Unique Broadband Over Powerline Project Planned For Mosques

Lucas123 writes "Broadband over powerline (BPL) provider Velchip is heading up a project that will offer 60 million very unique network users an unlimited high speed Internet connection of 224Mbps at a cost of only around RM5 ($1.58) per user per month. That's the cheapest, fastest internet connection in the world. The network is slated for use in the $14 billion 'Smart Mosque' project, which will be rolled out over three years in Indonesia and will link together 400,000 mosques. To add some perspective, in the US Verizon FiOS currently offers up to 30 Mbps downloads and 5 Mbps uploads starting at $42.99 a month. BPL modems use existing electrical power lines to deliver high speed Internet access and data transmission."

Unlimited?

I think you'll need Allah's help for that.

Re:Unlimited?

A fast connection to your ISP, doesn't mean you'll have a fast Internet experience.

While this will no doubt allow the ISP to deliver cache/proxy data very quickly, it will not be financially viable to provide very fast live-internet down this pipe. E.g anything that can be classified as a web-application will probably still be quite average/slow speeds.

The price comes about from using an existing infrastructure, as you know the biggest cost in rolling out a network is the transmission medium. (Especially if it's not your expense to maintain it.)

Re:Unlimited?

That of course if Allah has nothing against millions of believers downloading porn on bittorrent at super-high speeds.

Re:

That's what happens when morons get mod point!

I expect this post will also be modded down by a moron mod!

Whoa there Nelly!

That's the cheapest, fastest internet connection in the world.

No. It's not the fastet, because it doesn't exist.

To add some perspective, in the states Verizon FiOS currently offers up to 30 Mbps downloads and 5 Mbps uploads starting at $42.99 a month.

Yes, they do. Right now. Who knows what Verizon will be offering when (if) these guys get this network going. Awesome. The US still has better internet access than much of the third world.

Re:

The US still has better internet access than much of the third world.

Comparing our internet access to third world countries is pathetic. Why don't we have better internet access than ALL of the third world, if not the best internet access, period?

Re:Whoa there Nelly!

Why don't we have better internet access than ALL of the third world, if not the best internet access, period?

Because bad internet access is more profitable. If everybody had gigabit lines to their homes, it would be very hard to sell "faster" business lines to businesses at an inflated cost. By artificially limiting the low end of the market, they inflate the value of the high end, and hold the whole thing together by passing laws to block any competition. Isn't capitalism grand?

Third World?

Hardly a fair comparison. Japan vs. the US is a much better comparison. In some parts, they are offering 1Gbps. In most places, the average is 60 Mbs for about $35/mo.

Republicans have never been big on competition. Just ask their friends who helped to write the 1996 Telecommunications Act. That whole "Republican Revolution" was really a revolution for their *Republican* investor friends.

Bear Stearns will quietly tell you that Bush just wanted to bail his friends out. That's the free market for ya.

Until the market gets *really* free from the incumbents, we aren't going to see very high speeds on our internet connections. Here's a great link on the subject of how Bush and his friends let it happen:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/28/AR2007082801990_pf.html [washingtonpost.com]

Yes, Republicans like free markets, as long as its free for *Republican* investors to pillage, rape and burn.

So the next time you wonder why you're still using DSL at 1.5 Mbs, just ask Bush. At least he knows what a checkout scanner in s supermarket looks like. (Or does he?) Or you can go here: www.speedmatters.org

Enjoy.

Spec needs to be clearer

Well it's not clear from the article if it's 224Mbps for all 60 million users. Also, the premises could have 224Mbps locally, but the end to end a fraction of that.

The news headline and article are bullshit.

Why do they cound 400.000 mosques as 60 million users? If I have 10 people in my appartment do my Internet connection become much cheaper then? To me the price seems to be 1500 times more than what they say for each 224 mbps connection, which are 2370 $. Sure the dollar are falling but it's still expensive as hell, and it's neither of cheapest or fastest there is.

Just marketing bullshit.

Who cares if there are 1500 possible mosques visitors in each mosque?

fritz their brains with unshielded RF

i sure hope they don't fritz their brains by exposing themselves to that much HARSHLY modulated unshielded RF energy...

Bad Idea

Broadband over power lines is an extraordinarily bad idea.

It might just about work in a country where there is no radio or TV broadcasting or mobile telephony to interfere with, and no panic about the effects of stray RF waves on the human body.

Re:

BPL typically uses frequencies much lower than where most TV broadcasting takes place, and is WAAAAY below the frequencies used by mobile phones.

As far as RF exposure goes, these are power lines. The power levels that BPL uses are way below the EMP emissi

Could someone enlighten me?

Why would you need high speed internet at a mosque of all places? Who goes to a church, synagogue, temple, Scientology brainwashing center, etc. to access the Web?

Re:Could someone enlighten me?

Probably because the Mosque doubles as Town Hall and general purpose public building in many parts of Indonesia. I think this is a great way to enlighten people and broaden their experience of the world.

Re:Could someone enlighten me?

In much of the world mosques, Buddhist temples and\or Catholic churches are the only places the locals can get a proper education. Ultra high speed internet could be extremely useful to them when divvied up among thousands of students and religious scholars.

bpl is a hoax

Any power engineer worth his salt knows the power lines can be modeled as an RLC network... creating losses. These have been optimized for low frequencies (50-60 Hz). Once you get above 1 kHz, your signal won't propogate more than 500 feet. 1MHz and you're lucky to get 50 feet. BPL doesn't actually use the copper line as a waveguide, but creates a rude radio transmitter in the GHz range, which can cause all kinds of trouble. The reason they're trying this abroad is that it's already been rejected outright in the US.

BPL is deploying in the U.S.

I live in the deplyment area in Virginia. Here is the U.S. map: http://www.bpl.coop/deploymentmap.php [bpl.coop] It is funded partly by the old Rural Electrificatio Agency of the 1930's! Its successor agency actually, in the Ag Dept. The problem of interfering with radio, especially ham readio, was supposedly fixed by "notching of" certain frequencies.

But... deployment here is three years behind schedule. Customers of two substations have it, but I don't know how well it is working. The company claims some equipment problem.
Rural users are really looking forward to this, if it works, or any alternative to satellite. The electrical co-op (non-profit utility, like a credit union compared to a bank, established in the 1930's) said the price would be $25/month. Satellite is $40 with terrible contracts and equipment costs. Not to mention gamers cannot live with the 0.7+ second lag.

There is no alternative in rural areas, where our cell service is marginal. Dialup with images off has been fun! More important than images off is selectively blocking Flash.

Deployment: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_line_communication#Deployments [wikipedia.org] But see the next section, "Concluded Deployments" with a long list of place where BPL has been dismantled.

As for the tech. aspects, note you can run internet over a fence wire. :) I'll try to find the link.

Re:

What you're talking about is PLC which is the low frequency predecessor to BPL that is used for grid control functions. I think PLC goes up to about 500 khz. That technology is proven, works fairly well and doesn't interfere with radio spectrum. Many co

Note for the Slashdot Grammar Council

60 million very unique network users

I can make the argument that a particular network design is "very" unique, suggesting that the design has "many distinctive attributes". Many grammar weenies would vehemently disagree with me.

But I have a tough time understanding that there could be 60 million "very" unique network users. I'd suppose that they'd just be unique.

Re:Indonesia?

The contractors are Malaysian--but yes, I hardly believe this will go on. Power lines in Indonesia are horrible, usually they black out whenever there's heavy storm for some reason. Nevermind that some people STEAL power lines and cables for money (how do they do that I have no frickin clue). Add the incompetency of bureucrats, and there you go. I don't know how does islamic organizations respond to this, and most importantly, who is going to pay for all of this. We got a huge national debt already, and not much people have a laptop--and those who do certainly don't bring them to mosques, where footwear got lost all the time.

Re:It'll never happen

You might be surprised to learn that "square waves" aren't traveling as is on the lines... they are being modulated in a way that makes them less susceptible to noise, and span across a limited bandwidth... this has the side effect of making them look more like a finite combination of sine waves. Besides, copper telephone lines used for ADSL aren't shielded either.

Re:It'll never happen

Besides, copper telephone lines used for ADSL aren't shielded either.

Twisted pair copper is self-shielding; it's one of the reasons why we use it today in telephony instead of the old open straight wire.

Re:

Why would a mosque need internet access? Isn't it suppose to be a place of worship, not an internet cafe?

People should be free to worship their deity of choice in their own way. If they want to do so sitting in front of a computer screen looking at picture

Re:

I've heard Indonesian radio, its probably a blessing