Fiber optic cable installers

[oldcodger]

I live in a rural area with only satellite internet available. Recently a company has been stringing fiber optic on the phone poles and preparing drops for each house. Never heard of the company. I don't see how it can possibly be a good paying operation with so much cable required for so few customers.
The money must be part of the infrastructure money.
What are the advantages of this cable vs satellite?

 

[dishdude]

It's ultra fast and reliable.

 

[Revving2Redline]

satellite has horrible download ability. Can't game very well. Living out in the sticks has its negatives but a pond or a creek and a good beer makes you remember the good outweighs the bad

 

[simple_gifts]

What are the advantages of this cable vs satellite?

The fiber in my city is symmetrical 1Gbs upload and 1Gbs download

Originally they (GoNetSpeed) wanted only the high density areas in downtown but funds became available and the mayor indicated she'd get them if the company committed to do the whole city to cover any school from home scenarios in the future.

 

[tnt_motorsports]

We switched to Fiber several years ago. It is awesome especially for using Hulu and other streaming services. With 4 users and multiple devices it sure has made a difference.

Just my $0.02

 

[Skippy722]

I live in a rural area with only satellite internet available. Recently a company has been stringing fiber optic on the phone poles and preparing drops for each house. Never heard of the company. I don't see how it can possibly be a good paying operation with so much cable required for so few customers.
The money must be part of the infrastructure money.
What are the advantages of this cable vs satellite?

For satellite, the latency is generally awful. Unless you have Starlink, your latency is probably insanely high, like half a second or more high. It doesn’t really matter if you’re just browsing the web or watching video, but it makes online games unplayable and video chats a pain.

Bandwidth cap is another, satellite providers generally have pretty low caps.

Speed a big one, fiber can be way faster and more consistent.

 

[nomas]

Depending on how good of a network they install , they can " rent space " on their fiber to other companies .

 

[y_p_w]

For a sparsely populated area they might just be stringing cables with fewer lines bundled together and possibly less complicated switching equipment. Also - a lot of this sort of things gets government subsidies.

 

[14Accent]

Get on board with fiber ASAP. I had gig service at my last place, and it was amazing. We have 250 meg here in rural WI and it's also bulletproof.

 

[86cutlass307]

A company called Vexus has been subcontracting an underground boring company to create a hole to push orange or blue plastic pipe through to run their fiber optic cable in my area. There has been untold damage to residential water service taps/meters, natural gas pipe penetrations, electrical service cuts, you name it. My personal experience was a ruptured service line from my meter to a backflow preventer. The boring crew leader tried to tell me their work did not cause my leak; I said, "No leak before you bored under my water line, leak after you bored under my water line, this isn't rocket science brother." They paid the plumbing bill.

 

[simple_gifts]

A company called Vexus has been subcontracting an underground boring company to create a hole to push orange or blue plastic pipe through to run their fiber optic cable in my area. There has been untold damage to residential water service taps/meters, natural gas pipe penetrations, electrical service cuts, you name it. My personal experience was a ruptured service line from my meter to a backflow preventer. The boring crew leader tried to tell me their work did not cause my leak; I said, "No leak before you bored under my water line, leak after you bored under my water line, this isn't rocket science brother." They paid the plumbing bill.

I assume you are providing this as an incidental story and not a case against fiber.

 

[brianl703]

I assume you are providing this as an incidental story and not a case against fiber.

Just hope that whatever subcontractor they use to install the buried drop to your house has a little more care. I could get Verizon FIOS where I live. I won't, because they'll need to cross my well line with their cable, and I'd rather not be without water for a day or more because the knuckle-draggers they hire hit it.

 

[Number_35]

Depending on how good of a network they install , they can " rent space " on their fiber to other companies .

When I was in fibre design, the incremental cost of adding extra fibres was about $0.02/fibre strand/metre. In other words, very cheap compared to the job as a whole.

The major cost of the job is the installation; it makes good sense to build in extra capacity (in the form of dark fibres) up front.

 

[86cutlass307]

I assume you are providing this as an incidental story and not a case against fiber.

No heartburn with fiber at all...the bandwidth is amazing.

 

[Revving2Redline]

497 Mbps Down, 10.8 Up

 

[mk378]

The drop line to a house will not be buried deep like the main lines are.

 

[johnnydc]

I live in a rural area with only satellite internet available. Recently a company has been stringing fiber optic on the phone poles and preparing drops for each house. Never heard of the company. I don't see how it can possibly be a good paying operation with so much cable required for so few customers.
The money must be part of the infrastructure money.
What are the advantages of this cable vs satellite?

Once you switch to fiber optic, you will never want anything else. Very fast, Very reliable. As long as the lines don't go down. Every now and then we get a driver knocking down a pole or some wind damage, But it's usually back up in a matter of a couple hours.

 

[Kruse]

For a sparsely populated area they might just be stringing cables with fewer lines bundled together and possibly less complicated switching equipment. Also - a lot of this sort of things gets government subsidies.

The local rural providers here get HUGE kickbacks from Uncle Sam to provide rural internet service.

 

[mk378]

This should have been done like the REA where the government offered 50 year zero APR loans to electric utilities to build power lines into rural areas. There was rapid buildout to universal coverage, and ultimately it did not cost the government very much.

Also that should have been done 20 years ago. The fiber of 20 years ago is the same as it is today. And into the future, today's installed singlemode fiber is physically capable of much higher data speeds simply by updating the equipment at the ends as that technology becomes available.

 

[I<3oil]

497 Mbps Down, 10.8 Up

Only 10 up? Ouch. Ours is 1000/1000 symmetrical