The story of the Broadband providers in our town.

[Technoid]

The story of the Broadband providers in our town.

Well, sometime in the dawn of broadband a tech tried to explain Internet, servers gateways, routers, switches, hubs, CAT cable, NIC’s for the "Bosses and their aids" (from now on named Gorillas and chimps) and got a total blanc stare!!!
So he tried a simpler version and still got a blanc stare

Then, he said "DUH" and told them "Okay, the magic glass cable comes from wall that connects to the magic black box and then that magic box splits the internet up into smaller magic cables that goes to every apartment in a building"

To that the Gorilla said, "uhm new cables to all apartments that will be expensive, cant we use some cables that are already there?"

The Tech sighed deeply and said that if they used a different magic box and sold other magic boxes to the tenants they could use the cable TV cables
"Good" said the Gorilla and the chimps smiled!
The Gorilla then decided that this was the best and told his chimps to go out in the world and educate all other gorillas!

Okay all this is said in a sarcastic way, but its the only way I can imagine that they have been able to get so damned locked into the "broadband can only connect to a cable TV network" idea that they cling to like a life jacket!!!!



The TV cable network in the house is incompatible with data communication.
The cable provider is not interested, so the landlord is not interested either, naturally

We have a fiber in the basement but because we aren’t the landlord the provider won’t talk to us.
And even if they’d talk, they insist on that it needs to be connected to a compatible TV cable network (coax) and then to a cable modem and lastly to our SINGLE computer.

The fact that the fiber end terminal can be connected to a computer network directly is as alien to them as Startrek and BORG cubes.

And therefore we are SOL!

We have been trying to communicate with the chimps and gorillas since last summer but sadly, I think that I after this time actually would had been able to get the idea across to a REAL gorilla or chimp

[drslump]

LOL

they are certainly gorillas and chimps.
an employee have to know how to perform his/her job but an employer only needs to know how to make proffit.

This remembers me of the spanish sci and technology minister, he said that even if Spain is high developed country, internet is not that much important so they keep the prices very high (luxury item).
I'm paying 45 eur/month for a shitty ADSL 256/128 kbps with a crapy USB modem. My ping won't go under 150ms even if I enter a server in my neightbourhood

ciao, ivan

[Wombat]

Can't you get off the USB?

[drslump]

I could go and buy myself a router-modem but the ISP won't tell me which models are "tested" to work with their service

Anyway for such a small conection speed (256/128) and taking into account that I mainly use it for browsing, spending time and money finding a router will not be worth it.

A friend of mine went for another ISP using the same network (in spain there is only a one spreaded) because they offered a router. He was completly pissed off because the router would only open ports with a known public IP but the ISP gave him a dynamic IP. When he contacted the ISP to see what was their solution to the problem they answer him that they don't offer tech support for "ports".
Right now he has the router with an "allow all" rule and using a software router/firewall

I don't understand much about WAN networks but is it normal that when pinging a computer on my neighbourhood (of the same ISP) the packets have to travel from Barcelona to Madrid (600km) and then back again to Barcelona?
If I ping to a computer in Rome for example it will go to Barcelona, Madrid, Amsterdanm, London and finally Rome

ciao, ivan

[Brian Ellis]

Ivan

Count yourself lucky. I'm stuck with 56 kbit/s copper modem. The local state-run telecomms company, which is the main ISP as well (CYTANET, not to name them) started advertising an ADSL service about 3.5 years ago. I applied. The latest forecast is that they may install it where I am before the end of 2005 In the meanwhile, I pay more for phone charges on a very crappy, unreliable all-copper system than I would for an ADSL. The frustrating thing is that CYTA (Cyprus telecommunications Authority) have an optical fibre node just 1.5 km from the house. As it is, it takes me an average of 2 - 3 tries to get a connection to the ISP servers (each time with a dial-up charge) with a reasonable chance I can get beyond that, as the interconnection between their units (gateway>DSN>mail servers) is also slow and unreliable. Other ISPs are no better, as they use the same crappy phone connections, with zero choice.

Broadband, what is this?