said by Nsaneiceman_Work :

The speeds are great for the price, but the ping times are in the ~300-400 ms all the time to yahoo.com and there seemed to be alot of packet loss.

I worked on someones computer when I was with Geek Squad. He was beta testing BPL for a company in Forney, Texas and he lived around the Ferguson Rd and N Buckner Blvd area IIRC.

said by Gilitar :

More competition is a good thing.

said by nasadude :

Right now, BPL is less relevant than sat broadband; and we see how well sat broadband is helping.

said by amigo_boy :

It has to start somewhere. I'd like to have BPL, DSL and cable and muni-wifi available so that I could subscribe to two and use a router with two WAN ports to load balance.

Competition is always good.

My electric company (Salt River Project) replaced my meter yesterday with a digital meter ("elster"). It's supposed to let them read the meter remotely. It has a LAN ID printed on the front. I meant to ask the installer if it used wifi or BPL. I'm thinking BPL because I didn't see an antenna.

Mark

said by Cheese :

Two words, and I could be wrong, Internal Antenna.

said by amigo_boy :

You're right. This is what they installed: »www.elsterelectricity.com/en/rex.html

"The REX meter has on-board two-way radio frequency (RF) communications that permit the meter to respond to requests over an unlicensed 900 MHz local area network (LAN). REX meters deployed on the EnergyAxis® System act as repeaters and are self-registering via an A3 ALPHA® meter/collector."

Mark

said by W1RFI :

I am honor bound to point out that 902-928 MHz is an Amateur Band, ... do you think that Amateur users could use that band for all that relaying that Amigo_boy thinks should be done so that BPL can make strong radio noise in the ham bands?

said by amigo_boy :

Ed, now you're being intentionally provocative. I've suggested more than once that 2 meter or 70 cm can be used. And, in the event of a disaster, 33 cm wouldn't be affected by local power meters that are out of service. It would also not be affected by propagation (common argument against BPL interference of HF, lower frequencies).

said by rf_engineer :

And why do people need the Internet anyway if ...

said by amigo_boy :

False analogy. Various access methods to the Internet are commercial. Not public gifts like hobby radio. Hobby radio is akin to a public park (who's users complain that it must be used exactly a certain way, err... until they themselves become pragmatic and ... oh well.).

said by rf_engineer :

But what's so important about your access to the Internet? It's really just a hobby for you.

said by amigo_boy :

A hobby I (and *billions*) pay for. Not a grant of *public* airwaves to a tiny minority who insist it must be used as [fill in the blank], but then [fill in the blank] and then... "but we're not being inconsistent. There is purity in pragmatism.".

said by amigo_boy :

Ed, now you're being intentionally provocative. I've suggested more than once that 2 meter or 70 cm can be used.

said by W1RFI :

And I suggested another licensed band that could be used.

said by W1RFI :

The relay scheme you propose to allow BPL to make strong noise on the Amateur bands, however, is not a viable alternative,

said by W1RFI :

It is clear that you think that this should be changed.

said by amigo_boy :

This is becoming quite predictable.

Hobby radio should be protected because it serves a public purpose (once every few years). When it's pointed out that only 20-30 people out of 650k licensees participate, the argument in favor of hobby radio changes to something else.

If circumstances have changed (and they obviously have in the past 2-3 decades, increasing the options for emergency communications) the public can "taketh away."

said by W1RFI :

far more than 20 Amateurs participate in EMComm work and that it occurs far more than once every few years.

said by W1RFI :

Your misinformation is intentional, IMHO.

said by W1RFI :

Get back to us when you have completed changing that. Everyone will be most interested in how it turns out.

said by amigo_boy :

How many? And, how often?

What I was referring to was the news reports of 20-30 hobbyists performing communications during the recent Northwest flood. That was portrayed (in this forum) as the reason to protect hobby radio.

Most reasonable people would wonder how significant that is relative to the 650k licensees (which isn't representative of actual active users). If public service is a selling point, perhaps it should be mandatory.

Ditto.

Be careful what you wish for. It seems to me like hobbyists would be better served by looking for ways to be more relevant today, including mandatory service. Taunting the public to go further in disrespecting their hobby seems counter-intuitive to me.

said by amigo_boy :

Be careful what you wish for.

said by amigo_boy :

How many? And, how often?

said by W1RFI :

An AMR-equipped meter will allow the utility to save a few dollars on meter-reading costs. Unless it is linked into a network, it can't be used for load shedding or other utility operations.

Of course, I am honor bound to point out that 902-928 MHz is an Amateur Band, with any Part 15 unlicensed opeation being entirely secondary to the licensed service.

Hey, do you think that Amateur users could use that band for all that relaying that Amigo_boy thinks should be done so that BPL can make strong radio noise in the ham bands?

said by amigo_boy :

It has to start somewhere. I'd like to have BPL, DSL and cable and muni-wifi available so that I could subscribe to two and use a router with two WAN ports to load balance.

Competition is always good.

My electric company (Salt River Project) replaced my meter yesterday with a digital meter ("elster"). It's supposed to let them read the meter remotely. It has a LAN ID printed on the front. I meant to ask the installer if it used wifi or BPL. I'm thinking BPL because I didn't see an antenna.

said by nasadude :

more relevant competition is a good thing. this is only relevant to a small number of people.

Right now, BPL is less relevant than sat broadband; and we see how well sat broadband is helping.

said by PDXPLT :

Current already has a big commercial deployment in the Cinncinati area. The ARRL says they have no interference complaints from them. No one else has complained either.

---

Current Technologies systems operate from 32-48 MHz on overhead lines and use HomePlug from 4-28 MHz inside the premises. HomePlug has designed permanent notches in the ham bands into the their specification.

If a BPL manufacturer avoids using bands licensed to the Amateur Radio Service and its filtering is state of the art, it can avoid widespread harmful interference problems involving Amateur Radio.

HomePlug has led the way in this direction, and Current has excellent communication with ARRL. The combination has been successful.

Other DS2-based BPL manufacturers have also started to avoid using the Amateur bands, at least in the US. At this point, ARRL has open doors of communication with all of the manufacturers marketing BPL in the US.

The most logical next step would be to take these successful models and turn them into industry standards and national regulations. Clearly, not using the Amateur bands is technically feasible, and equally clearly, with state of the art filtering and careful implementation, the model can work. If the entire industry were to follow the HomePlug model and develop industry standards that fix the Amateur interference problem permanently, it would be better off.

Ed Hare, W1RFI
ARRL Lab
225 Main St
Newington, CT 06111
Tel: 860-594-0318
Internet: »www.arrl.org/bpl
Email: w1rfi@arrl.org

said by Skeedatl :

No more guys walking the meter reading beat.

said by rf_engineer :

Automatic meter reading has been available for ten years without using BPL.

said by BF69 :

Funny I still see guys reading the meters every month where I live. I'm 99.9% positive that if my local electric company had the ability to dump it's meter readers and pocket the savings they would.