Personal Finance Blog by Pocketbook

Personal Finance Blog by Pocketbook:



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Deadline looms as first copper-to-NBN switch approaches - CNET

Deadline looms as first copper-to-NBN switch approaches - CNET:



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NBN Co readying for copper wire switch-off | Echonetdaily

NBN Co readying for copper wire switch-off | Echonetdaily:



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100 things you must eat in SA: Great Plates 1 | The Advertiser

100 things you must eat in SA: Great Plates 1 | The Advertiser:



Look for the bit on Fino's



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Where Legends Begin: Feeling Lucky? It Must Be Jaclyn's Leprechauns!

Where Legends Begin: Feeling Lucky? It Must Be Jaclyn's Leprechauns!: Twist of Luck Blog Tour Every day a different blog will post a question. When you find the answer, send an email to me at:   jacly...

NBN Co turns corner in SA fibre rollout - Telco/ISP - Technology - News - iTnews.com.au

NBN Co turns corner in SA fibre rollout - Telco/ISP - Technology - News - iTnews.com.au: "NBN Co has turned around construction delays in South Australia, posting a 37 percent increase in the number of premises passed by fibre in the space of a week.

The company's latest rollout metrics prove NBN Co's new construction partner,SA Power Networks, is overcoming delays to the fibre rollout which occurred under the watch of now-axed partner Syntheo.

Between January 5th and 12th this year, the number of premises passed by fibre in South Australia rose from 4708 to 6473.."

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Copper condition curtails cut-price NBN's great leap forward | ZDNet

Copper condition curtails cut-price NBN's great leap forward | ZDNet: "China may have landed a robot rabbit on the moon — well done, by the way — but here in Australia, it seems we've already gone way beyond that. Our entire telecommunications executive demographic has gone completely post-lunar, rocketing itself deep, deep into the derposphere.

If only we had the technology to fire them all the way into the sun, because after the glorious comedy that was the public hearing (PDF) conducted by the Senate NBN Select Committee in Sydney on Tuesday — all it needed was a laugh track — there was ample proof that they'd qualify for passage on the B-Ark. Most of them, anyway.

We had previously learned that NBN Co reckoned it would be impossible to deliver the broadband coverage and schedule promised by the Coalition government. In the very first hour of the hearing, we learned that it wouldn't guarantee the promised speeds, either. The discussion was "robust", as they say. There was blood in the water, and committee chair and former Communications Minister Senator Stephen Conroy was circling.

During the course of the day, we learned that NBN Co had downgraded its estimate of how many premises would be passed in its fibre rollout this quarter because of Christmas. Well, Christmas just sneaks up, doesn't it? There's no way they could have predicted that."

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NBN alternatives: fibre to the node or HFC cable?

NBN alternatives: fibre to the node or HFC cable?: "A third of Australian homes will connect to the internet via pay TV cables under the latest national broadband network proposal.

After scrapping the plan to run fibre to 93 per cent of premises, the government initially proposed switching many homes to fibre to the node – using the copper phone lines to cover the last few hundred metres. Now it supports a multi-technology mix with roughly an even split between fibre to the premises, fibre to the node and the existing hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) pay TV cable.

Fibre to the node will struggle to offer more than 50 megabits-per-second (Mbps) in the near future but could eventually reach 100 Mbps, depending on the condition of your copper line. Cable already offers the 100 Mbps speeds promised by fibre to the premises. Unfortunately cable is highly susceptible to congestion and regularly grinds to a halt for some users.

The multi-technology mix model increases the number of homes on the cable networks, but proposes upgrades to boost speeds and reduce congestion. Even then, cable might still be more prone to neighbourhood congestion than fibre to the premises."

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NBN Co to bring fibre-like uplink speeds to copper - Telco/ISP - Technology - News - iTnews.com.au

Might bring it, but will copper deliver?

NBN Co to bring fibre-like uplink speeds to copper - Telco/ISP - Technology - News - iTnews.com.au: "NBN Co intends to seek upload speeds on the fibre-to-the-node network that mirror those achievable on a fibre-to-the-home connection.

Head of strategy and transformation, JB Rousselot, told a Senate Select Committee yesterday that "expert advice" received from the Boston Consulting Group as part of the strategic review suggested that uplink speeds on FTTH could be matched on FTTN.

"The assumptions that we've put in [are that] all sizes of the FTTN products will deliver the same type of uplink speed that are currently offered on the FTTH products," he said."

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No guarantees on NBN download speeds: Switkowski | ZDNet

The digital divide worsens


No guarantees on NBN download speeds: Switkowski | ZDNet: "Although Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull went to the 2013 federal election promising minimum download speeds of 25 megabits per second (Mbps) for all Australians by 2016, NBN Co executive chairman Dr Ziggy Switkowski said that the company will not be making any such guarantees.

In the press release accompanying NBN Co's strategic review released last week, NBN Co said it would be designing a "new-look NBN" to provide the guaranteed speeds to NBN Co's wholesale customers, while end-user speeds will depend on factors outside of NBN Co's control, including end-user equipment quality, software, broadband plans, and the ISPs.

The result means that although NBN Co would offer the retail service providers a minimum speed, it would not guarantee that the speeds achieved at the end user's premises might be substantially lower than that."

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NBN Co sneaks out gigabit speeds | ZDNet

Found out today that I have that speed to my wall. -Tom

NBN Co sneaks out gigabit speeds | ZDNet: "NBN Co delivered on its promise of making 1 gigabit per second (Gbps) download speed services available on the National Broadband Network (NBN) fibre network before the end of 2013, but the company did not announce the availability of the service until questioned about it by a Senate Select committee.

The 1Gbps down, 400Mbps up service sells at a wholesale price of AU$150 per month, excluding the connectivity virtual circuit capacity charge. NBN Co executive chairman Dr Ziggy Switkowski revealed that NBN Co had met its April promise to have the plans in the market by the end of 2013. He said the services were made available to retail service providers this week, but that he had not made any announcement to the public.

"I'm not aware that we've made an announcement. We're not expecting to be bowled over," Switkowski said."

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NBN trounced by regional offering from locals with an eye for enterprise | Technology | theguardian.com

NBN trounced by regional offering from locals with an eye for enterprise | Technology | theguardian.com: "As arguments on the national broadband network continue, some people have taken matters into their own hands

More than 15 years ago, an optic-fibre cable was laid from Sydney to Melbourne. It went through public and private land, up hill and down dale at a time when ordinary users and businesses were only starting to understand the potential of the great, rambling beast known as the internet.

When it came to our area, a community-minded farming family refused to let the cable be laid through their farm land unless a connection was made to our local town.

For years, the cable lay idle and its ownership changed as local business, council and community groups tried to figure out a way to use it without pouring in great chunks of capital not available to a country town."

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HFC in the National Broadband Network | Simon Hackett

HFC in the National Broadband Network | Simon Hackett: "HFC, the NBN, and the meaning of life

With the release of the NBNCo Strategic Review earlier this week, I’ve seen some very significant misunderstandings (and consequent angst) expressed about the inclusion of HFC into the mix of technologies intended for the NBN rollout.

This post is intended to be a counterpoint to those misunderstandings.

I haven’t written this post to tell you that this is the best, or the only, way to change the shape of the future version of this network.

I haven’t written this because I’ve stopped believing that the best ultimate answer wherever possible is Fibre-To-The-Premises (FTTP) – because it still is."

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Here's The Full NBN Co Strategic Report | Gizmodo Australia

Here's The Full NBN Co Strategic Report | Gizmodo Australia: "ancy a bit of lunchtime reading? Malcolm Turnbull dropped 134-pages of NBN report on us today. Get into it right here.

The full report is being hosted on NBN Co’s website (PDF).

Here are a few headline points to come out of the report:

• The Fibre-To-The-Node rollout has been canned for existing Hybrid-Fibre Coaxial cable networks in the Telstra and Optus footprint, with optimisation to take place on these networks to improve existing speeds

• Bill Morrow, former CEO of Vodafone, is the new CEO of NBN Co.

NBN Co will miss its national 25Mbps roll-out target of 2016, instead pushing the roll-out date back to 2019.

The new NBN roll-out plan will cost $41 billion."

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NBN strategic review: By the numbers | ZDNet

NBN strategic review: By the numbers | ZDNet: "The release of NBN Co's strategic review puts the company on the path for a massive change in the rollout of the National Broadband Network (NBN), but the justification for the proposed changes have relied on a re-estimation of the current project. ZDNet has compared the new figures with those NBN Co prepared prior to the election.

Prior to the election, NBN Co was preparing a new corporate plan detailing the current state of the network rollout, and an indication of the expected cost for the network.

The table below contains the information contained in the leaked draft compared to the information NBN Co released today of the revised forecast and the new proposed NBN plan."

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Turnbull to release NBN review Thursday

Turnbull to release NBN review Thursday: "Nearly two weeks after receiving it, Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull will release a censored (‘redacted’) version of the NBN Strategic Review tomorrow (Thursday)
In a dramatic twist, the document will be released to selected journalists in a lockup similar to that used on budget day, giving them access to the documents under embargo two hours before they are publicly released, at around 1pm.

Turnbull has long called for greater transparency around NBN information, and has accused the former Government of not releasing all NBN documents. The ALP has accused Turnbull of sitting on the document too long and of tailoring it to suit the Government’s agenda.

Meanwhile the Labor dominated Senate Committee on the NBN called NBN executives back before it to appear today, a move Malcolm Turnbull described as ‘disruptive’."

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In-home FttN wiring testing needed, costly: NBN Co | ZDNet

In-home FttN wiring testing needed, costly: NBN Co | ZDNet: "Connecting customers to a fibre-to-the-node (FttN) National Broadband Network (NBN) will require testing of in-home wiring and a network termination device (NTD) that costs more than the equivalent NTD in the current fibre-to-the-premises (FttP) rollout, NBN Co warned the incoming government in an assessment of the three possible scenarios for NTD deployment.


The quality of in-building copper can significantly impact FttN performance: NBN Co.
(Image: CC BY-SA 3.0 Adamantios)
The assessment — contained in a confidential report prepared by NBN Co for the incoming government's "blue book" at the request of the now Department of Communications — warns that "FttN-based services will require in-house remediation as well as incur a modem cost that exceeds the cost of equivalent fibre-based end-user equipment".

A one-off credit for new installations "may be warranted" to ensure that the cost of end-user connections isn't too high, the report suggests."

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NBN Co execs to be hauled before Senate committee | ZDNet

NBN Co execs to be hauled before Senate committee | ZDNet: "Several key NBN Co executives have been ordered to appear before the Senate Select Committee on the National Broadband Network (NBN) tomorrow, after they once again declined to appear before the committee.

In a press release this afternoon, acting NBN Co chair and former Communications Minister Stephen Conroy said that NBN Co's head of strategy JB Rousselot, chief operating officer Greg Adcock, chief technology officer Gary McLaren, and chief financial officer Robin Payne were invited a week ago to appear before the committee.

Although the committee had changed the date to avoid a conflict with an NBN Co board meeting, Conroy said that NBN Co informed the committee that the executives had declined to appear tomorrow."

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FttN NBN needs customers more than coverage: NBN Co report | ZDNet

FttN NBN needs customers more than coverage: NBN Co report | ZDNet: "Fibre-to-the-node (FTTN) technology might be faster to deliver in its early days than fibre-to-the-premise (FTTP) technology, a confidential NBN Co report has advised, warning that lower revenues from the Coalition's national broadband network (NBN) strategy mean "it will be important to prioritise activations over...any coverage objective."


Viability of the Coalition's FttN model depends on maximising customer density, not its speed: NBN Co. Image: CC BY-SA 3.0, David B King
“While FTTN architectures typically have a reduced construction period compared to the rollout of FTTP architectures, ramping up to a volume rollout of FTTN architecture will take time,” the report – prepared by NBN Co during the caretaker period to form part of the incoming government brief given to incoming communications minister Malcolm Turnbull – warns."

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Coalition’s NBN already in trouble, says leaked report

Coalition’s NBN already in trouble, says leaked report: "An internal NBN Co document says the Coalition’s fibre to the node (FTTN) policy is inadequate and unlikely to be completed on time.

NBN Co executive chairman Ziggy Switkowski is unlikely to have an easy time of it when he fronts the Labor-dominated Senate Committee today (story follows).

Fairfax Media has published details of an internal NBN Co analysis which says the Coalition’s FTTN strategy, which Switkowski strongly supports, is poorly planned and is unlikely to be completed on time or on budget. The report also says that its revenue will be much less than predicted, mainly for those reasons.

The paper was prepared as part of the so-called ‘blue book’, which departments typically prepare as a briefing document for incoming governments.

“There are a number of conditions that will impact on NBN Co’s ability to undertake a volume network rollout,” Fairfax quotes the report as saying. “Given the complexity of these conditions, it is unlikely that NBN Co will meet the 2016 deadline to upgrade the fixed network to enable Australians to have minimum download speeds of 25 Mbps.”."

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