Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!clyde!att!osu-cis!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!rutgers!sunybcs!boulder!bobk
From: bobk@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Bob Kinne)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Re: ISDN
Message-ID: <5508@boulder.Colorado.EDU>
Date: 27 Dec 88 16:16:57 GMT
References: <8812141208.aa12705@note.nsf.gov> <443@ambone.UUCP> <17941@glacier.STANFORD.EDU>
Sender: news@boulder.Colorado.EDU
Reply-To: bobk@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Bob Kinne)
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
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In article <17941@glacier.STANFORD.EDU> jbn@glacier.UUCP (John B. Nagle) writes:
>
>      ISDN may be an idea whose time has passed.  Optical networks are
>coming, and it's very possible that delivery of TV signals will be over
>the same medium used for voice and data, especially into homes.  ISDN
>offers only 64Kb data, and with modems at 14Kb, the benefits of rewiring
>the entire phone plant for ISDN are marginal, especially since the cutover
>to optical is already beginning.  

I'm not an ISDN fan, but there is far more to ISDN than 64k data
lines.  ISDN is now completely defined to T1 rates (1.544Mb/s in
US, 2.048 in Europe).  Work is now being done on broadband versions
of ISDN, and yes, future versions will employ optical networks and
support SONET interfaces.  It is also not true that ISDN requires
rewiring the entire phone plant.  Much of the defined ISDN function
runs on existing plant.  The significant changes to date are mostly
in the switches and in incorporating out of band signalling.