Fiber optic cable installers

[I<3oil]

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

It’s not just kickbacks. It’s outright infrastructure money and grants.

 

[Number_35]

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.

Agreed the optical glass is mostly the same - but the last 15 or so years have seen the introduction of bend-tolerant fibre, which allows the installer lots of leeway.

And agreed the end equipment can be upgraded while the original fibre cable can continue to be used.

The oldest cables in our system go back about 35 years and the glass has held up well.

 

[brianl703]

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.

Ironically enough, MOST of the outages I've had with my cable modem service were due to Verizon contractors installing conduit for FIOS. Same group of clowns also hit a Verizon copper cable in at least two places, one of was in my front yard. They hit it on Friday and Verizon didn't show up to fix it till Tuesday. Then Verizon completely screwed up the drainage ditch in the process of fixing it. It doesn't drain properly to this day.

Done with that clownshow. I want nothing to do with Verizon. If they want to be an employment program for people who can barely dress themselves in the morning, so be it. I won't be their customer.

 

[chainblu]

Recently a company has been stringing fiber optic on the phone poles and preparing drops for each house.

Doing this in my neck of the woods. too. The 'drop box' is already mounted on the power pole by my driveway. Still waiting for final hookup. Apparently, they are using the actual service power lines to get the data to the houses. I'm curious to see how that works.

 

[dlundblad]

Was there an existing cable before? Frontier has a cable that runs down our road on the power poles, but they don’t service our area for some reason. We kept getting their junk mail every 3-6 months after buying the house so I kept calling hoping something would change. Nope sadly.

Wish we could get it. It’d be much faster and reliable. We have antenna internet now. It’s good enough for streaming, but on occasion goes down after a high wind.

 

[oldcodger]

Does the cost of fiber optic internet cost any more than sat. systems?

 

[mk378]

Fiber is usually a considerably lower monthly price than satellite.

 

[Skippy722]

Does the cost of fiber optic internet cost any more than sat. systems?

Did a bit of googling, MCEC (a rural co-op) is offering 100mbps up and down for $60/month with no data cap.

Fiber should be cheaper without knowing who you currently use for internet. But the fiber should lack the data caps that come with hughesnet/viasat.

 

[blufeb95]

Was there an existing cable before? Frontier has a cable that runs down our road on the power poles, but they don’t service our area for some reason. We kept getting their junk mail every 3-6 months after buying the house so I kept calling hoping something would change. Nope sadly.

Wish we could get it. It’d be much faster and reliable. We have antenna internet now. It’s good enough for streaming, but on occasion goes down after a high wind.

My grampa lives in an ex-GTE area and he was paying a ridiculous amount for a line with limited long distance until 2019, when he went to a cell, he doesn't want a computer or to pay for internet, but I looked out there before and Frontier has nothing available even though they used to send him fliers about DSL. His electric co-op ran fiber a few years ago but the last time I looked it was like $75/mo for at the cheapest option and he's fine not having a computer at his house and just going up town to the library, and now we've given him a smartphone he can look stuff up on.