Covad's AnswerNew DSLAMs, a new take on VoIP ( old news - 09:23AM Thursday Jan 13 2005) tags: hardware · clecTipped by Karl Bode  Something long expected by users in our VoIP forum, Covad has announced they'll be offering "transparent" residential VoIP services (No consumer side hardware), which they've dubbed line-powered voice (LPV). The service is much like traditional copper service until it hits their new DSLAMs, which as we've mentioned, are developed by Nokia. With deregulation eliminating line-sharing, Covad has been hard at work exploring next-gen DSLAMS that remove the bells from the equation. Covad says its new Line-powered voice access will offer an alternative to competitive local exchange carriers (CLECs), allowing them to migrate lines (some 19 million of them) from the Bell's UNE-P network, and onto Covad's nationwide UNE-L network. One of the perks of the technology, according to Covad, is unlike its traditional DSL based VoIP service, the service is not facing DSL's 18,000-foot distance limit. The company estimates this could allow them to serve roughly forty percent more voice customers. The VoIP service also requires no consumer level hardware; users simply plug their phones into the wall like traditional service. This also eliminates the power-outage headaches faced by many VoIP customers. The company says they'll begin trials of the service within the next thirty days in Atlanta, Denver and San Jose, California. They intend to offer the service wholesale to other CLECs sometime during the second half of 2005. If it works, it could be the life-buoy Covad and other CLECs have long been looking for. If it doesn't, Covad could quickly become irrelevant as the bells reach toward faster networks and next-generation fiber solutions. The Covad press release has a bit more detail.
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gissa
I Hit Things With Sticks
join:2002-01-28
Hyde Park, MA | Viable Solution Hopefully the trails prove that this is a viable solution for the IXCs to transfer UNE-P customers to UNE-L in a stream-lined manner. This could potentiall be a huge growth spot for Covad. | |
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PGHammer
join:2003-06-09
Accokeek, MD
clubs:
 ·Comcast
| Re: Viable Solution However, there is a fly in the ointment (and especially for Covad).
There would be nothing stopping the fiber-based ILECs (especially Verizon) from simply minimizing their profits on POTS by offering more AYCE voice services for either little or nothing (in an FTTP network, *all* outbound analog information becomes digital at the ONT, so Verizon's POTS customers become VoIP customers, essentially; and with the overhead from VoIP being so small, Verizon could afford to eat most, or even all, of the cost for intra-network voice calls).
It's ugly, and even reprehensible, but also *legal*, since Verizon doesn't have to lease UNE-P to anybody *and* this method of undercutting the CLECs doesn't break anti-trust laws (because Verizon is not losing money). | |
| | | k_mumm
join:2001-06-14
Laramie, WY | Re: Viable Solution Expect the PUC wouldn't let them do it. | |
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Slidetbone
Mazin Go
Premium
join:2002-11-10
Land O Lakes, FL
1 edit | Re: How is this service is not hindered by distance said by djtim21 :Isn't regular telephone (pots) hindered by distance? don't you have to have load coils and bridge taps in order to send pots farther with out an RT "amplifying" the signal? Maybe we can get some guru's from the bell forums in here to explain that. Distance limitation of DSL is due to non-line powered systems.
The technology COVAD is planing to use is a powered-line technology that will use the electrical properties of copper with the use of repeaters. This is how they can overcome distance.
The system COVAD plans to use takes services from the local access platform, combines multiple services, adds voltage to power the line and sends the combination out of their facilities in a digital format.
At longer wire distances, the repeaters will recover this digital format and recreate a "clean" digital signal for longer distance transmission.
I would like to see what they plan on doing when they try to add this to a copper pair that has current analog service. COVAD does not own their own copper. | |
| | mc_365
join:2004-07-29
Brooklyn, NY
| I think in the context of this article they are refering to DSLs inability to function over long distances. It seems like the the article is saying that this new technology will illiminate the need to have DSL or Cable Broadband to get VoIP service. It would make covad Phone Company. | |
| | 
DaSneaky1D
one wall to block them all
Premium,MVM
join:2001-03-29
The Lou
·Charter Pipeline
| If I understand this right, the phones are powered by the DSLAM. When a call is made, it's caught at the DSLAM, then goes straight over Covad's IP network. It never touches the Bell's PSTN.
Distance only affects DSL sync rates. Since these calls aren't made over DSL, Covad can reach a greater range of potential customers using their own network.
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| | audiog
join:2004-08-09
Detroit, MI
| Under the UNE-L rules competitive carriers will be able to lease the loop (copper wires and T1 lines) at cut-rate prices from the Bells. Hence, these competitors must migrate from UNE-P to UNE-L solution.
Under the cheapest route:
UNE-L is still provisioned out of the RT but bypasses the Bell switch port that is suppling Covad the UNE-P element to provide DSL. IN SBC land UNE-P= port + loop. UNE-L is just the loop to your house or business. Covad will have to collocate a softswitch/packet based switch. Basically it is a mini class 5/class4 switch that can handle voice and IP broadband router. This is a Tandem router that can handle very large bandwidths. Tandems are used to connect RTs and such. So who ever is providing the access Tandems to Covad for IP will directly connect to Covad and the consumer instead of going through the Bell
The other model it unthinkable.
That is where Covad builds its own RT and provision the loops out to you. Pulling glass and copper to the pole and leasing the loops to the house. | |
| russotto
join:2000-10-05
Collegeville, PA | OK, so... Isn't this basically POTS to the CO, digitize there, and then send it over the Internet rather than a private network? | |
| | | | | mc_365
join:2004-07-29
Brooklyn, NY | Re: OK, so... My question would be, "Who is responsible for line maintenance from the phone to the dslam?" | |
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gissa
I Hit Things With Sticks
join:2002-01-28
Hyde Park, MA
·RCN CABLE
| Re: OK, so... The Bells. They own it. Covad will still rent the last mile copper. Part of the monthly fee they pay is for maintenance.
There is no distance limitations. You will never lose power (unless power in the CO is gone) and you have the same functionality as most VoIP providers (ie find/follow me etc.) if the user has a compter. | |
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treetop1000
join:2003-11-07
Lexington, KY | No matter what they try, they cannot get rid of the local loop.... talk about job security.... | |
| RadioDoc
58ef2c0
Premium,ExMod 2000-03
join:2000-05-11
 ·AT&T Midwest
| Deja vu all over again "that remove the bells from the equation"
So I see Covad has strung their own copper now, eh?
No CPE, "line powered". This is just POTS with different 'head end' equipment if you will. They still need the ILEC copper, they still can't get past a RT, and they still are at the mercy of regulatory whim.
Looks mostly like a way to recapture some of the cost of renting dry pairs by adding services to them beyond broadband. In this case they are putting analog phone signals back on it.
It's an interesting prospect, but it's just the same pig in a different dress.
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Too many people and not enough eyes to see. º Too many churches and not enough truth. | |
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IronChefMoto
Premium
join:2001-02-08
Alpharetta, GA
| Re: Deja vu all over again said by RadioDoc :it's just the same pig in a different dress. Weird...I haven't heard that since some buddies of mine saw my freshman college homecoming party date.
IronChefMorimoto | |
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PGHammer
join:2003-06-09
Accokeek, MD
clubs:
·Comcast
| Actually, it's a completely different pig.
What Covad is doing is going after traditional POTS customers (as opposed to broadband customers). By installing at the RT (instead of at the CO), Covad can basically provide *naked* VoIP at prices less than POTS (because Covad's lease fees will cover basically the *last half mile* from the RT to the customer, as opposed to CO-to-customer-including-RT fee they pay for traditional DSL coverage).
Covad's problem is that the ILECs (especially Verizon) are fully intending on removing copper from this *last half mile* (unless Verizon basically plans to give Covad the last half-mile, since it won't use it itself).
In the Verizon thread, there are several comments from Verizon itself on not only their FIOS FTTP services, but their plan of attack on their whole wired network. (Basically, Verizon plans on going copper-free by no later than 2012. *No* copper whatever (except within the customer premises).)
By overbuilding their entire network with fiber (that it doesn't have to share with anybody) Verizon is the biggest threat to CLECs that lease rack space from it (such as Covad). However, in providing voice services, Covad is very much in danger in getting caught in the wake of the *fiber effect* (where voice rates will drop so low that Verizon will basically be able to offer AYCE voice service within their network for nothing or next to nothing, just as they currently do on the Verizon Wireless network). Covad sees a way to gain *traditional* POTS customers by providing LPV; however, Verizon can trump that by providing low-cost or no-cost intra-network calling.
It's about to get seriously bloody. | |
| Automate
join:2001-06-26
Atlanta, GA | What about the extra fees and taxes? I wonder if they will charge all the extra fees and taxes like a normal POTS line. This is a little different than Vonage etc. because the VOIP to analog conversion is done outside of the home. | |
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ropeguru
Premium
join:2001-01-25
Hollywood, FL
clubs:
 ·VOIPo
| All I want to know is.... will this allow speeds higher then the 470k down I am getting now for DSL?? I am at 18,000 feet and need something better than this. I cannot use Comcast as I need a static ip and be able to run my email server.
Covad does have presence in my CO as I used to have a SDSL line provisioned at 384k through them. Just wondering how long it will take for them to do their trials and start upgrading DSLAM's in other areas? | |
| | mc_365
join:2004-07-29
Brooklyn, NY | Re: All I want to know is.... This wonte help you one bit.
This has realy very little to do with DSL. | |
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SpitefulCrow
Insert Witty Tag Here
Premium
join:2003-06-04
Berkeley, CA
| This has nothing to do with DSL data access actually.
If I'm reading it right Covad has contracted with Nokia to get a solution that lets them put linecards in one of their DSLAMs or an RT mini-DSLAM and provide POTS service (not VoIP because it comes in the form of a regular 48VDC analog voice signal into the consumer's house). The IP part comes in where Covad converts the analog POTS signal into VoIP and transmits it over the Internet or a private ATM or frame relay to the other end, thus bypassing the ILEC's switching equipment.
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ropeguru
Premium
join:2001-01-25
Hollywood, FL
clubs: | Re: All I want to know is.... Ok. Then what is the ADSL2 compliant talking about?? I am so confused on this one. | |
| SpeedJunky
join:2001-08-14
Glen Cove, NY
| Is It easier to.... Maybe I'm talking from ingnorance but wouldn't it just be easier for the CLEC's (ie Verizon) to just offer standard POTS service for the same or arround the same cost as the VOIP providers! It seem like the easiest thing to do....
Don't get me wrong I love my Packet 8 box..... | |
| | mc_365
join:2004-07-29
Brooklyn, NY
1 edit | Re: Is It easier to.... Covad would be able to give you nation wide access as well as international calling at dramatically discounted rates because they would only be paying line fees for a small portion of copper. Its like a call from NY to CA would only have to travel over my 4,000 feet to the DSlam and the additional distance from Covads equipment in CA to the other partys home, which would be no more than a few miles. | |
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How is this service is not hindered by distance
