Do You Still Have Broadband?

Author: John Shipper

If you think broadband internet speeds have increased recently, you're right. Broadband was a stunning improvement over telephony when it was first introduced and then quickly discovered. For years, a few megabits per second seemed pretty fast. Then 10 Mbps became the norm. Companies are now moving to faster speeds of 100 Mbps and beyond, while the FCC sets 25 Mbps as the minimum at the start of broadband. What does this really mean and what does it show in the future?

What is the new standard?
Official broadband standards have never been a leading indicator. They are installed after the technology has proven itself and the need for it has become clear. The jump from 4 Mbps to 25 Mbps is a real leap forward and says a lot about the importance of bandwidth requirements. Is 25Mbps the end of the road for a while? Unlikely, here's why.

Few individuals and fewer businesses are willing to pay for higher line speeds just to show off. Something is driving the need for an upgrade and then another upgrade. Important factors are the conversion of local resources to remote resources and the type of content.

IT needs are increasing rapidly
Do you remember message boards? Digital communication is used to refer to the transmission of ASCII text. You don't need to accelerate to the speed of light to transfer a few kilobytes of characters to a remote server. It was the text-based computing paradigm that led Bill Gates to claim that 640 kilobytes of RAM was enough for a real computer, because who needs more? Well, no one did when the migration started with 64K 8-bit processors. In a few years, 640 KB has become a joke. When will 640 GB become the limit? Probably faster than any of us think.

Processor speed is approaching some practical production limits, but using multiple processors can solve this problem. Storage, both RAM and hard drive (now solid state), continues to grow. bandwidth ? Why is it no surprise that WAN bandwidth demands are increasing as processing and storage capacity increases exponentially?

And now?
Computers are always on the verge of falling behind because of the functions we ask of them. Text? These are childish things. Image? Soft HD and 4K videos? It's more of a challenge. Will 4K be fully adopted before 8K takes over? And now?

You might think software is less complicated due to the relatively small size of downloadable apps compared to some of the huge software packages that once came in fancy boxes. It is an illusion. The real power of the applications we use lies in all the internal processing that takes place on a remote server. Everything is now geolocated (with GPS) and very private. Most of these adjustments are subtle and automatic. The system monitors your behavior instead of manually entering a series of parameters.

There was a major hurdle when big data had to be processed locally. How many databases can you host on one computer and how much effort will it take to keep them up to date and accurate? Even large databases in large data centers can offer many possibilities. It makes sense to invest in collecting and managing all of this data to make it easier for the end user. This does not mean that the system is easy. It just means that you and I are only treating the tip of the iceberg with these systems.

Big data needs big support
Big data and complex IT business applications have led to a new architecture: the cloud. The cloud combines all the processing and storage you can use into a single system that allows individual tenants to scale at will. Someone else can use what you don't need now. The freed up resources can be used to work on your growing applications. As long as there are enough resources beyond what everyone needs right now, the system seems infinitely scalable.

Often does not extend to infinity or even seems to expand the range. A WAN connection, whether a leased line or an Internet connection, has become the new bottleneck. Think of these clouds as vast lakes of data, and you'd cut yourself with an old garden hose.

For businesses to be more productive, they must enable their machines to do more. Paperwork is a thing of the past in most office processes. Filling out forms by hand is as old as standing in front of a drill or using a sickle to chop corn. Don't worry, performance will continue to increase and maybe even speed up. If you don't, your competitors will. This means more complex processing, greater portability and representation of more data in simpler, usable formats, greater manufacturing flexibility (think 3D printing), and larger data connections.

How much bandwidth is sufficient?
In the long term, we have no idea how many gigabits per second, Tbps or Pbps will be needed. We can now make good guesses about what we need now and where it will develop over the next few years.

Single-digit dialing quickly outgrew its usefulness. The only places where T1 lines are still suitable are typical POS terminals and remote locations where there really isn't a good fit. Connecting a T1 line can boost speeds to 10 or 12 Mbps, but this is a temporary measure. You will need more in the future.

If the consumer limit for broadband access is 25 Mbps, that also seems like a reasonable price for businesses. Of course, most professional users don't make HD movies and stream them all day. But they access cloud applications, conduct video conferences in the office or in meeting rooms, share large files between offices, and use cloud phone systems. Note that a customer or household uses 25 Mbps. Your business needs may not be the same for everyone, but many of you are headed in the same direction. Performance is also more important when paying people. You really don't want them sitting around waiting for the computer.

This indicates the need for at least 10 Mbit/s and often 25-50 Mbit/s for very small operations. In the past, 100 Mbps Fast Ethernet was expensive and hard to find. Now it's cheap and available. It doesn't seem unthinkable that an average sized office would have 100 Mbps broadband...especially considering that 100 Mbps can't cost more than a 1.5 Mbps T1 line, when they use broadband for the first time in several years.

Large enterprises producing complex video content or industrial-scale 3D printing operations can easily justify Gigabit Ethernet. School districts and others can do the same with hundreds of concurrent users.

What about very large companies? The new threshold could be 10 Gbps Ethernet or 10 Gbps. The service is readily available in urban areas and some network operators have started rolling out 100GeE across the country. There will soon be a ceiling. Can the tbps service be late? It is currently under development.

Ethernet is the way to go
Please note that all of these recommended services are based on Carrier Ethernet. Here, the industry aims to enable interoperability and rapid scalability. As with cloud resources, connection switching is also done on demand.

What about your broadband business? Feeling stressed trying to get more packs for older fonts? Angry that the FCC says your connection falls under broadband standards? Do not worry. There are much faster fiber connections , and now they cost a lot less than you might think. It's a good day for a broadband upgrade.