Page 6 of 33

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: August 11th, 2014, 10:07 am
by nickmgray
If they are going to charge $109 a month for the service, they will be delivering fiber to your house. I would gladly pay that much for internet if I know they can guarantee the speed they are promising. Comcast is horrid and there are no other options for those of us who do not reside in USI's fiber coverage area.

I'm glad USI has been rolling out fiber to Minneapolis, but it will take them another decade to cover the whole city at the pace they are moving. Century Link has the cash needed to get things moving much quicker. I doubt they will have Minneapolis and Saint Paul completely covered within a year, but they could offer coverage to a few hundred thousand customers by then.

Honestly, this is exactly what we need. Since Century Link is looking to bring wider coverage to the Twin Cities, it could force USI to step up its game.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: August 11th, 2014, 12:23 pm
by David Greene
Century Link has the cash needed to get things moving much quicker.
Actually, no they don't. They cover several states and have a paltry budget for upgrades. Unless they've got some secret cash reserve somewhere, they don't have nearly the money to make fiber-to-the-door appear in any significant area. mattaudio is right about them using copper to some "nearby" fiber line.

It's taking USI a long time to wire everything because they have to dig fiber under all of the boulevards and some places don't even have boulevards so they have to pound concrete. It's extremely time-consuming. Perhaps CenturyLink could use poles instead.

The money is probably going to be the limiting factor.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: August 13th, 2014, 12:56 pm
by nickmgray
The company doesn't have a lot of cash on hand (roughly $160 million at the end of the last quarter), but that doesn't really mean much. The company is profitable and could easily get financing or sell more company shares to get the cash for this infrastructure investment. At some point, companies like Comcast and CenturyLink need to realize that they need to spend a lot of money to stay in this business. If they don't invest at the right time, they will fizzle out and become irrelevant.

Right now, CenturyLink speeds are slower than Comcast. If (and that's a really big if) Comcast decides to start laying fiber first, CenturyLink could have a very hard time staying in business.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 3rd, 2014, 2:39 pm
by nickmgray
Did anyone happen to stop by the CenturyLink booth at the state fair for a demo of their new service? I've been seeing a lot of commercials on TV their plans to roll out the new and improved 1GBps fiber network, but can't find any details about the rollout plan.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 7:06 am
by Longfellow
Does USI Wireless have any plans to lay down fiber along Minnehaha Ave since it is scheduled to be reconstructed from 2015 to 2016? It seems like this would be a good opportunity for them.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 7:39 am
by seanrichardryan
I talked to several century link folks 're: their rollout. The Fiber will be coming down the poles just above their current copper bundles. Connections to homes will be mostly aerial. Fiber can't be cut like wire so the pieces to the homes are in premanufactured lengths and any extra is rolled up at the connection point. Homes who have signed up on a waiting list for 1g service will be first, with concentration on areas not currently served by a fiber network.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 8:19 am
by mattaudio
Yay, more wires in backyards! ugh

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 10:20 am
by jkrejci
Just saw this pretty nifty interactive map showing addresses/apartments with the fiber service. It could be used for apartment shopping.

http://fiber.usinternet.com/customers/where/


Also, fiber can be cut like wire and re-spliced and it can be done either in the middle of a span or at the end with the connector.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 11:22 am
by seanrichardryan
My thought exactly. I learned this while having my service buried between the house and alleyway. I asked if there was some fiber line I could pick up to throw in the trench while I had it open. Unfortunately... No.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 6:51 pm
by bus14
I talked to several century link folks 're: their rollout. The Fiber will be coming down the poles just above their current copper bundles. Connections to homes will be mostly aerial. Fiber can't be cut like wire so the pieces to the homes are in premanufactured lengths and any extra is rolled up at the connection point. Homes who have signed up on a waiting list for 1g service will be first, with concentration on areas not currently served by a fiber network.
Any information about multi-family buildings? Or anyone else? Can we expect service to highrises (I myself live in one)? It would seem easy enough to connect the main building, but do they then need to go floor by floor to spread out the fiber?

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 8:11 pm
by jkrejci
I have no idea how CenturyLink does it, maybe not at all. US Internet can run fiber to the building then install cat5 to the units of the building. A high rise with no existing cat5 might be a bit of a challenge but it can certainly be done.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 8:16 pm
by FISHMANPET
A friend lives in a new building with USI Fiber, USI feeds the building and the building is wired with Cat5. There's really no reason to run Fiber to each individual unit, but retrofitting an existing building could be difficult. Either way you're running something new.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 18th, 2014, 9:52 pm
by Smoothuser
So I saw Hennipin County Fiber trucks out by my work on Hwy 55 and got excited. Then saw this: http://www.startribune.com/local/west/118296159.html

However, this was from 2011 and I still watch the sea of cars sit on 55 every morning.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 19th, 2014, 7:37 am
by illman00
I've been noticing Egan construction trucks appearing to be burying fiber lines all down highway 394 working their way west from hwy 100. I just noticed them like a month or do ago and wonder if it has to do with the century link fiber. They have are near ridgedale now.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: September 19th, 2014, 3:07 pm
by mulad
The top article in the dead-tree version of the Strib this morning was about Bemidji getting gigabit Ethernet next year, though they're saying it would cost $100/mo -- a bit more in the range of a small-business service rather than for the home (unless they ran a cable TV-like service over it, I suppose)

http://www.startribune.com/local/275682421.html

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: October 1st, 2014, 7:46 am
by dbaur31
My building was supposedly the first to get CenturyLink's fiber downtown. The tech that did the install actually told me that as far as he knew, I was the first person to get it. Here's a screenshot from a recent test. I'm currently on a three month promo, but it goes up to $100ish this month I think. The connection smokes, no doubt about it, but I can't say I really need the horsepower. I'll be downgrading, but it's been nice while it lasted :)

https://www.dropbox.com/s/r06zydrerksal ... 8.png?dl=0

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: October 1st, 2014, 8:00 am
by seanrichardryan
Meanwhile, here's my morning on their 20mbps service:

Image

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: October 2nd, 2014, 10:17 am
by blobs
New runs should be strung with Cat6 or even better Cat6a, but not Cat5. Cat5 is defunct.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: October 2nd, 2014, 10:21 am
by mister.shoes
New runs should be strung with Cat6 or even better Cat6a, but not Cat5. Cat5 is defunct.
I just had my entire house wired with ethernet as part of the finishing-the-basement project. My electrician (!) pulled cat5 everywhere when I specifically asked for cat6. "What's the difference? It's all the same wire." *sigh* Thankfully, it's all cat6 now.

Re: Minneapolis Fiber

Posted: October 2nd, 2014, 10:25 am
by David Greene
New runs should be strung with Cat6 or even better Cat6a, but not Cat5. Cat5 is defunct.
I just had my entire house wired with ethernet as part of the finishing-the-basement project. My electrician (!) pulled cat5 everywhere when I specifically asked for cat6. "What's the difference? It's all the same wire." *sigh* Thankfully, it's all cat6 now.
I've actually been thinking long-term about doing something like this. The question I always come back to is, "why isn't wireless good enough for inside the house?" Right now, I can't think of a reason. I'd appreciate your perspective.