AT&T's VDSL 5,000 Foot Challenge > 20-25 M down

reply to Transmaster

Re: Copper

Yes the Telco's have 1000's of miles of copper lines strung out across the country side it has poisoned their brains to improvements in their network.
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The older I get the more I prefer the company of my dogs over that of man kind.

At least Verizon is laying out the cash while it's still making it and before the cablecos steal too much market share. ATT is spending money, and not even that much less than it would spend on fiber, on a transition technology that will be obsole almost right away. We'll see whether ATT still has enough cash to spend on fiber in 5-10 years when they realize that they have no choice but to upgrade.

Look at the population served people. Or rather, look at a map. ATT is spread out throughout the Midwest to the southwest and soon to the southeast. Verizon's Customer base is much more clustered then ATT's, making FTTP much more justifiable for verizon. Whats wrong with them trying the last bit of distance to the home over copper and if it fails they go the rest of the way.

reply to Zorglub
I'm sure engineers will figure out a way to rectify the problem. FTTN is more than enough for most people right now to avoid total customer defection. Only really really techy people will switch for the higher speeds of cable. HD won't be a deciding factor as long as AT&T can push two HD streams down the pipe to accomodate two TVs which is what most people have.