Sunday, 9 December 2007
How does my broadband connect to my ISP
Main | Software As A Service »
The physical side of connecting is by Local Loop Unbundling (LLU), this supports ADSL (Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line).
The first link in the chain is the copper wires from your home/office/shop to the BT or Kingston (in Hull) network. A splitter (micro filter) is used to combine the high frequncies used by your modem (modulator/demodulator) signals and you low frequency voice signals.
In the UK BT and Kingston provide the copper cable link between the telephone exchange and the customers premises. BT and Kingston make these links available to other companies by the use of LLU technologies.
The companies (operators) have a number of methods to hook into the copper cable links (local network) to provide it’s services.
The first method is internal to the exchange and has two favours:
a) A room in the exchange (a hostel)
b) A bespoke arrangement (for none standard requirements).
In both of these methods the copper wires from the customers premises runs to a PCP (Primary Connection Point), these PCP’s are the green boxes at the side of the road. From the PCP a pair of cables runs to the telephone exchange and into MDF (Main Distribution Frame) an then onto the internal exchange equipment. From the MDF (internal) cables go to a HDF (Handover Distribution Frame) which makes the cables available to the (external) operators.
The second method is Distant Location.
In this method the customer to MDF route is the same but the HDF is located in a different location to the exchange (either a building or roadside green cabinet) so the cables are external.
The third method is Line Sharing.
Under EU regulations BT and Kingston have to offer Operators line sharing (also known as shared access). At the MDF a splitter is used to separate the frequencies used for voice from the higher frequency services. This allows BT (or Kingston) to provide voice while another supplier provides data/internet services.
The fourth method is Sub-Loop Unbundling.
This is where the Operator (or BT/Kingston for their own services) at the (or more likely alongside) the PCP. High speed fibre optic cables are run directly to the PCP as copper cables can only carry very high bandwidth services (e.g. VDSL) for a short distance
Posted by at 11:30 AM in Internet Connections
[Trackback URL for this entry]
