That happened to me once. I was rewiring my dial-up. The experience is overrated.
Are landlines more reliable than digital phone?
- Thread starter Morpheus 02
- Start date
Though landlines are more reliable this thread makes me remember what happened in my city many years ago when very few people had mobile (cell) phones.
A couple of crims decided to rob a bank at night. They need to deactivate the alarm so they chopped through a mass of phone cables at a substation. As a result 80,000 people on Hobart's eastern shore were without phones for two and a half days while repairs were made.
The greatest concern was what to do in an emergency. The phone company did set up some units at shopping centres and some people put up signs in their windows saying that they had a mobile phone available for emergencies.
Onw man had a heart attack. Without a phone his wife couldn't call for an ambulance. Then she saw a bus approaching and she ran out onto the road and stopped it. She got the bus driver to use his walkie talkie to contact the depot on the Western Shore and to get them to phone for an ambulance.
The two crims failed to get into the bank and were caught on the roof. They received long sentences and the judge told them they were lucky that no deaths could be attributed to the phone outage, if there had been deaths their sentences would have been more severe. If I remember correctly the damage to the phone lines was costed at 1.5 million dollars.
A couple of crims decided to rob a bank at night. They need to deactivate the alarm so they chopped through a mass of phone cables at a substation. As a result 80,000 people on Hobart's eastern shore were without phones for two and a half days while repairs were made.
The greatest concern was what to do in an emergency. The phone company did set up some units at shopping centres and some people put up signs in their windows saying that they had a mobile phone available for emergencies.
Onw man had a heart attack. Without a phone his wife couldn't call for an ambulance. Then she saw a bus approaching and she ran out onto the road and stopped it. She got the bus driver to use his walkie talkie to contact the depot on the Western Shore and to get them to phone for an ambulance.
The two crims failed to get into the bank and were caught on the roof. They received long sentences and the judge told them they were lucky that no deaths could be attributed to the phone outage, if there had been deaths their sentences would have been more severe. If I remember correctly the damage to the phone lines was costed at 1.5 million dollars.
As you point out, having two lines of different types is always more reliable than having one of either. Which is why it was bad design in the first place to have landlines with no backup and having backbone go through a place where it can be easily vandalised. If deaths happened the main responsibility for me would be on those who designed the phone network and allowed the outage to happen that easily.
Anyway, with an Internet phone you can have two internet connections and two power suppliers (and/or an UPS) and connect the phone to both. Of course, if the Internet phone uses a central server (e.g. SIP or XMPP/Jingle), you'd be dependent on the redundancy at your phone service provider, but there is peer-to-peer VoIP and technology is advanced enough that you can also have the “central” server located at the phone itself, in which case you can always be called directly, so an Internet phone can be much more reliable than a land line. It can be as reliable as you want it to be, and that without the inconvenience to have multiple phone numbers/accounts.
A mobile phone can connect to another phone network when you don't have coverage from your phone provider or there's an outage. For me that works only when I'm in another country, but it should work always, and I think it's enough to make a mobile phone more reliable than a land line.
Anyway, with an Internet phone you can have two internet connections and two power suppliers (and/or an UPS) and connect the phone to both. Of course, if the Internet phone uses a central server (e.g. SIP or XMPP/Jingle), you'd be dependent on the redundancy at your phone service provider, but there is peer-to-peer VoIP and technology is advanced enough that you can also have the “central” server located at the phone itself, in which case you can always be called directly, so an Internet phone can be much more reliable than a land line. It can be as reliable as you want it to be, and that without the inconvenience to have multiple phone numbers/accounts.
A mobile phone can connect to another phone network when you don't have coverage from your phone provider or there's an outage. For me that works only when I'm in another country, but it should work always, and I think it's enough to make a mobile phone more reliable than a land line.
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Though I think that the telephone company was slack with the security of the substation I am not sure what sort of backup they could have been expected to have back then.
This was a time when mobile phones where very expensive (about $1500 each to buy) and the mobile coverage was poor, or non-existent in many parts of the city. In fact, at the time of the outage I had only ever seen one mobile phone in my entire life and that was carried by a a Housing Department inspector who was inspecting a house fire.
At this stage the phone company was an monopoly and the substation contained all the cables that crossed the river to the Eastern Shore.
This was a time when mobile phones where very expensive (about $1500 each to buy) and the mobile coverage was poor, or non-existent in many parts of the city. In fact, at the time of the outage I had only ever seen one mobile phone in my entire life and that was carried by a a Housing Department inspector who was inspecting a house fire.
At this stage the phone company was an monopoly and the substation contained all the cables that crossed the river to the Eastern Shore.
Don't forget that while the telephone company switching offices and the communications between them have gone electronic/digital that pair of wires connecting you home/business to the switching center is still operating on standards created over a century ago. If your going to invest in the equipment and installation costs to create alternate signal paths your probably going to install some sort of fiber to copper bridge, which will be dependent on its own battery backup (limited operating time) or a small generator (if there's natural gas available at that site) when there's a power outage.
As with the more modern telephone networks your internet connection might be dependent on some bridge between fiber and some sort of electrical network like coax. If that bridge serves multiple subscribers it's still going to be dependent on whatever backup provisions the communications provider has installed. If there are no natural gas lines nearby that backup battery might run down in a prolonged blackout.
Of course cell sites require electrical power too. Some might not have a backup generator on site, especially if neighborhood resistance to "ugly" towers has driven them to install the antennas on/in some other facility like a church steeple or office building.
I've always felt land lines to be much more reliable. And in an emergency, I'll take a land line over mobile hands-down. IIRC, Bush Jr. passed a law in his administration to co-opt the cell networks in case of another attack or general emergency. I think we saw a small piece of that when the earthquake hit DC. I could only get a text through my mobile but land lines were still working. Could also be pure volume overload on the tower switches, too, but either way, land lines simply work better. And yes, VOIP sucks ass.
I never really got the answer I was looking for... So AT & T (and others) keep pushing their digital landline (for home use).
Being more of a technobabble person than an actual tech person (as people seem to confuse me with)...
So would AT & T's digital line, in case of a storm or electrical outage, still work? (I have an old school phone that plugs into the wall, in addition to the cordless set which would NOT work during such an outage).
Is the digital part more in the central office end, and I just hear the results at home?
I like having the "security"of a back up line at home, when the cell phones are out for various reasons (and with little girls, that's the phone I have them use -- for now)
I am heading into the AT & T store tomorrow, so wondering if we should go with the digital home line.
Being more of a technobabble person than an actual tech person (as people seem to confuse me with)...
So would AT & T's digital line, in case of a storm or electrical outage, still work? (I have an old school phone that plugs into the wall, in addition to the cordless set which would NOT work during such an outage).
Is the digital part more in the central office end, and I just hear the results at home?
I like having the "security"of a back up line at home, when the cell phones are out for various reasons (and with little girls, that's the phone I have them use -- for now)
I am heading into the AT & T store tomorrow, so wondering if we should go with the digital home line.
It's probably just a fiber optic line they're calling digital to make it sound high tech. I worked for one of AT&T's long distance competitors during the 80s and we had one of the first fiber optic networks. They were promoted as fiber optic then. Nearly everything's digital now instead of analog. I still order landlines because I think they're more stable for local service. The minute you go long distance though, you're probably on a digital circuit beamed to a satellite or via microwave to destination.
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So would there be any changes, other than a fiber optic line on the outside rather than a copper one?
Same reliability, especially in power outages?
In my area, a lot of the main phone trunk lines are underground, so are not going to get whacked by a storm. But any phone lines on telephone poles along with power lines can get knocked out.
As far as fiber optics, isn't the quality only as high as the worst point along the path?
As far as fiber optics, isn't the quality only as high as the worst point along the path?
I've never had a problem with my iPhone. For several years now it's been my only phone, and I get excellent service with it. I don't miss landlines one bit. 
I have often found landmines to be quite unreliable.
I mean... you have to saturate the area you're trying to protect. The triggering mechanisms get wonky. A person can just set off an entire section of minefield with a single grenade, thus compromising said protection. They can be easily spotted with metal detectors. They also tend to blow up the good guys if they're out doing mine maintenance and---
Oh---
Land lines.
Ahem....
Carry on.
I mean... you have to saturate the area you're trying to protect. The triggering mechanisms get wonky. A person can just set off an entire section of minefield with a single grenade, thus compromising said protection. They can be easily spotted with metal detectors. They also tend to blow up the good guys if they're out doing mine maintenance and---
Oh---
Land lines.
Ahem....
Carry on.
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