fios is sick. just got it.

The speed of light comment was kinda dumb. Electromagnetic waves DO travel the speed of light, everything on the electromagnetic spectrum travels 300,000,000 meters/sec.

But anyway

shawnaj7731 said:

Okay let me school you on some things..........

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Likewise....

It won't be long before nearly all hardwired communications will be fiber optic. You say that it's been tried, failed, and will fail again. It's not the medium that has failed, it was the implementation and ability to support that failed.

Fiber optics are cheap to make, getting cheaper everyday, and have the capability to carry and infinite amount of more information than any digitally conductive wire.

Coax for instance, has a finite capacity that it is able to accommodate. You can only vary a digital signal X number of times before the break for one signal, while another signal is sent, is too short to allow for a third (there are actually thousands of separate signals but you get the idea).

A single strand of fiber optic line can carry a much greater number of separate signals because a single message can be sent faster and allow a greater number of additional signals to be sent during the first's break.

Now consider that the intensity of each signal can be varied so that you can send multiple signals at the same time while each variance has only the signals on it's wavelength to contend with. In short, a single fiber optic strand can carry roughly 10 times the number of simultaneous signals that a copper wire can and it's roughly the thickness of a strand of hair.

Consider this when we start talking about a large group of these strands wrapped into an assembly that's the same thickness as a piece of coax cable!

The fiber optic cable that is being installed down your street today (and that has been being installed over the last 10 years or so) is able to handle more users than all of the people in Manhattan combined! The kicker is that new technologies are being developed every day that allow for further splitting of digital wavelengths in a fiber optic cable that allow an even LARGER number of simultaneous signals to be transmitted in the same cable at the same time. In essence, the cable is being exponentially "fattened" without actually varying the physical size or properties of the actual cable itself. I do not recall the exact figure in my head, but the cable ebing put into the ground now is expected to be overkill for the next 50 to 100 years. That's with population density and expected growth in the number of users that are "plugged in" factored in as well.

Now... 10 mega-bits per second (mbs) is 10 mega-bits per second, regardless of whether it comes to your house over a copper wire or a fiber optic one. If you have 10 mbs down and 2 mbs up on coax and your buddy has the same on fiber optic then throughput is throughput. The only difference you'll be able to notice at all might be in the quality of the ISP server you're talking to and it's ability to give you the necessary attention time vs. your buddy's ISP. This of course, is aside from throughput and aside from your "ping" time. An overworked server is almost always the culprit for really poor broadband connectivity.


Fail again? Companies might fail implementation is some areas but fiber optics itself, is a foregone conclusion.

FIOS , hands down better than my local cable company . Just switched a week ago . The HD picture is night and day . I got the phone,net,and HD package for less than I was paying for cable alone .

good stuff

Aliate X said:

diaf

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What is that? Die in a fire??? Not my fault you're dumb.