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JigglyWiggly
join:2009-07-12
Pleasanton, CA

JigglyWiggly to telcodad

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Re: Dream Modem - 24x8

i wonder if there is a point to support more than 8 channels since Comcast will probably deploy fiber rather than push through the 300 mb/s barrier with coax.

AnonMan
@sct.com

AnonMan

Anon

The Comcast and fiber thing won't last. It was done as a marketing thing for now. The high install price and contract should have given that away.

99% of people can't qualify for it probably and COAX can handle much more bandwidth still. (currently is limited by the frequency range being used).

The future is all TV will go to IP and at that point the entire frequency range on COAX can be dedicated for Internet and when someone is not watching TV that idle bandwidth will be able to feed someone elses Internet or provide more bandwidth.

Works the same way hosting companies do now. They oversell because they know not 100% of customers use 100% resources.

Fiber to the home may be the future but in the US it seems most are not willing to make the change when they can keep pushing existing tech.

Phone companies will have the hard time, cable not as bad as they can do more channel bonding to gain the speed.

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MVM
join:2011-09-16
Lincroft, NJ

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to JigglyWiggly
Well, as the new DOCSIS 3.0 chipsets can support the bonding of up to 24 downstream channels, the CMTS vendors need to be able to support that too.

Also, as was stated in that Light Reading Cable article (»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable ):

And, according to this statement from Comcast spokesman Charlie Douglas, it appears that Comcast will use the fiber-based approach as a placeholder for very high-capacity residential broadband services until it makes business sense for the MSO to make significant changes to its Docsis platform:
"We've demonstrated our Docsis 3.0 infrastructure, which we currently deliver to more than 50 million homes, is capable of delivering 1 Gbps or more. While demand for faster speeds continues to grow, demand for ultrafast speed tiers (of more than 200 Mbps) is still emerging. In the near-term, until there is clear demand to modify the capacity of our existing Docsis infrastructure, we can provide our new residential Extreme 305 service by leveraging the fiber already in our network and our Metro-E product."
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to AnonMan
And possibly, maybe sometime in late 2014, we may see a new series of modems being released that incorporate the new "DOCSIS 3.1" enhancements: »DOCSIS 3.1 spec to be discussed at Cable-Tec Expo [0] comments

EDIT: Also this article on the Multichannel News site today:

CableLabs Moves Ahead On DOCSIS 3.1
By Todd Spangler, Multichannel News - October 4, 2012
»www.multichannel.com/new ··· 1/139611

EDIT2: The SCTE press release about this session: »www.scte.org/cablelabs%c ··· o%c2%ae/
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MVM

And to support these future "dream" modems, ARRIS will be showing off their new, CCAP-capable, model E6000 CMTS at this week's Cable-Tec Expo in Orlando:

Arris Unleashes a Monster CMTS
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - October 15, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable

From the article:
Arris says the decision to use the E6000 as a massively dense Docsis CMTS represents a "middle step" that addresses the near-term needs of cable operators as they continue to increase downstream capacities and bump the amount of bandwidth per subscriber by shrinking service groups.

Running the E6000 in CMTS mode will come in particularly handy when cable operators start to bond as many as 16 downstream channels, says Todd Kessler, the VP of product management for Arris's CMTS platform.
EDIT: An article on Multichannel News site about it: »www.multichannel.com/bro ··· t/139821
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MVM

ARRIS will will be displaying their new Intel Puma 6 (»newsroom.intel.com/commu ··· ble-show) based gateways at this week's Cable-Tec Expo.

From today's Light Reading Cable's cable news round-up (»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable ):
Arris Group Inc. is the latest cable modem vendor to introduce Docsis 3.0-based gateways that take advantage of the full capabilities of the Puma6, a chipset from Intel Corp. that can bond up to 24 downstream channels and produce speed bursts close to 1 Gbit/s. Arris's new line of gateways also will be outfitted with MaxLinear Corp. tuners and video-optimized Wi-Fi chips from Celeno Communications.

Arris's latest lineup, which will be on display at this week's Cable-Tec Expo in Orlando, includes two gateways that bond 24 downstreams and eight upstreams, and five models that use the Puma6's 16x4 configuration.

Other vendors are sure to follow with 24x8 D3 gear, but Hitron Technologies Inc. was the first to announce a model, and already has plans to submit its new gateway for CableLabs certification next month.
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MVM

An article about the new ARRIS gateways also on the Multichannel News site today:

Cable-Tec Expo: Arris Pushes DOCSIS Gateways Near 1-Gig Mark
Vendor to Show Off Seven Wi-Fi-Enabled Models With 16- and 24-Channel Bonding

By Todd Spangler, Multichannel News - October 16, 2012
»www.multichannel.com/bro ··· k/139834
telcodad

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MVM

This morning's session at the CTAM conference provided a bit of a sneak peek at the developing DOCSIS 3.1 specs:

Docsis 3.1 to Be Smarter, Faster & Cheaper
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - October 16, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable

RR Conductor
Ridin' the rails
Premium Member
join:2002-04-02
Redwood Valley, CA

RR Conductor

Premium Member

How much cheaper? I mean, the extreme tiers now are outrageous, what does 3.1 mean, a little less outrageous?

telcodad
MVM
join:2011-09-16
Lincroft, NJ

telcodad

MVM

Looks like Comcast will be deploying those new ARRIS E6000 CMTSs:

Comcast Cheers Arris CCAP Plan
By Todd Spangler, Multichannel News - October 16, 2012
»www.multichannel.com/blo ··· cap-plan
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MVM

CommScope is also showing-off their new CCAP-capable CMTS models at the Cable-Tec Expo:

Cable-Tec Expo: CommScope Tips CCAP Hand
Vendor Says High-Density Edge QAM Platform Beats Spec Targets

By Todd Spangler, Multichannel News - October 17, 2012
»www.multichannel.com/bro ··· d/139855
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MVM

to RR Conductor
said by RR Conductor:

How much cheaper? I mean, the extreme tiers now are outrageous, what does 3.1 mean, a little less outrageous?

At the end of that article, it says:
And 3.1 is also about the almighty dollar as broadband usage continues to climb. Getting costs down "is a key part of Docsis 3.1," said Cox Communications Inc. EVP and CTO Kevin Hart.
And one way to do that is by providing higher (competitive) speeds without spending a lot of money doing FTTH:

From:
Docsis 3.1 Will Change Cable's Data Channels
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - October 16, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable
Utilizing one of those [200MHz-wide] blocks would enable cable to produce a data path in the neighborhood of 1Gbit/s. Cable [companies could] later bond together 200MHz-wide channels together to create multi-gigabit capacities and give cable the ability to keep up with fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) speeds without having to pull fiber all the way to the home.
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MVM

FYI -Some early reports on that DOCSIS 3.1 session today at the Cable-Tec Expo:

Cable-Tec Expo: DOCSIS 3.1 to Blaze Trail Toward 10 Gig Speeds
CableLabs: Spec Won’t Require Plant Upgrades, Will Be Backward-Compatible With 3.0

By Todd Spangler, Multichannel News - October 18, 2012
»www.multichannel.com/cab ··· s/139883

and:

Diving Into Docsis 3.1
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - October 18, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable

EDIT: And also:

Cable-Tec Expo: SCTE Forms Working Group for DOCSIS 3.1
Motorola Technical Fellow Jack Moran Named Chair

By Todd Spangler, Multichannel News - October 18, 2012
»www.multichannel.com/bro ··· 1/139880

EDIT 2: And now:

Docsis 3.1 Targets 10-Gig Downstream
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - October 18, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable
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MVM

Today's news items on the new DOCSIS 3.1 spec:

Cable ops reveal game plan for DOCSIS 3.1
With FTTH threat diminished, MSOs can wring more from HFC

By Jim Barthold, FierceIPTV - October 19, 2012
»www.fierceiptv.com/story ··· 12-10-19

and:

DOCSIS 3.1: Engineers finding a way to continue using HFC
Improved technology, gateway device promise big bandwidth to home

By Jim Barthold, FierceIPTV - October 19, 2012
»www.fierceiptv.com/story ··· 12-10-19
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MVM

Well, they did say things will move faster with DOCSIS 3.1 than with 3.0:

Docsis 3.1 Set for a Spring Fling
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - October 29, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable

From the article:
The first iteration of hardware specs for Docsis 3.1 could emerge as soon as next March or April to help cable modem and cable modem termination system (CMTS) vendors get a jump on product development for the new, speedier CableLabs platform, multiple industry sources tell Light Reading Cable.
:
According to the information presented by CableLabs at this month's Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers (SCTE) Cable-Tec Expo in Orlando, the plan is to have the Docsis 3.1 specs "substantially complete in 2013," setting the stage for the first wave of Docsis 3.1 products to appear sometime in 2014.
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MVM

This item »www.lightreading.com/blo ··· d=227176 on the Light Reading Cable site concisely lists the main areas in which DOCSIS 3.1 signaling will be significantly different from earlier versions:

•Using a higher order of modulation, for greater spectral efficiency, could conceivably add at least 25 percent more capacity and up to 50 percent more over the same HFC network. Note that the proposed DVB-C2 specification in Europe has been tested to support 4096 QAM downstream within existing cable networks.

•A new modulation format, Orthogonal Frequency-Division Multiplexing (OFDM), that takes efficiency and robustness to new levels. OFDM enables sub-carriers to be squeezed directly against one another, eliminating the need to use valuable RF spectrum as guard bands. At the same time, the longer symbol durations of the sub-carriers make OFDM more capable of dealing with impulse and burst noise than are SC-QAM guard bands.

•The use of Low Density [Parity] Check (LDPC) coding to improve noise immunity by several dB over current Reed-Solomon encoding at similar channel efficiency, or to provide greater channel efficiency at the same MER (modulation error ratio).
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MVM

An article about technology developed by Javelin (f/k/a Vyyo), that can help cable companies extend their operations above the current 1GHz limit, and enable new DOCSIS 3.1 features:

Ex-Moto Execs Hope to Revive Javelin
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - December 3, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable
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MVM

Some more CCAP news today:

Cisco Extends Bridge to CCAP
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - December 12, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable
On Wednesday, the company launched two capacity-boosting cards -- the Performance Routing Engine (PRE5) and the 3-Gigabit Shared Port Adapter (3GSPA) -- made to snap into its widely deployed flagship CMTS, the uBR10K. They'll act as an intermediate step toward CCAP, an architecture meant to help cable unify all services, including video, under IP.
:
Cisco says trials are planned with "several major" cable operators in the U.S. and abroad starting in the first quarter of 2013. Cisco didn't name them, but Comcast Corp. and Time Warner Cable Inc., two of Cisco's key customers, are expected to be among the first MSOs to test and deploy CCAP.

Comcast has already issued a CCAP request for proposal (RFP) and has said it will begin some initial deployments this year. More details about that could emerge today at noon E.T. during a Light Reading Cable webinar sponsored by Cisco that will feature John Mattson, Cisco's senior director of strategic marketing, and Jorge Salinger, Comcast's VP of access architecture.
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MVM

A follow-up article to yesterday's one on Cisco's CCAP activities/strategy:

Cisco Says CCAP's Tipping Point Is 1Gbit/s
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - December 13, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable
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MVM

Comcast's CCAP Deployment Plans

Another follow-up article with Jorge Salinger's (VP of access architecture) update on Comcast's CCAP deployment plans and results from their CCAP operational-readiness test that was conducted earlier this year:

What Comcast Learned From Trying Out CCAP
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - December 14, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable
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MVM

Re: Dream Modem - 24x8

Looks like Netgear will be the first to release a 24x4 modem/gateway:

Netgear's 1-Gig Cable Gateway Breaks Through
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - December 19, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable
Netgear Inc. is the first cable modem vendor to reveal that it has obtained CableLabs certification for a modem that can bond 24 channels and get within shouting distance of a shared 1Gbit/s downstream.

Netgear said it received the CableLabs stamp for the CG4500TM, a gateway with two voice ports, integrated Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA) for wired home networking, and a dual-band 802.11n access point. The model's 24-channel downstream is paired with a four-channel upstream, the minimal upstream configuration allowed by the Docsis 3.0 specifications.

The device also uses MaxLinear Corp.'s MxL267 Full-Spectrum Capture tuner/front-end receiver.
:
A Netgear spokeswoman also confirmed that the CG4500TM is powered by the Intel Corp. Puma6 chipset, and that the product is expected to reach commercial availability in the first half of 2013.
EDIT: CED Magazine also has an article on this now:

Netgear’s new gateway garners CableLabs DOCSIS 3.0 certification
By Mike Robuck, CED Magazine - December 19, 2012
»www.cedmagazine.com/news ··· fication

EDIT2: Also, the press releases from Netgear and MaxLinear:
»www.netgear.com/about/pr ··· 012.aspx
»www.maxlinear.com/maxlin ··· -family/

SHoTTa35
@optonline.net

SHoTTa35

Anon

Guess my 8x4 Moto will be fine for now - still waiting for that 24x8 though if I were to ever buy anything newer. Hell 32/16? :P

Since I doubt my ISP is doing anything soon, I think i'm good for now. Would still love a 100Mbps and say 20Mbps up even though my 50/8 doesn't slow me down now.

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MVM
join:2011-09-16
Lincroft, NJ

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An article on the LRC site today about 4 technologies that cable companies may/will be using to extend the life and capabilities of their hybrid fiber-coax plant:

Four Ways Cable Is Saving The Coax
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - December 26, 2012
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· lr_cable
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MVM

Broadcom is now launching their new line of DOCSIS 3.0 chipsets that can bond up to 24 downstream channels, matching the capabilities of Intel's Puma 6 ones:

Broadcom Matches Intel With 1-Gig D3 Chipset
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - January 8, 2013
»www.lightreading.com/doc ··· 40145750

and

CES: Broadcom Debuts Chips for 1-Gig Cable Modems, Ultra HD Set-Tops
By Todd Spangler, Multichannel News - January 8, 2013
»www.multichannel.com/bro ··· s/141088

Chris 313
Because It's Geekier
Premium Member
join:2004-07-18
Houma, LA

Chris 313

Premium Member

Very interesting. A modem with one of these chips would do Comcast's current fiber 305 service easily.

Think this would be what they need to bring it to the masses outside of the Metro-E area?

telcodad
MVM
join:2011-09-16
Lincroft, NJ

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MVM

I don't think Comcast will ever offer 305Mbps service using DOCSIS 3.0. If they ever do offer such speeds over their HFC network, it would probably be by using equipment built to the new, currently-under-development DOCSIS 3.1 specs (see: »Re: Dream Modem - 24x8).

Also see Jeff Baumgartner's blog item today about all this:

Will Broadcom Go for More Than 1-Gig?
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - January 8, 2013
»www.lightreading.com/blo ··· 40145759

Chris 313
Because It's Geekier
Premium Member
join:2004-07-18
Houma, LA
·AT&T FTTP
·Comcast XFINITY

Chris 313

Premium Member

Yeah, I did some reading on it and you're probably right. I do find it funny though. I just got the D3 upgrade here about 3 weeks ago, after 5 years of waiting. Docsis 3.1's first products aren't due until some time next year. Wonder how long it'll take to get me that upgrade?

Keep up the goodies. I'm drooling over here.
34764170 (banned)
join:2007-09-06
Etobicoke, ON

34764170 (banned) to Chris 313

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to Chris 313
said by Chris 313:

Very interesting. A modem with one of these chips would do Comcast's current fiber 305 service easily.

Except that would require upgrades to all of the cable nodes where they would provide this service via DOCSIS. It is easier going the FTTH route for these speed tiers.
34764170

34764170 (banned) to AnonMan

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to AnonMan
said by AnonMan
99% of people can't qualify for it probably and COAX can handle much more bandwidth still. (currently is limited by the frequency range being used).
[/BQUOTE :

Unfortunately the real world comes into play. Paper specs do not do any good if it doesn't work in the real world. Cable co's need things they can implement now not things based on theory on paper.


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MVM
join:2011-09-16
Lincroft, NJ

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Re: Comcast's CCAP Deployment Plans

FYI - An update on CCAP deployment and vendors on the Light Reading Cable site today:

Sizing Up the CCAP Players
By Jeff Baumgartner, Light Reading Cable - January 23, 2013
»www.lightreading.com/hea ··· 40146837