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Message-ID: <20220529192147.GA29678@telecom.csail.mit.edu> Date: Sun, 29 May 2022 19:21:47 +0000 From: Bill Horne <malQRMassimilation@gmail.com> Subject: Re: ISDN's days are numbered: What should you do? On Fri, May 27, 2022 at 07:53:56PM -0000, Garrett Wollman wrote: > In article <O8SdnfjNCtEMEhP_nZ2dnUU7-LHNnZ2d@giganews.com>, > Doug McIntyre <merlyn@dork.geeks.org> wrote: > >> We always did 128k bonded connections with no issues. No mystery >> here. The biggest problem was the customer equipment. Most of it >> sucked hard. > > In the early part of my career, I supported ISDN connections for staff > and faculty in my lab. This was before widespread cable ISP access > and overbuilding, but Bell Atlantic (as then was) had a special tariff > that allowed universities to get unmetered ISDN BRI lines installed at > employees' homes. We used Ascend equipment to terminate a PRI in our > building, which also supported model dial-up. Normally we'd use a > smaller Ascend box (smaller than my current cable modem!) on the > residential end, and we'd configure it to nail up both B channels 24x7 > and give each user a subnet. [snip] I'm going to have to descend from whatever foothold I used to have on Mount Olympus, and admit that I don't understand how you could "nail up" two bearer channels without disabling the ISDN line's capability to carry phone calls. Were the ISDN lines used only for data service, or could the Bearer channels be divorced while a phone call was in progress? -- Bill Horne (Remove QRM from my email address to write to me directly)

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Message-ID: <1eddd0fd-ce13-be52-66ed-650c312af5c0@panix.com> Date: 28 May 2022 16:12:50 -0400 From: "David" <wb8foz@panix.com> Subject: Re: ISDN's days are numbered: What should you do? Fred Goldstein said: > ISDN Basic Rate Interface (BRI) is generally no longer available in > the US. ... > But few know how to provision it. Many of the switches that > provided it (mainly 5ESS and DMS-100 in the US) no longer are in > service. I suspect that last sentence is a major aspect. VZ at least is actively working to get rid of their 5ESS's. A benefactor of their recent buyout told me that the ongoing software charges were "onerous"....

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Message-ID: <20220529205906.GB30139@telecom.csail.mit.edu> Date: Sun, 29 May 2022 20:59:06 +0000 From: Bill Horne <malQRMassimilation@gmail.com> Subject: Re: ISDN's days are numbered: What should you do? On Sat, May 28, 2022 at 04:12:50PM -0400, David wrote: > Fred Goldstein said: > > > ISDN Basic Rate Interface (BRI) is generally no longer available in > > the US. > ... > > > But few know how to provision it. Many of the switches that > > provided it (mainly 5ESS and DMS-100 in the US) no longer are in > > service. > > I suspect that last sentence is a major aspect. VZ at least is > actively working to get rid of their 5ESS's. A benefactor of their > recent buyout told me that the ongoing software charges were > "onerous".... It must be the heat: I'm just not getting the subtext of messages today. "A benefactor of " ... *whose* recent buyout, of whom? What software charges? Do you mean the fees charged for the version of Unix used in the 5E switch? Come to think of it, who owns that switch design now? Bill, who is still feeling old. -- Bill Horne (Please remove QRM from my email address to write to me directly)

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Message-ID: <20220529205126.GA30139@telecom.csail.mit.edu> Date: Sun, 29 May 2022 20:51:26 +0000 From: Bill Horne <malassQRMimilation@gmail.com> Subject: Re: ISDN's days are numbered: What should you do? On Sun, May 22, 2022 at 12:11:50PM -0400, Fred Goldstein wrote: >> On 5/19/2022 9:05, Bill Horne wrote: >>>> I was talking to an old friend yesterday, and he told me that >>>> he's been working from home for a while now, and the conversation >>>> turned to > >>>ISDN phone service, which I recommend to anyone >>>> who can still obtain it. >>>> >>>> 1. Which states still have tariffs for ISDN BRI lines? > > ISDN Basic Rate Interface (BRI) is generally no longer available in the US. > Verizon and I think ATT long ago gave formal notice of discontinuance or > grandfathering. Maybe Qwest, pre-Century, didn't bother, so it may still be > on the books there. But few know how to provision it. Many of the switches > that provided it (mainly 5ESS and DMS-100 in the US) no longer are in > service. It was useful, especially for broadcasters doing remote feeds. It > was better than a modem for Internet access, and that's what killed it as it > was coming out in the early 1990s -- the Bells hated the Internet, which > broke their locality-based business model, and while they couldn't attack > modem users per se, they could at least attack the most obvious Internet > user group, non-Centrex ISDN BRI users. This is twice in one day that I've had to take a step downward from my place on Mount Olympus, and I fear I might turn into Sisyphus if I don't - pun intended - watch my step. ;-) Why would the bells hate the Internet? To be sure, their business model was built around central offices which each served a rate center, but how could they have predicted and/or anticipated the development of VoIP? Did Mother Bell see /any/ data transmission method as a threat? Why? The Baby Bells knew that Cellular was coming, and I'd bet they knew it would displace copper-served POTS within time we've had to see it happen. Still, I just don't remember the leaders of the Baby Bells as being such long-term thinkers. The Internet hasn't replaced their locality-based feeding trough: we still have and use phone numbers, and even if a cell call has to be routed using VoIP and/or SIP trunks, the savings in billing offered by "Free" long-distance would have more than offset the cost of adapting to new trunking paradigms. > Bell Atlantic l/k/a Verizon was also fanatical in those days about > selling Centrex, and saw ISDN BRI as a tool for Centrex feature > phones, but that was about it. That business has faded out too. I wonder why? What was so different between the business models of the 1990's and those of the 2020's that Centrex would no longer be a cost-saver for firms which chose to use it? Granted, the Coronavirus has caused a reexamination of work-at-home as a viable real-estate strategy, but I think the /time/ spent on dialing, connecting, and suffering with the shortcomings of cellular calls, like picket-fencing, fading, disconnecting, and - last but far from least - being easily tapped by anyone with an antenna ana a few items of listening equipment. > ISDN Primary Rate Interface (PRI), which runs over a DS-1 ("T1") channel, is > still out there, though again its number are in decline. It is a very good > trunk interface for PBX systems, and many different 1995-2010 vintage > switching systems support it, as it handled the dial-up era's modem pools. > But most newer systems use SIP trunks instead. PRI has higher quality of > service than SIP/RTP/IP, but the industry has moved away from it, as the > higher-volume IP services usually have a lower price tag. I'm afraid comparing IP-based telephony to ISDN PRI links is the ultimate race-to-the-bottom in voice communicaiton. As far as I can tell, the only thing that makes SIP or VoIP or /any/ Internet-based real-time service - don't forget streaming video - viable is a surplus of bandwidth which will, inevitably, decline as paid-prioritization methods and equpment take hold. Bill, who is feeling old and out-of-step. -- Bill Horne (Please remove QRM from my email address in order to write to me directly)

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