users have been capped.”
Are you sure ? You should get what you’ve signed a contract for and paid for shouldn’t you ? Anyone recieving a service, certainly should recieve that service, otherwise the World just stops working .
“What I am concerned about is, as ‘Simon’ says above, there is no indication of if and/or when the issue of capping the ports will be removed/relaxed.”
Sounds like large concerns that don’t concern. ???
The whole lack of transparency, has become so transparent that no one is fooling anyone. Why do we stand for such treatment ? We just give over our credit cards juggling convenience over honesty and have accounts paid by direct debit knowing too well we are being robbed, once we get around to doing some basic bookeeping. Very curious culture indeed.
Have to say Telstra are an odd bunch.
I live in the Gold Coast, I get 20mbps solid from my cable extreme plan, even though listed at 17mbps. Have to agree the upload speed is pathetic.
Coming from New Zealand, telstra cable there was 10mbps/2mbps many years back and has the option for 25mbps/2mbps if you pay more. Sure the cost is higher, because the country is much smaller and the network exists in only certain parts of the country.
But in saying this, I was surprised to move here and get 20mbps, but only 256k upload. This to me is definitely not a technical issue, it is purely implement by Telstra as a router config setting or that. I initially thought it was because in Australia Uploading is free, which in that case fair enough to limit the upload speed to limit torrent users etc. But considering it counts to your limit, I don’t see why they limit it.
Considering Australia is ranked number 2 in the Human Development Index, which is pretty impressive, the major Internet Telco seems pretty random. Even surprised me you pay for each phone call you make on the cheaper phone plans when I first looked at them.
Hey mate, got a fairly odd situation here. I’ve been with telstra for as long as i can remember (since around 1993).
When I was using ADSL1, my highest download speed was around 700 to 900KB/s. I have now been on ADSL+2 Since it was available in my area (Springwood, Blue Mountains NSW), and my download speed never gets higher than 450KB/s max.
Just wondering where all that speed went, as I thought ADSL+2 was an upgrade as opposed to a downgrade.
Any info would be much appreciated. Cheers, Thomas.
Thomas.
Unfortunately ADSL is distance dependent. At short distances, the speed can be great, but at longer distances it runs out and ADSL1 can in fact be the faster. Which appears to be the situation that you have now.
Here is a speed/distance chart that will explain the situation.
http://www.internode.on.net/residential/broadband/adsl/extreme/performance/
Simon has hit the nail on the head, Telstra is responsible for my crap speed, not my equipment!!
For 4 years I have been on a rim capped at 3MB SPEED, yet I get charged for ADSL 2+ speed, yet can never access it.
When is Telstra going to allow other ISP’s access to RIMS so they can upgrade them?? When is Telstra going to upgrade rubbish Backhauls? I DONT see Telstra doing anything to improve us poor customers stuck on RIMs!! Let other ISPS fix your RIMS, as Telstra clearly wont!
Telstra cable upload speeds outside of Sydney and Melbourne are so patheic that webcam with sound between Melb and Bris contiually breaks up on the uplink from Brisbane. Now … Telstra charges the same end user irregardless of their location for cable broadband so why should a customer outside of Melb or Syd have to pay the same and only be able to use voice to voice without video? Speed tests conducted during the conversation. Melb upload 1.9mps, Bris 0.09mps
Melb download 27mps Bris 17mps. Telstra has admitted overpriced internet plans but what about speed? In the 21st century upload is just as important as download. Perhaps Telstra is scared we might all want to use webcam VOIP rarther than their crappy copper lines.
RIM congestion is a MAJOR issue which Telstra appear happy to ignore.
We have had an open ticket with Internode since 18 January 2009 because of congestion on the Telstra RIM we are forced to use. This ticket remains open to this day and unresolved.
In March 2009 Telstra investigated and confirmed that the cause of our unusable link was congestion. In the same breath they also advised that “there are no plans to upgrade capacity on the RIM”.
Telstra refused to speak to us as we had no “direct relationship” with them and referred us back to Internode.
Telstra later advised that they would not have supplied us with an ADSL service at our address because of the congestion issue.
To test this theory, we recommissioned an old phone line, applied for Bigpond ADSL and within 5 days were provisioned with Bigpond ADSL1. So much for not supplying us with a service because of the congestion problem. This service is also on the same RIM as the Internode service and also suffers from crippling congestion and is largely unusable.
However, we now have a direct relationship with Telstra.
An email to David Thodey resulted in a CEO escalation with more investigations being carried out again with the same result. I must stress that the technical staff carrying out the investigations were fantastic and really tried to help us find a way around this ongoing problem.
The situation as it currently stands is that we have been told it will cost $160,000 to stand up another cabinet. Apparently there is a letter on the way to us from Peter Dowling explaining this. We are yet to see this letter.
I find this completely unacceptable.
I can think of no other business who will admit (in writing) that they are knowingly supplying a deficient, defective service and have no intention of fixing it. To add insult to injury, we are forced to pay full price for a known defective service.
Our situation is by no means unique. Head to whirlpool.net.au and search for the word “RIM”. The number of RIM users who are crippled daily by this oversubscribed technology blocker is astounding.
I would like to know when Telstra are going to upgrade the second rate RIM infrastructure that residents in some of the biggest growth corridors in the country are forced to use.
I am on a congested RIM at the moment – I am a Telstra customer by proxy through my ISP who utilizes Telstra wholesale to provide my service.
Most days I am lucky to get under 1000ms latency off the 2nd hop to my ISP. I would be happy with a reliable constant 1.5MBPS connection were it available but Telstra seem unable to even provide that, and you wonder why no one wants Telstra on the NBN.
Telstra seem happy to ignore this discussion just like they do their backhaul congestion issue.
I am in the process of purchasing a computer for my mother and looking for a broadband plan. Why is Telstra/Bigpond so expensive? My mother is a pensioner and is becoming increasingly housebound. She want to keep in touch with our scattered family, but also do some genealogy research. No doubt once she starts she will be using the internet a lot. But your plans are prohibitively expensive for pensioners. You recently offered me $59.95 a month to change from an AAPT plan, yet you would charge my mother $98.00 for a similar service. Why isn’t there a plan for pensioners that doesn’t leave them destitute? Why are most other providers so much less expensive?
BIGPOND and TELSTRA have a MAJOR ISSUE and that is the use of SERVICE call centre’s in the Phillipines. To start with they are VERY HARD to HEAR and UNDERSTAND. They also do not understand what you are talking about.
This must be CHANGED ASAP or you will loose MORE CUSTOMERS.
I had ADSL and a week ago had it upgraded to ADSL2. Since then I have observed noise on the corresponding phone line. It was only after some elimination testing that I found it came when the modem was on. I gave it a day or two to see if the noise went away but it did not.
Today I called BIGPOND SERVICE and I was very unhappy with the service and reply.
Very little information on how to attend to these problems except pay out for useless services calls.
They DO NOT KNOW WHAT is SERVICE. They do not know the service the PMG to Telstra gave over many years. I know because I gave it for almost 39 years where the customer came FIRST.
It appears the problem I have with noise is to do with the filter. ADSL2+ need a different filter but you have to go searching to find it out and then which one is suitable is a problem. I am going to check one out and see if it solves my problem.
I wish I was even able to get an ADSL connection. Despite ports being available in the area the fact we are located on a Pair Gain network seems to lead to no action from Telstra.
What really hurts is when you see some of the super plans for Phone, Internet & TV that are around at the moment knowing that Telstra can’t provide the service!
Give me a break Mr Michael Lawrey. This country is so far behind with the rest of the world with the internet we have here today. So many areas are on a cheap rim exchange which provides poor internet services to residents while the services providers and consumers still pay full price for sub-standard internet service that serves speeds below the plan’s maximum bandwidth and high latencies. Telstra have no interest in what the consumer wants and the future of the internet, they just build cheap rim networks in the new estates with no plans for the future to upgrade the infrastructure. I know too many people who are suffering from poor internet services in their area or don’t even have adsl available due to full ports or congested exchanges. What year is it? Seriously! What year is it? 2010! And so many people still have problems accessing a decent internet connection that is now part of our everyday lives. I honestly can’t wait for the NBN to kick in and to put Telstra out of business. I will be celebrating for months! Picku mater Telstra. Bill from Wyndham Vale Victoria.
Tom and Bill, we DO NOT want the internet service you are asking for. The likes of you wanted a different telephone service some years ago and look where we are now. The standards of some calls is very poor. You just cannot understand the weak voice on the line.
The changes you forced on TELSTRA has made the situation we have today. Telstra should of been allowed to continue and build the BEST NETWORK in the world for Australia.
Bill and Tom the NBN will not give you what you want.
Now BIGPOND needs changes. When you upgrade from ADSL to ADSL2+ there is problems but no information about it. I am doing testing and have one step(change filter on modem leg) to go in checking all possibilities. New filter on phone leg does not help.
LOL @ Grahame Barclay, you are so naive. Please do not reply to this article unless you know what you’re talking about.
Bill says “Picku mater Telstra”…lol
Bit harsh Bill (lol) and that’s coming from me – the one Vasso claimed single handedly forced the closure of NWAT, due to my Telstra bashing [sic]!
But again Bill, lol…
Bill I came from the old school where you started from the basics but with regret today a lot do not have this understanding.
I have just proved that with an upgrade to ADSL2+ you need an inline/splitter in both the modem part and phone part otherwise you will have noise on the phone line when using the internet.
TELSTRA DID NOT tell you this. WHY Michael. How many out there would have the understanding to find out that the standard ADSL modem sends out signals in the normal telephone band which will be picked up as noise on the phone when both are in use if you do not have the filter/splitter in both legs. They do not tell you that an upgrade of the inline/splitter would be required.
Bill I have just seen the results of ADSL2+ and the difference can be seen very clearly. Full screen Video of high quality. RIM’s were provided to provide a telephone service not the internet service provided by ADSL2+.
I know what I am talking about as I had almost 39 years with PMG/Telstra and provided much in Service Assurance through unique process’s, assistance and analysis. My aim was if a customer appeared to have a problem I would do whatever I could to solve it.
I also developed a process I called PREACTIVE.
Identify a future problem, clear or fix before it became active and affected the customer. It had much success.
It was NOT PROACTIVE because I found PROACTIVE FAILED to fix problems before they were active.
I have been retired for just over 6 years and from what I can see from the outside a lot needs to be done as far as Customer Service. The Customer is Number one, if you upset the customer you do not have a job.
Michael. You need staff with understanding and experience, who can work in a preactive mode. It appears the staff with this understanding have all gone. They were the ones that held everything together.
Identify all the problems like Bill’s above etc and see if solutions are available now, or what needs to be done. Identify cases where the right information is not getting out such as my case.
We need advice to customers about problems that may occur in the future and what to watch out for. Many companies try and sell VOIP and state that you can do away with your Telstra phone line. But what happens when people start getting delay in voice on calls and alarms are delayed going to the base due to internet overload!!
Everyone will BLAME TELSTRA AGAIN!!!
How many customers understand their home communications. Better still how many ones with the qualifications to do home wiring do fully understand it?
Is Telstra looking at these types of problems and preparing solutions now for the Australian Telstra customer if Telstra start using internet broadband for telephone traffic.
Australia does NOT WANT a copy of the NBN from OVERSEAS. We MUST have a NBN built for AUSTRALIAN CONDITIONS controlled from Australia nothing less and built ASAP, providing also a secure landline phone network.
lol back at you Robbie.
But I meant what I said and the company deserves it. Here is an article that people might find worth reading about:
http://www.smh.com.au/news/web/now-we-arent-talking/2007/05/14/1178995048612.html
Where abouts in Sydney is Telstra Cable actually available? It’s available in Bondi, yet not Surry Hills, which is much closer to the city!?
Though wireless broadband is quite expensive but I like mobility so I can always prefer wireless broadband.
Wireless broadband is a limited resource. Also how secure is wireless broadband. The one’s pushing wireless, do they understand the limitations.
When you are mobile wireless broadband is very useful but to place everything on wireless would be like putting everything in the one basket. This would apply to telephone lines also.
Thanks for the link Bill.
“People” did and will find it interesting. Others blinded by TLS greed, will make-up another bland excuse, typical eh?
Does anything really ever change at the Telstra blogs (apart from the name)?
The ADSL2+ product does work VERY GOOD. Watching FULL SCREEN TV is VERY GOOD. When others start to use this the load on the network will increase.
Has this been taken into account?
The Government push to separate TELSTRA will not assist.
Because these problems will not be identified early enough.
It show the people running communications for Australia TODAY DO NOT UNDERSTAND the TECHNICAL ASPECTS of it.
Do they understand what is needed to provide what customers will want now and in the future.
Australia needs better.
We do NOT want a rerun of the batts in the roof fiasco.
It appears that some want a NBN built which will be a free for all (ISP’s) to connect whatever they want to it.
A GIGANTIC STUFF UP of Australian Communications. I can already see the problems of today and see the problems of the future if we do not change.
The push for VOIP is a major concern with the major issues that it can bring. Why are these not shown!!!!!
It is a real worry that the Technical aspects of Australian Internet and Telecommunications is very much at the back of the queue whilst talks mainly of a political and monetary nature are in the fore.
Honestly I think David Thodey and the Telstra people really should be consulted rather than harassed. It’s been a long time coming getting Telstra back on its feet after previous CEO’s.
Simple issues such as the Government Internet filter system, which is apparently going ahead, show a lack of knowledge of the basics in Computer management.
We are all using “filtering” software anyway with Anti Virus/Malware software .
Tracking down rogue sites using ISP’s and shutting them down makes a lot more sense, off track I know but emotions from so many sectors show the confusion on this issue.
In fact seems open discussions are the way to go with Online security, … educate people now, … and the Government.
I agree with you Anthony about the Technical aspects. Because Telstra Technical area was at a very high standard much was let go as you stated by previous CEO’s.
We do NOT WANT the standards of calls coming from overseas call centres like India become the standard in Australia.
People in charge of communications TODAY appear to not understand standards that need to be kept. You just do not understand the other end of the call due to delay, echo, overload of the signal etc.
A lot think the Internet(NBN) is the FUTURE of communications using VOIP etc. Just wait to the major issues hit us. They will learn the limitations of mobile communications and the use of the pure internet.
They will find they
WILL NOT HAVE A SECURE TELEPHONE NETWORK.
Then we will need URGENTLY one’s like Michael to have built the secure system we need for the future, built by ones who understand the Technical issues fully.
Michael talks about the transmission speed and what can be obtained, we also need to address the ability of the network to switch all the data. With massive increase in data due to High Defintion TV downloads etc delays will occur and will need to be understood and managed. This will cause delay in voice transmission which we have not been used to before. How will the general public take to this change.
Many think the NBN will replace Telstra landlines? Do they understand all the major issues?
“”Do we keep a NATIONWIDE NETWORK for voice so that we have a secure network for voice and not just use the internet network. “”
In the next few years internet traffic will increase at a very rapid rate and we do not want cowboys connecting services to the NBN. A problem FAR WORSE than the insulation batts.
” You got to learn to walk before you can run”
[ With the NBN you got to understand all communications before you take over everything, this many new ISP's etc DO NOT UNDERSTAND ]
I see, nothing has changed.
Salami. Where have you been. A lot has changed in recent times. I saw a situation today where a line was cut due to it being installed in the wrong place over 40 years ago. Now Telstra cannot fix it straight away. WHY.
Because Telstra management retrenched too many in recent times and they think they can get away with not having them. Also what about the customers in south west NSW who have to wait till next month to have service restored( Shown in todays paper).
We have the likes of Michael working hard to improve the service we put on to the lines but what has happen to the provision of the lines!!!!!!!!
In the old Telstra urgent services were restored ASAP even through the night if called on.
The case above is a medical case where telephone line is required. .