Verizon DSL → Anyone on an Rt and get >3 Mbps?

Just wondering if Verizon lets anyone out of an RT be provisioned at anything higher than 3 Mbps down. All the people I know who have DSL from an RT can't get anything higher than 3M/768k.

I'm on an old RT which allows for 7.1Mbps, and I currently have 5Mbps off of it. I don't recall what Verizon's specific requirements are, but in my case there is an OC3 Fiber circuit connected to the RT and it happens to be a Litespan 2000.

To get more than 3Mbps from Verizon on DSL you really have to bug them and be on the right equipment. It too me quite some time of beating around the barrel until someone in Verizon reached out to me concerning >3Mbps speeds for my specific, already capable RT.

If you've seen my other post ("DSLAM build location"), Verizon is currently working on deploying DSL to my area. Work just started, they installed new telephone poles and put up a new line on them, and there's a cement pad where the equipment will go. We will never have cable available here so I'm just hoping that it might end up being something more than 3M for the rest of eternity.

We will be the last house on the loop after the new installation. I'm about 1.5 or so "driving" miles from where the RT will be - I'd suspect the actual loop length is a little but less than that.

Bet on 3Mbps. It's a sad reality, but unless they run Fiber (i really hope they do or did) you're likely going to get just enough connectivity to the DSLAM to support 1 or 2 3Mbps circuits running full bore 24/7. Frontier Communications, while not Verizon does something similar when they extend DSL out to many places. They install pole-mount DSLAMs or very small cabinet-based DSLAMs which will be fed by up to several T1s (1.5Mbps/1.5Mbps per T1).

I posted a picture if that thread of coiled wires hanging on the pole. Any way to tell if it's fiber or copper? (I know that fiber is supposed to have orange markers on it when it's on the pole?)

Very hard to tell based on those pictures. You would either have to look at the cable through the end or see if there are any markers on it which make the cable telltale as Fiber. Normally, Fiber is coiled up to preserve the cable integrity, and to act as slack while on the poles, but that could just as easily be copper. Depending on how big the cable is, 6 pairs looks generous for that size.

If you come across any Verizon techs in your area, you might be best asking them what's up at that location. You may or may not get an answer.

I drive by daily in hopes to catch someone working, but I always manage to miss them!

Our DSL is supposed to be available by 10/25/14, according to the state law about broadband deployment. I hope it's sooner!

Same here, on an rt. it's a long story. But similar to Smith6612. I really had to bug VZ allot. I was told by a CO tech that I could 7 Mbps line. Turned out he overlooked the equipment I was attaced to. So that never happened. Just as I was going to give up on VZ ( congestion issue with my 3 meg line) I spoke with a local CSR who said I qualified 3.1-7 now (magically) Within 24 hours I went from 3 to 7. Still had congestion issue. I didn't call in for a month or so due to a CSR possibley saying it was the speed increase that was causing the slow speed during peak hours, which I knew it wasn't. I called in again spoke with the same CO tech and he switched the router I was on, and it's been rock solid since. I do get a retrain once a week ever Saturday at 12:50 pm never fails. Not sure why that happens because I might have 30-40 CRC errors all week ( nothing else for errors) Then Saturday I'll get 450 CRC errors and that's when I get the retrain. I work Saturdays so It doesn't bother me. I've been told my RT is planed for an upgrade....but over the last month there has been a new XLTE tower that's going up down the road so I'm pretty sure now that's the only thing being upgraded around here.

How far are you from the RT?

3/4 of a mile. My attenuation is 27-12. I know there is way to estimate your distances. Maybe a mile at most.

I can only speak of the area i'm in, but MA shouldn't be much different as we were NYNEX at one point, and a vast majority of the processes are the same...

RT's come in 3 varieties that I am aware of... SLC 5, SLC 96, and Litespan. As Smith6612 pointed out, the Litespan variety is fed by an OC3 fiber, and around here at least, are now being provisioned with the 3.1 - 7m service, in addition to the 1, 1.5, 3m plans.

Unfotunately, the older SLC systems are fed by a DS3/T3, and are therefore capped to 3m for each customer. Some of the SLC's have Fiber feeds to them, but it's T3 svc via fiber (as opposed to copper), still only moving ~45m.

I will admit, it took me by surprise what I started seeing lines running over 3m out of the Litespans, but it certainly makes sense. Unfortunately, unless you are currently working in a Litespan, I would HIGHLY doubt you could request to be moved to one. I really can't see them spending the $$ to upgrade a SLC to a Litespan (which actually Lucent has discontinued).

Given that it sounds like OP is moving from being totally CO fed (CO to a cross-connect box to OP's house) to a new RT being added, I wouldn't be surprised at all if what they do is just drop a DSLAM in fed by however many T1s/e.SHDSL lines or gig-Ethernet fiber and put it right next to the existing SAI.

This is an extremely common arrangement on CenturyLink, and is also how the AT&T "VRAD" and "IRAD" units work. What CenturyLink typically does is drop in a gigabit fiber and puts up to four Adtran Total Access 1124 or 1148 units right next to the SAI, where AT&T is using a Lucent 7330 with different cards in it. Either way, depending on how many customers the SAI feeds, they can put more than one pedestal full of DSLAMs in, or (in some cases) they can put in a bigger DSLAM. The Lucent 7330 is pretty big, but CenturyLink's "big DSLAM" (at least in Qwest areas) tends to be the Total Access 5000. I think Embarq areas get the TA3000 series sometimes, but that may just be older installations.

Older CooledPeds (the boxes with vents near the top that hold four 1100-series sealed DSLAMs) are typically fed by up to eight T1s, though the newer ones are now fed by gigabit fiber Ethernet, and Adtran is adding GPON client capabilities to them.

So, from a technical perspective, literally anything is possible. It'll be interesting to see what Verizon actually does in this situation.

Here's a good photo of a cross-connect box with three CooledPeds at it: »Re: [Qwest] Centurylink upgrades speeds, but service is horrible

And here's what a CooledPed looks like inside: »image1.aving.net/2008/06 ··· 3903.jpg

And this area has a CooledPed and a LiteSpan at it, per some of the other posts in the thread. »Re: [Qwest] Centurylink upgrades speeds, but service is horrible

If you can get some pictures of what Verizon eventually installs, that would be really neat. Unfortunately, even though CenturyLink will happily sell 100/12, 80/40 and (purportedly) 100/40 out of their remote DSLAMs, but it sounds like on Verizon you'll be lucky to get 7, even though they have plans for up to 15 megabits. (Plus, at a mile of wire length, you're probably looking at about 7-10 megabits on ADSL2+ anyway.)

Good luck and keep posting updates!

I'm in an ex-GTE area, currently without DSL, and I am assuming my line comes out of the CO. I've followed the lines and don't see anything like an SAI (that I can see, anyway). There is one interesting area near a pole that's some old, odd-looking concrete vault-type thing. I know sometimes these are SAI's that are underground, but I don't know what they look like. There's also a power meter there that appears to just go into the ground. I couldn't tell if it was actually spinning or not. The thing looks so abandoned and it's almost completely covered by trees/vegetation/forest I have no idea what it is. (I've even taken notice of the numbers on the poles. New poles that were put up on my street start with "B16" and I followed the lines the line from these poles appears to go underground at the pole at this area...which just so happens to be "B16". So I don't know if that means anything or not.) I've also never seen a cross-connect box aside from the pedestals.

This thread is sort of a piggy back off this thread I started »[Info Needed] DSLAM build location . I saw cables that say "Corning optical cable" bundled in a group of 3 today, not attached to anything yet.

They are installing a new concrete pad with what I assume with be an RT and a DSLAM, supposed to be ready by 10/25/14 (per PA state law). We live 1/2 mile from cable here, too, so even if it's only 3M we'll be super happy. This pad is not near the weird underground/concrete/power meter thing I mentioned before, though. Totally a new location and sort of random spot.

Wish I could find a picture online of some other RTs/DSLAMs that have been installed in the area as a result of the broadband requirement. I'll see if I can snap some soon, and then compare when they start installing ours!

In case you're interested, attached are pictures of the outsides of a Catena SLC (DS3 over Fiber carrier, ADSL, I believe a CNX-5) RT along with the Litespan I come out of, in addition to another Litespan in my area. One of these Litespans needed to be replaced a few years ago due to a truck crashing into the white cabinet (the DSLAM). The fourth picture is that of an unknown DSLAM I haven't yet identified. I have a relative serviced out of this equipment which is handing out ADSL2 service whose line I may play with later to identify the gear. Appears that there may DSL Equipment (looks like a T1 repeater housing, though) high up on the poles if it's not in the brown/tan cabinet (Catena? Remote switch? Services a rural area).

Realistically the cabinets could have anything in them from any vendor. When you get service and if you land a modem such as the ActionTec GT784WNV, you can access the modem through SSH or Telnet and find out the vendor if you're interested. The modem will output the vendor code along with some other nifty information about the DSLAM, along with some tone loading readouts.

The Litespan in your 3rd pic looks like other ones I've seen deployed in the area. Can anyone really be surprised it got hit by a truck? It looks like it's less than 3 feet from the road ... and those flimsy poles I'm sure did nothing to help!

Really getting anxious now. 4 months to our deployment date but I hope it is sooner.

You're not wrong in that assumption. Rocks would do a better job stopping cars. People have started putting rocks around their property boundaries to stop drivers from destroying property from speeders/drunks. Instead, the person who runs off the road gets their oil pan ripped out, tranny destroyed and their engine seized Maybe local businesses should take a hint, as there's a "Crashing into storefront" problem around here.

I'm waiting for the day I can either get off the Litespan and onto Fiber or my Litespan winds up getting repaired. My phone and DSL go out each time the power blinks. Phone is usually back in about a minute but the DSL takes a good three minutes followed by 10 minutes of inconsistent speeds to come back fully. The gear has been deployed for so long, the battery backup isn't in good shape. The first image I posted has gear that is quite overloaded. DSL connections physically drop out (lose sync) due to the congestion.

I think those white boxes are newer T1 or e.SHDSL repeater cases. There are a zillion of them around here where I live, though ours are typically mounted closer to the ground.

The LiteSpan boxes are what VZ is installing all over NW PA. All I have seen around Erie. Warren and Crawford counties are fiber fed. The pics posted by Smith6612 show the bigger version - I have only seen one of those, most around here are smaller - single door on 3 sides. I can post some pics when I find them. We got our dsl via the BRFF program a few years ago, and since then I have have helped friends get about 5 other RTs. Watch for orange conduit down the pole and up into the concrete pad, the fiber all goes in orange when underground. On the poles they run a black plastic conduit (with attached steel cable), then push the fiber thru there once the conduit is all in place. Vz is really doing a lot of fiber buildout in NW PA, to feed RTs or upgrade the older Brick Building or green fiberglass "huts". I'll try to find my pics (including inside of the units0, and post them.

Yes, I saw some orange conduit before the RT was put in, but now the fiber appears to just be hanging there - maybe the orange is coiled up somewhere.

If you post the pics, put them in my other thread please!

I'm in the Lehigh Valley, I guess you would call it "East-Central PA". But we used to be GTE, so perhaps our equipment could be a little different

I am also in an Ex GTE (NW PA), the orange is just the plastic pipe/conduit. The fiber cable is actually has a black plastic outer cover. It you saw an orange pipe sticking out of the cement pad, or running up the pole, then the RT will be fiber fed.

Decided to go back to this thread. Anyone else (in PA) who has more than 3 off a remote terminal?

From my less-than-scientific method of plugging addresses into Verizon.com, it looks to me like Verizon doesn't even offer the 7.1-15 Mbps tier anywhere in PA, at least in none of the cities where I entered an address. Or, perhaps it was just my bad luck. I did see 3.1-7 in several places, though.

I entered my grandparents address, who are fed from some type of RT, although I have seen it and it looks more like a building than a road-side cabinet. But they were able to get 3.1-7, surprisingly.

I'm in eastern Pennsylvania, I'm on an RT "hut" less than a block away and I've been set to 5216Kbps/864Kbps (granted my SNR downstream is 6, however I haven't experienced issues). The CO is ~2mi away, however my loop length is nearly 16000 feet.

Are you sure you're on that RT if your loop length is that long?

I was told I was running of an RT that was less than a block away (which appears to be a hut of some sort when I looked at it, funnily enough there was a VZ tech truck there when I observed it) when I was talking to a "DSL specialist" however a VZ rep. on the VZ Direct board said my loop length is something like 15700ft. Maybe its the loop length between the RT and CO?