Last Mile Access Technologies

Rumesh Eranga Hapuarachchi

rehrumesh@hotmail.com

Overview

• Introduction

• Current technologies

• Future technologies

• Applications

Last Mile

• Known as the physical connection from your internet service provider to your home.

• Local Area Network

• First Mile

• Local Loop

Techniques

• Four main groups

• Copper wire based networks

• Cable TV networks

• Wireless networks

• Other types of physical access networks

Copper Wire Technologies

• Dial Up

• ISDN

• xDSL

Dial Up

• Connections through analogue modems

• Uses the “voice band”; 300-3400 Hz

• Primarily used for point to point connections

• V.90 – 56 kbit/s downstream - 33.6 kbit/s upstream

• Due to signal-to-noise ratio no analogue modem can be faster than V.34

• Pros• Economical (given some premises

• Mobile

• Cons• Not economical

• Transient

ISDN

ISDN

• Integrated Services Digital Network

• No analogue signals – pure digital

• Transmission of voice and/or data with better speed and quality

• More infrastructure need

• ISDN has two types of channels• B-channel (Bearer)

• D-channel (Delta)

• SDN has two basic types of service• Basic Rate Interface (BRI)

Two 64kbit/s B-channels & one 16kbit/s D-channel

• Primary Rate Interface (PRI)30 B-channels & 1 64kbit/s D-channel

xDSL

• Digital Subscriber Line

• Capable of speeds ranging from 128 Kbit/s to 24 000 Kbit/s

• The last mile of PSTN

• Initially designed to carry POTS voice communication

• Capable of carrying frequencies well beyond..

xDSL

xDSL at the receiver side

xDSL

Cable TV

• The idea is to use pre-installed cables that are not used to their full capacity for internet access.

Cable TVPros & Cons

• Pros• Large bandwidth/high quality cables

• Pre-built infrastructure

• Cons• Users over a large area share bandwidth

• Shared line = privacy/security issues

• Available to non-TV subscriber

Wireless

• WiMax (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access)

• Standardsbased wireless technology

• High-troughput connections over long distances

• Last mile connections or hotspots etcetera

• GPRS

• UMTS• One of the 3G mobile phone technologies

• Supports up to 1 920 Kbit/s data transfers

• FON• Martin Varsavsky

• Aims to provide a worldwide standard for WiFi sharing

• Special FON routers (firmware)

Other BPL

• Broadband Power Line

• The major problem with this technique is that power lines are unshielded

• They pick-up high-frequency noise and similarly interfere with radio signals nearby

• Slow

• Low cost

• Widely spread infrastructure.

Other

• Some other technologies include:

• Fibre + LAN (Á la Bredbandsbolaget)

• Satellite

• Fibre to the home (FTTH/FTTP)

Future

• Interconnections

• Fiber for speed

• How to use old cables and trenches

• Wire lesser

• Higher demand for mobility

Wireless technology instead of traditional last mile copper

* Integration of the third world

* Cheap technology fast

• Important steps for better integration

Summery

• Pros & cons of the different technologies

• Dial-up

• ISDN

• xDSL

• Cable

• Wireless

• Far-out stuff

References

• Wikipedia. “Last Mile” wikipedia.com [Online]. Available :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_mile

• Linctionaryt . “TIA/EIA Structured Cabling Standards” linktionary.com

[Online]. Available : http://www.linktionary.com/t/tia_cabling.html

• Margaret Rouse (2005, Apr. 1). “last-mile technology”. Tech Target [Online].

Available: http://searchnetworking.techtarget.com/definition/last-mile-

technology