[Starlink] On FiWi

Wed Mar 15 17:38:01 EDT 2023

Hi David,

> On Mar 15, 2023, at 22:07, David Fernández via Starlink <starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
> 
> Well, if you live in a house from 1918 and you want to pass coaxial
> cables

	I don't... coaxial cable is not my cup of tea ;)

> or Ethernet or fiber, unless they are visible, it is going to
> cost you a lot of money and maybe you will not be able to alter the
> facade with cables passing visible from the street.

	The house (where we live in an apartment in) is not on the street, and both the DOSIS and the telephony cabling enters via the basement. And yes putting cables in the walls is hard and dirty (brick walls). This being rented property I kept the wall engineering to a minimum.

> 
> Of course, old buildings can be refurbished,

	And routinely are, neither the fresh and waste water, heating nor the electricity systems in the house are the respective first versions. However I admit that change still is slow.

> but most of people just
> avoid it as much as possible, because of money and aesthetics. So,
> making laws asking for minimum infrastructure for telecommunication
> installations on buildings, like having common areas and spaces for
> antennas in the rooftop and for distributing communication cables are
> a good idea, that will save money to the building owner. It is also
> making it easier to people renting that houses to get some services.

	Yes and no, it externalizes some cost and moves around who pays for it. Which is fine with me, I accept that infrastructure is something where the community can be expected to chip in... (although I prefer the access network in public hands, where "chip" in can be easily organized and who generally are used to running infrastructure; then have the free market organize the services using that infrastructure)

> 
> I don't want to imagine the discussions and major works that I would
> need, for example, to put a Starlink antenna on the rooftop of any
> building of apartments, and passing cables, installing switches, to
> share the access with neighbours or not. Of course, anything can be
> done, but it cost a lot, and not only money.
> 
> I understand that PLC can be worse than Wi-Fi mesh for VDSL, because
> of the interferences of PLC on VDSL. Where I tried, the house with
> multiple floors, the access was HFC.

	Yepp, HFC/DOCSIS and FTTH, even LTE/5G are relative immune to PLC, however PLC often does not cross from apartment t apartment here due to how internal wiring is done, but inside a single unit electric grid it is supposed to work... my apartment is small enough not to need that, and I rather use an ethernet cable anyway. But I hread of users happy with PLC, after putting a cake shaper on both sides to reign in the original vendor firmware's tendency for high jitter.

> But well, Internet access is getting more and more personal and done
> mainly though mobile devices.

	That is one direction, the other direction is that it is going to be switched over to fiber. And these are not mutually exclusive. But looking at the LTE/5G offers over here most have clear warts when judged as a way to organize internet access for a family. As you say carriers prefer that each individual get their own access via a phone. However that is incompatible with some important use cases...

> In the future, maybe the phone company
> will put a femtocell on each house and you will just connect to it and
> pay a mobile subscription. Who knows.

	Maybe, hopefully not. I will not be looking forward to that future. Telcos and mobile carriers do not have the kind of business acumen that endears them to me. Case in point, the big ex-monopoly telco's in Europe are lobbying the EU to make big content providers pay for he privilege of causing the traffic that end-users consume... While my heart does not go out for the "poor" big 5 tech quasi-monopolies either, I am long enough in the game that I know that they will claw back that cost from their customers. Call me old-fashioned, but I do not want to pay twice for my internet access, once directly to the Telco and once infdirectly through higher costs for content. That said, I am not unhappy with my ISP and my mobile carrier, but I do not want to tempt them ;)

> That makes me think how is
> people with Starlink managing to get SMS for 2FA or regular phone
> calls on their mobiles,

	Honestly mobile phones are terrible 2FA devices... SMS is not secure (for little money you can organize to use SS& whith which you can route accessof SMS where ever you want, and mobile phone have a pretty gross update story, looking at you Android (that also affects Google itself, updates and especially security updates are stopped way typically well before the devices have stopped being useful).

> when they only have the Dishy and no mobile
> coverage, e.g. going somewhere remote with an RV.

	You switch to a non SMS based 2FA method, on the same phone that while for different reasons has a similarly sketchy security offering as SMS...

> 
> Regards,
> 
> David
> 
> 2023-03-15 17:09 GMT+01:00, Sebastian Moeller <moeller0 at gmx.de>:
>> Hi David,
>> 
>>> On Mar 15, 2023, at 16:24, David Fernández via Starlink
>>> <starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Hi David,
>>> 
>>> That's true: "any communications infrastructure that you mandate get
>>> built into new buildings is going to be obsolete long before the
>>> building is"
>> 
>> 	There is some truth to that, I live in a house from 1918...
>> 
>>> 
>>> I am afraid this is also true: any communications infrastructure that
>>> you do not mandate to get built into new buildings will never make it
>>> into them afterwards.
>> 
>> 	However the internal infrastructure was not last touched 1918... so updates
>> are possible ;)
>> 
>>> 
>>> So, we end up having things like IAB (Integrated Access and Backhaul)
>>> defined to extend 5G coverage to downtown areas, where buildings
>>> cannot be touched for historical/artistic reasons (extreme case).
>>> 
>>> Some time ago I tried to install coaxial in a flat that had only
>>> copper wiring. It was impossible. Coaxial was too thick to pass
>>> through the hole reserved for copper telephone cable (even removing
>>> old cables), so I stayed with DSL. It is important that architects
>>> consider the cabling needs of homes, not only for electricity.
>> 
>> 	Especially as power lines are often placed inside walls in "plaster" over
>> here. However even for power it has long been clear that the option with
>> long term usability is to not put the actual cables in plaster, but some
>> flexible tubes, wide enough to allow a few parallel cables. However for
>> telecommunication wiring things are often a bit special... like DSL-wires is
>> best not placed cloae and parallel to power lines, fiber and things like
>> cat8 cables have different minimal turning radii that power cables, ... all
>> things that make it preferable to design two distribution tube systems, one
>> for power one for comms.
>> 
>> 
>>> I have
>>> used PLC (Power Line Comms) to extend Wi-Fi coverage at multiple floor
>>> homes, but it is not perfect solution.
>> 
>> 	+1; not ideal especially for VDSL (profile 35b is quite sensitive to MIMO
>> PLC adapter which do carnage to the upper frequency sub carriers.
>> 
>>> I would not recommend it.
>>> Wireless mesh repeaters are worst, to my experience.
>> 
>> 	Funny, over here we are still mainly VDSL based (FTTH is coming, just not
>> very fast ;) ) and here PLC is typically less desirable than meshes of any
>> kind.
>> 
>> Regards
>> 	Sebastian
>> 
>>> 
>>> Regards,
>>> 
>>> David
>>> 
>>>> Date: Tue, 14 Mar 2023 11:37:21 -0700 (PDT)
>>>> From: David Lang <david at lang.hm>
>>>> To: David Fernández <davidfdzp at gmail.com>
>>>> Cc: starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net
>>>> Subject: Re: [Starlink] On FiWi
>>>> Message-ID: <8qq0r5n2-s836-1080-3362-2o8nr3qn1044 at ynat.uz>
>>>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"; Format="flowed"
>>>> 
>>>> any communications infrastructure that you mandate get built into new
>>>> buildings
>>>> is going to be obsolete long before the building is (especially radio
>>>> equipment)
>>>> 
>>>> I am a big fan of using wire (or fiber) directly to equipment when you
>>>> can.
>>>> wifi
>>>> is sexy and 'easy' to setup, but there is only so much airtime
>>>> available,
>>>> and
>>>> your radio footprint where you produce intereference to other equipment
>>>> is
>>>> much
>>>> larger than the usable footprint (let alone what your requirements are),
>>>> so
>>>> it
>>>> is far more work to share reasonably. You also are sending a lot of
>>>> power
>>>> places
>>>> where it's not useful, so you are wasting energy compared to having
>>>> somethign
>>>> hard-wired.
>>>> 
>>>> There are times when you need the mobility that radio gives you, and
>>>> times
>>>> where
>>>> it's advantages outweigh the disadvantages, but please don't fall into
>>>> the
>>>> trap
>>>> of thinking that wires are obsolete and should be discouraged, it's
>>>> exactly
>>>> the
>>>> opposite, the more we can hard-wire, the better the mobile devices that
>>>> can't be
>>>> hard wired can perform.
>>>> 
>>>> David Lang
>>>> 
>>>> On Tue, 14 Mar 2023, David Fernández via Starlink wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>> Hi Bob,
>>>>> 
>>>>> If you want that FiWi infrastructure on buildings, I am afraid that
>>>>> you only get it (in the long term) with a law that makes it mandatory
>>>>> to make new buildings with that infrastructure for communications.
>>>>> 
>>>>> In Spain, it should be added to this:
>>>>> https://avancedigital.mineco.gob.es/Infraestructuras/Paginas/Index.aspx
>>>>> 
>>>>> Regards,
>>>>> 
>>>>> David
>>>>> 
>>>>>> Date: Mon, 13 Mar 2023 21:27:23 -0700
>>>>>> From: rjmcmahon <rjmcmahon at rjmcmahon.com>
>>>>>> To: Sebastian Moeller <moeller0 at gmx.de>
>>>>>> Cc: dan <dandenson at gmail.com>, Jeremy Austin <jeremy at aterlo.com>, Rpm
>>>>>> 	<rpm at lists.bufferbloat.net>, libreqos
>>>>>> 	<libreqos at lists.bufferbloat.net>, Dave Taht via Starlink
>>>>>> 	<starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net>, bloat <bloat at lists.bufferbloat.net>
>>>>>> Subject: [Starlink] On FiWi
>>>>>> Message-ID: <bc1cfdf998bb6bb246a632f0dc0fe3a8 at rjmcmahon.com>
>>>>>> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8; format=flowed
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> To change the topic - curious to thoughts on FiWi.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Imagine a world with no copper cable called FiWi (Fiber,VCSEL/CMOS
>>>>>> Radios, Antennas) and which is point to point inside a building
>>>>>> connected to virtualized APs fiber hops away. Each remote radio head
>>>>>> (RRH) would consume 5W or less and only when active. No need for
>>>>>> things
>>>>>> like zigbee, or meshes, or threads as each radio has a fiber
>>>>>> connection
>>>>>> via Corning's actifi or equivalent. Eliminate the AP/Client power
>>>>>> imbalance. Plastics also can house smoke or other sensors.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Some reminders from Paul Baran in 1994 (and from David Reed)
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> o) Shorter range rf transceivers connected to fiber could produce a
>>>>>> significant improvement - - tremendous improvement, really.
>>>>>> o) a mixture of terrestrial links plus shorter range radio links has
>>>>>> the
>>>>>> effect of increasing by orders and orders of magnitude the amount of
>>>>>> frequency spectrum that can be made available.
>>>>>> o) By authorizing high power to support a few users to reach slightly
>>>>>> longer distances we deprive ourselves of the opportunity to serve the
>>>>>> many.
>>>>>> o) Communications systems can be built with 10dB ratio
>>>>>> o) Digital transmission when properly done allows a small signal to
>>>>>> noise ratio to be used successfully to retrieve an error free signal.
>>>>>> o) And, never forget, any transmission capacity not used is wasted
>>>>>> forever, like water over the dam. Not using such techniques represent
>>>>>> lost opportunity.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> And on waveguides:
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> o) "Fiber transmission loss is ~0.5dB/km for single mode fiber,
>>>>>> independent of modulation"
>>>>>> o) “Copper cables and PCB traces are very frequency dependent.  At
>>>>>> 100Gb/s, the loss is in dB/inch."
>>>>>> o) "Free space: the power density of the radio waves decreases with
>>>>>> the
>>>>>> square of distance from the transmitting antenna due to spreading of
>>>>>> the
>>>>>> electromagnetic energy in space according to the inverse square law"
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> The sunk costs & long-lived parts of FiWi are the fiber and the CPE
>>>>>> plastics & antennas, as CMOS radios+ & fiber/laser, e.g. VCSEL could
>>>>>> be
>>>>>> pluggable, allowing for field upgrades. Just like swapping out SFP in
>>>>>> a
>>>>>> data center.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> This approach basically drives out WiFi latency by eliminating shared
>>>>>> queues and increases capacity by orders of magnitude by leveraging
>>>>>> 10dB
>>>>>> in the spatial dimension, all of which is achieved by a physical
>>>>>> design.
>>>>>> Just place enough RRHs as needed (similar to a pop up sprinkler in an
>>>>>> irrigation system.)
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Start and build this for an MDU and the value of the building
>>>>>> improves.
>>>>>> Sadly, there seems no way to capture that value other than over long
>>>>>> term use. It doesn't matter whether the leader of the HOA tries to
>>>>>> capture the value or if a last mile provider tries. The value remains
>>>>>> sunk or hidden with nothing on the asset side of the balance sheet.
>>>>>> We've got a CAPEX spend that has to be made up via "OPEX returns" over
>>>>>> years.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> But the asset is there.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> How do we do this?
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Bob
>>>>>> 
>>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>>> Starlink at lists.bufferbloat.net
>>>>> https://lists.bufferbloat.net/listinfo/starlink
>>>> 
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>> 
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