said by Floid :

* PHY to NID (to-the-premises):
It appears that U-Verse has been deployed as a patchwork of "FTTN," "FTTC," and "FTTP" approaches. Some of these acronyms expand differently in the U-Verse than elsewhere; I gather that here "P" is "Premises"; "C" I assume is "Curb"; and N... Is that 'Neighborhood' (equaling Curb) or 'NID' (equaling Premises)?
Note that the P in 'FTTP' elsewhere means, and is easily mistaken for, 'Pole,' which I guess would map to a FTTC arrangement here.

* NID to RG:
It appears that, possibly contingent on the particular flavor of deployment, the choices are the new flavor of HPNA over coax, or "UTP"/"CAT5."
To actually understand what is going on here, someone needs to elaborate on the link layer on the copper option - is that DSL, ethernet, or... potentially one or the other contingent on what type of external deployment terminates at the NID?

* RG hardware:
Concretely documenting the make and model number of the current box being shipped would be a good starting point for techies needing to confirm their suspicions re: premise wiring etc. We all expect it to be from 2Wire; being able to see which model and glance at the specs and list of its physical ports would allow for more individual research/legwork.

* RG to LAN:
If it's a 2Wire box, I gather it features wired ethernet, 802.11, and apparently HPNA-over-coax.

* STBs, DVRs, and "IPTV" in relation to LAN
Are the incoming TV stream(s) truly IP-based [at least by the time it's into the LAN past the RG] or using some other approach?
If IP, what QoS technique/technologies are being used at what layers?
Whatever protocol(s) are in use, is this bridged across all the LAN interfaces of the RG by default/ever (meaning the HPNA, ethernet, and 802.11 segments), or are there multiple segments to deal with?

A brief discussion from the perspective of a home "network administrator" trying to get a handle on QoS and bandwidth-shaping concerns (together with overall network layout -- shove everything onto one GbE switch, or plan a completely separate segment for TV?) would be appreciated. I'm still not even completely clear on whether the TV rides on the excess capacity of the link between home and VRAD or rides IP to points more distant and eats into the "High-Speed Internet" throughput when someone's viewing.

* TV on PC?
With so many triple-plays being advertised, I've lost track of whether this is even supposed to be a part of U-Verse. Is it possible, is it considered part of the service, and is it supported in any fashion for non-Windows -- *NIX/Linux/Macintosh -- users? Basically, if it's being offered, how's it being offered from the technical person-stuck-with-making-it-work standpoint?

* Voice / VoIP
I gather that, going forward, U-Verse is standardizing on VoIP for voice. What are the QoS concerns, if any? Or is QoS enforced at the RG [as [part of bridging it off to analog ports], and the only "voice" traffic ever seen on the customer's LAN will be use of "extra features" like web voicemail?

My groan from the peanut gallery is thus: A reason I've preferred "telecom" companies, including The New AT&T, compared to entrants from certain other industries (television), has been the culture of reliability, particularly concerning worst-case/emergency preparedness. As we all know, POTS, by design, is quite capable of providing a dialtone under even the most adverse circumstances... and until recently, for various reasons and coincidences, the 'telecom' approach to consumer broadband happened to be DSL, which permitted/encouraged/did-not-collide-with continued use of POTS.

Now, with U-Verse Voice, if I have this right, the customer is being asked to maintain [and put up with the beeping from] their own UPS... which is apparently a "consumer" model Belkin or similar, capable of maintaining power for a paltry four hours if no one plugged something stupid into it. I realize there must have been many reasons to "give up" and do what "everyone else" (your friends in cable) does, but my first impression remains Have you lost your minds? The VRAD must still maintain backup power, and it should be a no-brainer to provide at least POTS-style power alongside the new-school physical link -- at which point y'all could trumpet the advantages thereof.

See, this would allow the RG to [be designed to] degrade gracefully; it could be as simple as split power planes -- the high-wattage IP/router side gets the wall-wart, the POTS bridge operates independently from telco power -- or as complex as building a lithium battery right into the unit, preserving TV and Internet in a degraded "emergency" state [56kb/s is still enough to send an email or a couple "I'm alive" IMs] for as long as reasonable when wall power goes, with the POTS bridge still powered from outside when everything else is dead.

Admittedly this may increase the risk of lightning or related electrical damage to customer equipment compared to a wholly copper-free install, but there are ways to mitigate that, and it's part of what I've been paying the "real telco" premium for. If all that stands between me and outage is a low-spec Belkin (which, for all I know, it might violate the ToS to replace with something beefier)... I might as well get service from people whose concept of reliability is "at least you can catch it in reruns."
Or just give up, get naked DSL, and find the voice and entertainment services from third parties... since adding the backup power and ensuring lights-out reliability is going to fall on me, either way.

(Of course, yes, I'm welcome to pay the "real telco premium" twice to maintain a POTS line alongside U-Verse, but at that point I might as well stick to a standard DSL pairing and get the TV from a dish.)

said by Floid :

Shame the TV-on-PC option isn't available yet but hopefully that means they'll "do it right" if they ever do.

said by dougall :

Actually around 6% of AT&T territory is FTTP(orC). Many developments in the last 5-6 years (which is quite a lot of building) is fiber. Northwest Austin has something like ~150 subdivisions that are fiber fed.

said by NormanS :

FTTC != FTTP. In the former SBC regions, AFAIK, no FTTC was ever deployed, just FTTP, and that mostly in "greenfield" communities.

FTTC appears to be a uniquely Bellsouth offering; and, from what I've gleaned in the AT&T Southeast forums, AT&T has not, yet, figured out how to upgrade the FTTC hardware for Uverse. The answer seems obvious, to me; the pedestals are already within 100 feet of the premises. Just splice fiber, and run the last 100 feet, and install the ONTs. But I don't have any technical clue as to how viable that would actually be.

Can you give me examples of FTTC outside of AT&T Southeast (former Bellsouth)?

said by apeface :

Richardson Texas had FTTC.