The OP runs their own plant, so they don't need to worry about what some other entity will charge them for things. Put in combo cards and be done with it. ----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Baldur Norddahl" <baldur.norddahl@gmail.com> To: nanog@nanog.org Sent: Sunday, May 10, 2020 5:57:59 PM Subject: Re: alternative to voip gateways Here we have DSL in cabinets so we can have short loop lengths and DSLAMS that control the entire bundle, to enable vectoring, v35b etc. Since this scheme does not work if there are multiple DSLAMS on a bundle, only the ILEC runs the DSLAMS now. I don't know if they just can't (Nokia) or if the power requirements are infeasible, but they are NOT doing POTS from the cabinets with DSLAMS. The cabinets have splitters and the POTS is routed back to the CO where you will have old equipment doing POTS probably dating 30 years or more. Hence if we want to order a DSL we only pay for the work done at the DSLAM cabinet and we only pay to rent a port in that DSLAM. If we were to order a POTS on top of that, we have to pay for them to connect the customer to the splitter and route him to the CO and then for him to be connected to equipment there too. This is clearly more work than just connecting him to the DSLAM and so it is not free. And then we also have to pay to rent a port on whatever equipment they have at CO. The FXP solution skips all that and uses a tiny bit of data with QoS and the voice quality is fantastic. For fiber there is of course no other way, so why not just do it the same way for all customers? Why pay to rent ports on the CO installed equipment? Well even the ILEC figured that out and started to do it that way. Probably because even for them it is not free to keep running the old equipment at the CO. That stuff uses power and I heard they also have to pay license fees. Also guessing that the reason so many DSL routers have FXP probably means someone are actually using this stuff. At 1700 scale it does not really matter how many there are. These things are going to download the centrally managed config. The OP is going to buy extra equipment to handle voice. At least that is my understanding. My question to him was just a humble suggestion that he could do away with that and just use the for free FXP ports. We have a whole country here doing that, so trust me it works at scale. Regards, Baldur On Mon, May 11, 2020 at 12:18 AM Mike Hammett < nanog@ics-il.net > wrote:
From someone that runs a DSL plant with CO-derived dial tone (and ATAs\gateways where appropriate), no VoIP is not cheaper and easier at the particular density we can infer from the OP.
What's the "lot of equipment" that "simply does not need to be there"? I have a DSLAM line card that does DSL only or a DSLAM line card that does DSL and POTS. No extra equipment, unless you're counting board-level components. Manage voice configurations on 1700 modems\ATAs or voice configurations on 1/48th of that in line cards? Yes, there are filters required, but I don't see that being a burden. Any ILEC (in the US anyway) dropping analog voice is attempting to go through some regulatory loophole, not because it's a technically superior or more cost effective solution. ----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com From: "Baldur Norddahl" < baldur.norddahl@gmail.com > To: nanog@nanog.org Sent: Sunday, May 10, 2020 11:54:01 AM Subject: Re: alternative to voip gateways On Sun, May 10, 2020 at 4:16 PM Mike Hammett < nanog@ics-il.net > wrote: <blockquote> If POTS last mile is available, why complicate it with VoIP? Because it is cheaper and easier? It is a lot of equipment there simply does not need to be there. If you have DSL you have CPE equipment and that CPE equipment can have FXP out for very little extra. You also save having filters to separate DSL and voice. In any case, even the ILEC here is dropping analog and delivering phone services via VoIP and FXP out on the CPE. I believe because the technician only needs to go to the DSLAM to connect you. If you are also getting analog voice, he needs to go to the CO too because voice and DSLAM are no longer cohosted. Regards, Baldur </blockquote>