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Why Asymmetrical Fiber? (alien.top)

submitted 10 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

4 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I bought land on a state road that has a Spectrum fiber line on it. I called Spectrum to get a connection to the fiber line for a new house construction, but they said symmetrical speeds aren't available yet in my area.

It's always been my understanding that being on a fiber optic network generally means symmetric download/upload, but why is it not the case here?

I tried to see if there was a Business option for higher upload, but it seems like Business internet has the same upload speeds with lower download speeds for double the price.

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

There are a lot of different variations of PON/FTTx. Most are symmetrical, some are not.

ISPs did a lot of experimenting with fiber based delivery methods over the years, and a lot of that old gear is still in use.

It might even be something like RFoG in your area, where it's fiber to the hole but converts directly to coax (with a micro node) at your house and uses a standard D3.1 cable modem.

You'd have to ask the ISP for more info, namely what delivery method they use at your address. There's a good chance the sales rep won't know anything about it, tho.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 10 months ago

Peering cost for spectrum. They simply pay less for ingress than egress (traffic to and from their networks). Pure business and cost factor. You are correct, ADSL and Coax can't send data at the same speed because of how they work (QAM) where as in fiber it's doesn't matter anymore.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It means you're getting RFOG, essentially, you're still using hybrid fiber coax and you will still have a cable modem.

You will have a node on the side of your house so that simply converts fiber to coax.

Thus, all of the same limitations apply as if you were connected to coax with the difference being your signal levels are going to be awesome and generally not affected by other households in your area.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 10 months ago

That’s not always the case, I have WOW fiber on a fiber to the modem install. It’s 500 Mbps down and 50 Mbps up. The tech who installed it said there’s no infrastructure reason why it’s so lopsided, other than what corporate decided. They do offer a gigabit symmetrical plan for more money with no hardware changes.