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Daily news and top headlines for broadband communications engineering and design professionals
Stepping boldly into the digital future
March 31, 1996 7:00 pm | by Roger Brown | CommentsWith two years and $150 million invested in a state-of-the-art facility, Tele-Communications Inc. is finally poised to enter the digital age later this year when its Headend In The Sky (HITS) facility begins beaming digitally compressed video to headends around the country. Instantly, the advent of digitally compressed video channels can transform a run-of-the-mill, 36-channel cable system into...
Advances spell end to net bottlenecks
March 31, 1996 7:00 pm | by Fred Dawson | CommentsMajor advances toward commercialization of cutting edge switching, optoelectronic and millimeter wave technologies are opening the way to an explosion in broadband services to the business community in '97. At the switching level, manufacturers have begun incorporating newly standardized capabilities into ATM equipment, enabling carriers to move the technology into the core of the telecommunica...
Commercial availability and patents
March 31, 1996 7:00 pm | by Jeffrey Krauss, Set-Top Boxer and President of Telecommunications and Technology Policy | CommentsOne company that is headquartered in Richmond is Circuit City, a company that wants to sell cable boxes in its stores. Get the connection? If this section means what I think it means, and what Circuit City wants it to mean, it creates a direct conflict with the nation's patent laws. Let's look at the new law, and you'll see what I mean.
Options abound for broadband network powering
February 29, 1996 7:00 pm | by Roger Brown | CommentsJust like the networks themselves, traditional thinking about powering options is undergoing a major revolution. As recently as a few years ago, there was one accepted network power design; today, there are numerous trade-offs to consider. For example, MSOs are already transitioning from 60-volt AC power to 90 volts to give them more "reach" with power.
Power (and telecom) to the people
February 29, 1996 7:00 pm | by Tom Robinson | CommentsFor many across this country, power to the people has meant the provision of public power. In fact, there are over 2,000 public power systems in operation today. Because some of these are currently expanding, modifying or upgrading their infrastructures to provide telecommunications services, and many more are taking a hard look at such developments, one day soon, public telecommunications in s...
Inside wiring - The next FCC attack
February 29, 1996 7:00 pm | by Jeffrey Krauss, Wiring Wizard and President of Telecommunications and Technology Policy | CommentsPart 68 Part 68 of the FCC Rules contains detailed technical rules that were adopted to limit hazardous voltages that might be produced by customer-owned telephones, in order to protect the health and safety of telephone company employees. But it was quickly expanded at the request of telephone companies to prevent customers from bypassing the telephone network billing systems.
Money talks, but how fast can it speak?
February 29, 1996 7:00 pm | by Roger Brown | CommentsCEOs of every major communications and hardware company were seemingly elated at the news. It is perhaps ironic now to realize that although the new law allows cable TV companies to get into the telephony business and telcos to offer video, neither scenario is immediately likely, except perhaps in some select markets.
Cable on track to get what it wants in data
February 29, 1996 7:00 pm | by Fred Dawson | CommentsWhat would have seemed a dream list of capabilities for high-speed modem and data support systems just six months ago is now within reach for commercial rollouts this year. "We're much further along then I'd hoped to be at this point in the process," says Richard Green, president of Cable Television Laboratories, in reference to the industry's push for agreement on protocols.
How Time Warner is winning over Rochester with telephony
February 29, 1996 7:00 pm | by Roger Brown | CommentsWith the passage last month of the telecom reform bill, many are now predicting all-out war between cable MSOs, long distance carriers, local exchange carriers and every other communications provider as they skirmish to beat one another at their own game. In fact, battlelines are beginning to take shape in several locations, especially between the telcos themselves.
Cable modem mania is beginning to build
February 29, 1996 7:00 pm | by Thomas W. Carhart, Product Marketing Manager, Motorola Cable Data Products; and Raja Natarajan, Principal Staff Engineer, Motorola Multimedia Group | CommentsBroadband data services have recently received a lot of well-deserved attention from the media and cable system operators. These novel data services provide extremely high-speed and cost-effective access to the Internet and other electronic services to residential and commercial subscribers. They create new value for cable system operators by capitalizing on cable systems' most unique asset...
Access charges for the Internet
January 31, 1996 7:00 pm | by Jeffrey Krauss, Perpetrator of Techno-Babble and President of Telecommunications and Technology Policy | CommentsThe last time the FCC wanted to impose access charges on "enhanced service vendors" like packet data networks and data retrieval services, it encountered a firestorm of grassroots opposition and threats from Congress. The FCC backed down. Now, an FCC staffer has been quoted as saying that this time, Internet users could be hit with this tax.
Hazards of retail set-top sales
January 31, 1996 7:00 pm | by Walt Ciciora | CommentsThe topic covered here is the hazards of retail sale of set-top boxes. Congressman Bliley has put forth an amendment requiring the sale of set-top boxes from consumer electronics retailers such as Circuit City, one of his constituents. As I mentioned in a previous column, the consumer electronics industry has positioned set-top boxes as evil things, the work of the devil.
'Manageable' fear a handy safety tool
January 31, 1996 7:00 pm | by Michael Lafferty | CommentsAs fiber optics continues to spread throughout broadband communication plants, and new fiber equipment is beginning to feature higher power outputs, many safety and training professionals in the industry are re-energizing their fiber optic training efforts. Kevin Wilkes, director of field services for Integration Technologies, says that while fiber optic technology continues to change, fiber op...
Seems like deja vu all over again
January 31, 1996 7:00 pm | by Roger Brown | CommentsThis isn't the first time that in-home cabling issues have risen to the top of the priority list. For years, the industry has been trying to deal with substandard in-home wiring and connectors that are typically installed by do-it-yourselfers. Often, the equipment used comes from retail hardware and electronics stores and is of poor quality, with little or no shielding.
Filling the potholes on the road to digital
January 31, 1996 7:00 pm | by Fred Dawson | CommentsThe past year saw many gains in engineers' understanding of the performance parameters of hybrid fiber/coaxial networks, but the technical cost/benefit equation that is the key to the digital future remains nearly as elusive as ever. "The key pacing item is our ability to upgrade our networks," says David Woodrow, senior vice president for broadband services at Cox Communications.
