Using PSTN for LAN dialup, 10 hour charge question...

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Using PSTN for LAN dialup, 10 hour charge question...

kiwirock

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#113196 9-Jan-2013 12:11

I remember when ISP's had to do the 087 move and Telecom threatened people who used dialup for more than 10 hours a month to a local number for Internet access a fee (I still think ISP's got taken for a ride by Telecom over this). Anyway the reason I bring this up is I need to clarify something.... the 10 hour local call per month charge.

What I want to know is, does this 10 hour a month thing apply when dialing in to a LAN? Telecom wouldn't be able to tell the difference so I'm guessing any data calls that last for anything beyond 10 hours a month to a local number get charged for it? Or has monitoring phone lines for this a thing of the past?

I ask because I experiment a lot with AAC and other codec audio links for broadcast radio. I usually use broadband for this but I'm pottering with a backup via dialup but won't bother if there's a charge for it still.

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#742185 9-Jan-2013 12:25

If you're on a plan that gives free local calling there are no charges for calling local numbers, period.

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tonyhughes

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#742194 9-Jan-2013 12:34

Whatever you are looking to do over dialup could probably be done effectively over a 3G connection?

Much faster.
Cheap hardware ($40 for a 3G USB stick with 1GB/2month expiry data).
No dependency on the vagaries of the POTs system.
Forward compatible (POTs is starting to disappear from our lives, as of now. Might take 100 years, but some folk already don't have POTs).

I already carry some backups on my handset - it comes into WiFi range, starts up a connection to a server, and downloads the latest backup file, and rotates an older one off. (Obviously this is not my only backup strategy), it would be trivial for a second location to be scripted in to offload that backup to (When connected to WiFi at second location), basically an automated sneakernet of sorts.

Hmmm, ranting now, and wanting to try it for myself.

kiwirock

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#742263 9-Jan-2013 13:51

I thought about 3G. As I already have a phone I can plug in to USB and off I go.

As out of date dial-up is though, when something goes wrong, ie quakes, natural disasters, 3G gets hammered with traffic.

If POTS still works which a lot of the times it does, it's circuit switched which is a big advantage. In an emergency plain old analogue with some transformers work, but most studios now have codecs on the end of broadband for outside broadcasts and some still with dial-up based units like the Smarti's and Comrex units where more than speech quality is required.

It would be very easy to chuck a x86 router in to interface dial-in with the broadband equipment and run it on 26K etc... But I'm not sure about how Telecom monitor lines to know when to charge more for data calls after 10 hours. Or if they even still do that, or if it only applied to 'known' ISP local calling numbers etc... or if they just flag anything that's data as coming under the 10 hour a month thing.

There's really not a lot of information about how they determine exactly what is calling an ISP vs LAN using TCP/IP etc....

wellygary

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#742285 9-Jan-2013 14:32

Fairly sure Telecom dont care anymore....

But I have to question why you are looking at this,

Dial up is pathetically slow, you might get 56Kbs if you are lucky, a good ADSL2+ connection should give you around 1Mbs upload, i.e near 20x the capacity of dial up, meaning you could complete your 10 hour per month backup phone call in 30 minutes over a BB connection......

If you wanted to you could also post them a USB stick once a month, but if you have Broadband, what is driving you to go to a analog solution......

steve98

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#742288 9-Jan-2013 14:36

Just thought I'd point out that in nearly all the Chch quakes when the POTS network went down or was overloaded, my XT connection hummed along with next to no issues. In the September 2010 one I was stood in my hallway with the world shaking around me making calls over Skype to loved ones overseas to let them know I was OK, while it was impossible to get through to loved ones here over POTS because either we were down or they were down or both.

kiwirock

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#742292 9-Jan-2013 14:46

Sorry should have worded it better.... a backup at a radio station means a backup audio feed or stream between studios or outside broadcast units, not a data backup for files.

The driving force of PSTN is its reliability and circuit switched to get the job done if everything else fails, ie the Internet.

Since everything is already TCP/IP in a studio when it comes to remotes, and POTS is about as primitive as you can get for simplicity sake - it's an important backup feed for links that span more than a local radio license can.

So I thought instead of using dedicated codec units with modems in them using some proprietary protocol, it would be just as easy to use whatever codecs on a PC or other Ethernet codec device and just switch to TCP/IP dial-in instead. But then I remembered about the saga over dial-up hours with local numbers way back and wondered what the exact ins and outs of it are today, if it still remains.

Zeon

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#742300 9-Jan-2013 14:57

I honestly wouldn't count on POTS being a good solution for if-all-else fails situations. What distance do you need to span IE where is the LAN in relation to you?

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Behodar

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#742302 9-Jan-2013 15:00

kiwirock: There's really not a lot of information about how they determine exactly what is calling an ISP vs LAN using TCP/IP etc....

I *think* that Telecom simply used to have a list of known ISP dialup numbers. As far as I know there was no "inspection" of the type of call.

kiwirock

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#742310 9-Jan-2013 15:06

At the moment only 3KM non-line of site.

We were using Wi-Fi for a while and getting away with the undesirable profile RF wise between sites, until more and more interference knocked that on the head (when it went it was brilliant, 6Mbps through-put, but when it didn't, well there can be no such thing as doesn't work in a live environment). So back to DSL for anything.

So I thought why not do both, have modems sitting on the PSTN then it also gives the option for long distance circuit switched in the few other situations where broadband wasn't possible (once due to 3G being down in CHCH - New Brighton about 5 months back halfway through a breakfast show), and another where there was no 3G coverage at all in Karamea and sharing broadband has it's cons with live streaming.

In those situations, a long distance doesn't matter since it's a toll call and it's being paid for.

But for locally when broadband fails, dial-in isn't so bad, unless it comes at a cost beyond a local call like Internet calls did. But how would Telecom determine which is which, LAN to LAN or Internet call?

kiwirock

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#742318 9-Jan-2013 15:21

Behodar:
kiwirock: There's really not a lot of information about how they determine exactly what is calling an ISP vs LAN using TCP/IP etc....

I *think* that Telecom simply used to have a list of known ISP dialup numbers. As far as I know there was no "inspection" of the type of call.

That's what I was hoping was done. I might just need to connect the two LAN's for a day and wait and see what shows up on the bill.

At the other end (3KM away studio), other studios in Auckland, Cromwell and few other independents take a live feed over DSL at a higher bitrate. There's 3G available if needed. If the Internet in the South Island goes down, which has happened before without the need for the POTS to fall over, POTS was the only thing still going. But why not digitise that in my opinion, unless it costs even more than a voice call.

So I'm pretty convinced having an old modem hanging off these routers won't hurt, but I need to know what the policy regarding price is on modem calls vs voice calls locally so there's no surprises.

wellygary

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#742347 9-Jan-2013 15:54

The only real issue I can see is if you bump up against the "Fair use policy" that is in the residential homeline contract,

If you are a non profit, then you will probably be fine, but if you are commercial you probably should have a business connection

http://www.telecom.co.nz/phoneline/phoneline/plansandpricing/

"Fair Use PolicyPlease also be advised that the Fair Use Policy applies. An indication of Fair use is averaged against customer profiles and estimated residential use of these plans. If you breach this policy we may ask you to moderate your usage. If you fail to do so, we reserve the right, without further notice, to charge you for the excessive element of your usage and/or remove the service from your account. The following uses would be considered to breach this policy – business use, automated call messaging, monitoring services, broadcast fax or outbound call centres."

raytaylor

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#742385 9-Jan-2013 17:02

I dont really see a problem other than the speed limitation
A 36k audio stream is very low quality - and you will have random disconnect issues.

10 years ago I had a tie line before broadband came to Wairoa between my parents office and our house. The idea was that they didnt want to pay for a 4c a min dialup connection, so the tie line would link the lan home where we had flatrate internet and i could proxy it. $300 for a tie line was cheaper than $600 for an always on dial up connection. Businesses were still charged a per min fee for the dialup to the isp numbers.

A tie line is where telecom lease you two copper loops from the exchange, and they bridge them on the patching boards in the exchange, like your own private pair of wires between buildings across town that bypassed the telephone network- which you can hook up to your pbx for a remote extension or alarm circuit.

So yeah i would expect issues with the codec sound quality and random disconnects. It was a problem we had - but automatic redial just fixed it within a minute for us.

edit: i ended up putting a SHDSL link in that ran at something like 128k using a couple of ethernet extenders. Had to get the local telephone tech to take off the loop filters inside the exchange to make it work though. Expensive but 3 months later we moved to napier and i got 128k with orcon - much cheaper.

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kiwirock

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#742475 9-Jan-2013 19:46

Ahhhh memories. That's expensive for a tie line. In the early 90's we had one at the local access station at the time to a home studio. The price was only $40 per end on the same exchange. It carried a full 20khz balance analogue audio feed. The line was equalised as flat as possible. That brings back memories though.... Everything was carts, reels and vynil and I'm not grey haired yet hehe. I was to young and naive to want to go he IT route then and stayed in the broadcast industry for a decade instead. But I would have loved to use a tie line for computer networking then. It was all BNC and thin coax then and a GB drive cost over a grand!

tonyhughes

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#742480 9-Jan-2013 19:53

I would check with your POTS provider about what your free calling covers.

Entirely possible that it is free voice calling only.

They wouldn't know or care about 1, 2, 3 hour circuit switched data calls, but consistent 10 hour calls might flag up, and get dealt to in some way.

If it's critical, then you should be sure your provider allows it.

But if it's critical, don't use POTS. ;-P

WiFi worked some time ago? Why not just get better gear? Might be a case of another metre or 2 higher, and some decent antennas and APs.

raytaylor

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#742487 9-Jan-2013 20:07

kiwirock: Ahhhh memories. That's expensive for a tie line. In the early 90's we had one at the local access station at the time to a home studio. The price was only $40 per end on the same exchange.

I looked at getting another one between the office and another building, and they quoted $700 per month so i said no. Then they stopped offering them.

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