German Cable ISP First To Deliver 4700Mbps Internet Connection 121
Mark.JUK writes "It's enough to make grown IT workers cry. German cable operator Kabel Deutschland claims to have become the first provider to successfully achieve a real-world internet connection speed of 4700Mbps (Megabits per second) after they hooked up to a local school's test account in the city of Schwerin. The ISP, which usually delivers more modest speeds of up to 100Mbps to home subscribers, used its upgraded 862MHz network, channel bonding, and the EuroDocsis 3.0 standard to achieve the stated performance. But don't expect to get this kind of speed tomorrow; right now there's no demand for it among home users, and you probably couldn't afford the bandwidth anyway." ("No demand at its current price," at least.)
Re:Wow, I'm amazed... not. (Score:5, Insightful)
While this is nifty, Kabel Deutschland subscribers' bandwith is often shared, which means at peak time you don't even get 30 of the promised 100mbit.
Still better than what I am pulling down during peak times here in Wisconsin. I pay for 25 Mbit and the only time I ever seem to be able to get it is when I'm running Charter's speed test on their web site at the behest of the CS people when I call to complain (how convenient, am I right?). Any other time, my 25 Mbit connection tops out at 12, and that's off-peak. Between 5PM-9PM, I'm lucky to pull down 3 Mbit and usually have
The last Charter tech that came out to my house (and I have them out at least once a year for service issues) told me to my face that my node was way over-saturated (due to the high volume of apartment communities in this area, there are 300 units in my complex alone and there are a dozen complexes along this street) but Charter doesn't upgrade their shit until enough people start dropping the service to make it worth their while. I guess QoS means jack shit to them...I know, surprise, surprise. Still, it's irritating because my only other choice is shit-tier DSL and from what other residents have told me, the phone lines in this building are piss-poor, too.
God what I would give for some real competition in this area. I imagine our Charter issues would evaporate virtually overnight...
Re:depressing .. (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, almost all of the things your listed were built by our grandparents. Since our grandparents didn't build fiber-to-the-house infrastructure, apparently it is not possible for us to even attempt to do so.
And a lot of those things, such as roads, garbage service, water supply, rail, and power, were built by our governments using tax money - which is absolutely forbidden in today's climate of economic religious fundamentalism which demands that all infrastructure creation and related services must be done by entrepreneurs - who have shown they cannot do what the governments of our grandparents did for less than an infinitely growing multiple of what the grandparents paid. Governments build and maintain for the lowest possible cost for the maximum possible return, while our new privatization model demands lowest tolerable service levels for a maximum, and ever-growing per quarter, return on investment. We will never have fiber to the house - with the exception of the very wealthy, of course.