Date   : Sun, 18 Oct 2009 21:04:31 +0200
From   : rick@... (Rick Murray)
Subject: [OT] ADSL capabilities

Rob wrote:

> I wish we had that option; over here, we have to rent telephone
> service as well..

It saves about 16 euros a month.

Now I pay about 50 euros a month. There's 39/month for the ADSL. There's 
3/month for the Livebox (gasp! I've not taken it apart yet! [*]). Then 
there's 7/month for special call tariff.

I rather imagine your ADSL costs a bit less? :-)

Orange is THE most expensive, however I've not so much heard horror 
stories as known people with them - cases where the telco and the ISP 
blame each other for months of non-service. As we have strung cables, I 
would rather EVERYTHING be dealt with by the same organisation so it can 
only blame itself. Peace of mind.

Besides, the call tariff is quite sweet. I get an hour a month free to 
mobiles. I think this may accumulate? To a point? Not rung any mobiles 
yet. Also calls are free to many international destinations (most of the 
world except places the Americans are blowing up). Mom calls people in 
the UK from time to time. Free. I Skyped a friend a few times. Free. I 
am getting up the nerve to phone some random Japanese organisation to 
say "Konnichiwa, eigo-ga wakarimas ka?", but would really like to know 
what to say if the response is "yes". After all, "Hi, I'm calling from 
France, how's the weather?" is totally lame...


* - I'd like to see if I can improve WiFi power. Getting the WiFi 
through a two-foot-thick stone wall is challenging at times. Can anybody 
explain why the WiFi has TWO antenna leads? If I wish to replace the 
stupid little inch-long metal twig (you call THAT an antenna?!?) with 
something better, how would I go about this? There used to be a book on 
Livebox hacking, but it describes the original style which only had the 
one antenna lead.
I also note that the USB port is now a HOST port. Plugging my MP3 player 
in shows the device as connecting, but nothing appears different to the 
Livebox UI. It'd be nice to plug in some sort of USB memory device and 
run a web server to serve content from the key. There's a web server 
built in, but it's for system configuration; and again it seems like the 
USB host port is like the Ethernet port in Freesat boxes - something 
deliciously tempting for the future...


> How big a green box? Normally exchanges are fairly large - even the
> smallest village's would be about the size of a double garage.

Smaller than a wardrobe. Bigger than a teapot. But remember, it's for 
about 280 people. Say 400 if they're trying to be really optimistic.

I recall the exchange at Slindon after a tree took out out in the 1987 
not-hurricane. Credit to BT for getting the phones working THE NEXT DAY, 
plus a day where all the payphones were free. Anyway, I think/hope that 
technology has moved on since then. I think half the Slindon exchange 
was mechanical nonsense and half was a really manically heeee-heee-ha-ha 
over-the-top battery pack. I wonder if a modern digital exchange could 
put in decent performance running off a car battery during power 
outages? Not that it would make any difference to me - if the Livebox 
goes off, so does the phone.
Mmmm... I wonder if I could run it off a PP3?
<looks>
Nope, power brick is 12V at 1.5A. So it'll be either a small lead-acid 
or a bunch of D cells. I'm leaning towards a Yashua lead acid, but it 
depends if the PSU is regulated to 12V or if it is sorta 12V. It is 
chunky, so it looks like "just a transformer in a box" rather than a 
fancy switchmode.


>> lived, which makes me dubious as to whether they just said that because
>> I'm "not in a town" or if anybody actually bothered to check.
> LOL.

LOL some more, we used the number of a neighbour to check the line. He 
is about 420 metres up the line. It says he can get 18mbit. Very highly 
unlikely, I don't think there's even an 18mbit service. We don't get 
TV-over-internet, unless you could the poor quality streaming bouquet 
that Orange offers on their website. Better than nothing, but not much cop.


> It looks like the line is syncing up at around 4Mbps towards you, but
> you are being software-throttled to 1Mbps at the ISP.

Riiiight. That's kinda how I interpreted the report but didn't want to 
say it.


> It saves your ISP having to do anything but change a speed setting on
 > your account, rather than having the teleco upgrade the connection.

If that's the case, the friendly girl in the big town where I signed up 
for this stuff might be able to bash out something on her computer to 
remove the software throttle.

FWIW, I think Orange has all sorts of customers on all sorts of options. 
When I first enquired, I was told the only low-end options were 2mbit 
and 8mbit. Then I find out 2mbit was done away with and 1mbit and 8mbit 
were the options, yet I know for a fact the bar I used to go to [*] was 
on 2mbit, I measured it.
The only thing for certain is the half-megabit baby-ADSL has died a death.

* - Mick, that nice bar? New management. It's gone all "upmarket" with 
poncey food tastefully arranged on black plates. WTF? There was also a 
truckstop aways off in Bain-de-Bretagne that did good chips and now its 
a grilled-sandwich/salad bistro joint. WTF? Couple that with McDonald's 
chips becoming increasingly crap over the years, I am getting very close 
to a Denis Leary style rant on why the hell can't I get a decent plate 
of fries.
Go YouTube for Denis Leary's rant about coffee (note: much language, but 
hysterically funny) and you'll get the idea.


> Sounds normal - most modern exchange equipment spends the first couple
> of weeks or so on a new connection gradually stepping down the maximum
> sync speed and monitoring the number of errors,

Thanks for confirming. That's what I thought was going on.


> (no use packets coming through 50% faster if it has to re-send every one!)

Exactly.


> Not given those figures - you're already talking to the exchange at
> 4Mpbs or thereabouts.

Mmmm... In that case I'll print out the report and walk it into Big Town 
soon.


Best wishes,

Rick.

-- 
Rick Murray, eeePC901 & ADSL WiFI'd into it, all ETLAs!
BBC B: DNFS, 2 x 5.25" floppies, EPROM prog, Acorn TTX
E01S FileStore, A3000/A5000/RiscPC/various PCs/blahblah...