Backhaul....

[Deval]

...which is interesting because Ethernet has been around for more than 25 years.

 

AJ

 

Yep, but now in the context of backhaul. Here at work, it interchanges between Ethernet and Fiber when mentioning NV backhaul.

[MarkyD311]

Here in OKC, VZW used Cox almost exclusively for backhaul in their LTE deployment. I'd be surprised to see Sprint go with the local telco (AT&T) for their backhaul when Cox has a really robust fiber network here, and has business class rates that are far lower than the incumbent baby bell. For what it's worth, Cox's site backhaul product around here is mostly Metro-E.

[koiulpoi]

When somebody says "ethernet", I think Cat 6 UTP. Which seeing as that (along with the same standards e.g. 1000BASE-T) are only rated to 100 meters... makes it not seemingly particularly useful.

[digiblur]

I hear Metro-E thrown around at work but it those speeds vary from 10meg to 1 Gig. Everyone just seems to have their own definition of things.

 

-- "Sensorly or it didn't happen!"

 

 

[tommym65]

When somebody says "ethernet", I think Cat 6 UTP. Which seeing as that (along with the same standards e.g. 1000BASE-T) are only rated to 100 meters... makes it not seemingly particularly useful.

 

"Cat-6" is a form of copper twisted pair. It is useful only for local area network segments. It can support very fast Ethernet (up to 1 Gbit), but it has virtually no relevance to mobile telephony.

 

Regardless of what "somebody says", Ethernet on modern fiber, microwave, coax, and even satellite media can move enormous amounts of data very, very quickly and for very long distances. Essentially all modern public communication (read: "The Internet") uses the various IEEE Ethernet protocols in transmitting and receiving its data.

[koiulpoi]

"Cat-6" is a form of copper twisted pair. It is useful only for local area network segments. It can support very fast Ethernet (up to 1 Gbit), but it has virtually no relevance to mobile telephony.

 

Regardless of what "somebody says", Ethernet on modern fiber, microwave, coax, and even satellite media can move enormous amounts of data very, very quickly and for very long distances. Essentially all modern public communication (read: "The Internet") uses the various IEEE Ethernet protocols in transmitting and receiving its data.

Oh, thank you, but I'm well aware of what it means. Simply, as I grew up with Cat5 and 10BASE-T being "ethernet" which evolved to 100 and 1000... my brain gets stuck on that.

 

I suppose my question would be: as far as I understood it, all of Sprint's PCS network had "Ethernet" backhaul, as it was all T1's, and then simply switched. Is this not correct? Are there sites with "non-ethernet" backhaul? What would that even be? Was there a time before that simply ran, uh, copper wire to the sites? It would make sense, but still...

[S4GRU]

Internally, Sprint refers to backhaul in the following categories: T1, microwave, direct fiber and Ethernet. Ethernet uses a direct internet connection from a provider as backhaul. Whereas the other types use a direct connection to the MSC and/or cores.

 

Robert via Samsung Note II via Tapatalk

 

 

[compuwizz]

I cannot prove you wrong. However, based on a conversation I had with a Samsung engineer early in deployment where he was talking about cable Ethernet installed at a site in Chicago, he said that sometimes they are installing coax directly to the telco box. He said final connections from AAV were not fiber very often. He is the guy I got the term "indirect fiber" connections from.

 

The connection from the telco box (demarcation) to the routers would be Cat 5e in this instance.

 

Robert via Samsung Note II via Tapatalk

 

DOCSIS based Ethernet over Coax possibly could be what this site was using.

 

UPDATE: Looks like its sometimes called Ethernet over DOCSIS: http://www.cable360.net/ct/strategy/businesscases/31019.html#.UOcVV2_Af_s

[compuwizz]

I see people mentioning Alternative Access Vendors (AAV) as a backhual type. How is this different than fiber to the tower or Microwave?

 

I would assume this would be companies such as Zayo, Sidera, XO, TW Telecom, Cox, Fibertower etc providing fiber to the tower versus the local ILEC/RLEC in the area. Is this assumption correct?

 

Related to fiber backhual, I have heard of some new Metro Ethernet peering exchanges that allow various companies such as the above to all interconnect to bridge the same customer onto the same network. So say Sprint could get a 10 Gigabit link to an exchange in a common place and then get linked up to all its towers that are served by the various Fiber (metro ethernet non Sonet) providers via one or two connections versus having a physical connection to each tower's fiber running back to a Sprint switch location.

 

All the fiber providers would connect into the same Sprint VLAN on the exchange and then Sprint could *see* all its towers.

 

These same exchanges can also be dropoff points for Verizon Wireless, AT&T and T-Mobile towers too.

 

Its much cheaper than dealing with MPLS ports and trying to get all the towers onto some giant MPLS network.

[Deval]

Actually,

Its much cheaper than dealing with MPLS ports and trying to get all the towers onto some giant MPLS network.

 

Actually one of the core benefits of the Sprint network is the tight integration with the MPLS core and wireless services.

 

http://convergence.sprint.com/?ECID=vanity:convergence

[compuwizz]

Good point, I guess since they own their own MPLS enabled network on the wireline side, the per port cost wouldn't be all that much internally for Sprint.

 

I'm used to seeing quotes for MPLS as a potential customer so the Metro Ethernet exchanges would be more cost effective for me instead of a MPLS network.