Jeff Burson wrote:
On Wed, 3 Jun 1998 kbrown@primelink.com wrote:
I'm pretty sure I'm not the first to read about this in our local paper, but Sprint announced their new strategy for integrating voice, data, video over "standard phone lines." They are calling this the Integrated On-Demand Network or ION for short. It sounds an awful lot like ISDN services from perhaps an ESS switch (8 viable bonded channels max) versus the DMS100 (2 bonded channels max).
An article at wired.com had a little more detail than the marketing hype that dominated the Sprint press release.
The only additional details that emerged were as follows:
1. The Sprint backbone that ION relies on will be the ATM network that they've been working on.
ATM to the home. What sort of loop, though? Bandwidth concerns?
2. For the end user, Sprint is going to be reselling various LECs' ADSL offerings and then charging an extra $200 to install a metering device at the end user's location.
The Chicago Tribune says you'll be able to buy it at Radio Shack :-) (Which means it'll be $350, but that's another story in itself).
It's not apparent as to whether ION for both the business user and the home user will rely on a LEC's ADSL (a scary thought).
Doubtful. It says it relies on the ATM network that Sprint's been building. There's supposedly a test rollout by 1999 in the major markets to small business and home-based businesses.. which, as we all know, means they probably havent even begun to think about how to do it. :-)
Following the ION announcement has been singularly frustrating due to the absence of any technical content in their announcements.
"Up to 100 times faster than conventional modems" is said in their press release. Taking a conventional stable modem to be 28.8, that puts the connection at 360 Kbytes/sec, or ~1.8 DS1 (2.88 Mbit). If a 56k were used as reference, that puts the connection at 5.7 Mbit, still DSL speed.. I wonder what kind of site equipment you need to support this, and what limitations will be placed on that. This is leading in the com-priv sort of way, but next issues: Obtaining telephone numbers? Local tarriffs? What defines "long distance"? Can you make a call or fax to some IP address (or equivalent) to another ION user, bypassing transition to the analog (LEC/Telco) network, and have reduced tarriffs? Perhaps this $200 unit is the NT1-equivalent. If so, it's damn cheap. If not, why isnt billing built into the customer-end equipment? I'll stop asking questions before people think Jim Fleming took over my email account. :-p FWIW, there is a dumb playback of the announcement at 888-590-5970.. http://www.sprint.com/sprint/press/releases/9806/9806010583.html It doesnt tell a whole lot (still listening to it), but whatever. If anyone knows how to get an AT&T 8520T to pipe into the line-in on an Ultra, I'll make an MP3.. :-) -- jamie rishaw (dal/efnet:gavroche) American Information Systems, Inc. rdm: "Religion is obsolete." gsr: "By what?" jgr: "Solaris." (1996) Tel:312.425.7140, FAX:312.425.7240