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FCC to Approve Powerline

  • Thread starter Thread starter Web Buddy
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All the documents you have so far provided are either meaningless press relases, or ones that have yet to come up with a conclusion of PLC emissions - but do usually show the emissions are way of from thoose of ADSL and background noise.

Even if the EMC is down, there still the inherent problem that bandwidth has to be shared from the start. We've already seen the case where a user on this forum has shown the speed hasn't being great on PLC.
 
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The full approvals are filed with the regulatory authorities and are held by the manufactures. The PLC product is marked with the approvals it meets. I suggest you contact them with regards to the approvals.

Full test results are not normally published they are treated by the regulatory authorities as commercially confidential.

If anyone can come up with a single documented case of PLC causing interference let me know.

Speed is not a problem with PLC. Yes as with any shared resource it can vary but the1 Meg service delivers close to 1Meg
 
Web Buddy said:
The full approvals are filed with the regulatory authorities and are held by the manufactures. The PLC product is marked with the approvals it meets. I suggest you contact them with regards to the approvals.

Full test results are not normally published they are treated by the regulatory authorities as commercially confidential.

This is another example of PLC avoiding the pollution issue. PLC modems don’t radiate until they are connected to the mains wiring. The EMC tests were not designed to test PLC modems.

A car is safe until a drunk get in it. A PLC modem is safe until you plug in the mains wiring, AKA antenna.

The RadioCommunications Authority has published tests of the Crieff system and it pollutes really badly.
 
Web Buddy said:
Speed is not a problem with PLC. Yes as with any shared resource it can vary but the1 Meg service delivers close to 1Meg

Out of 50 users, how many will be running Kazza (or whatever this weeks flavour is), 10, 15, 20?

Speed will be bad when a substation gets close to 50 users.
 
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Then so what?? Why all this doom and gloom? Its no skin off your back, if it does produce all the effects you say it does, then it will flop and thousands will be dissapointed and you will be happy.

You must have some pretty seroius issues with them to go to this effort to discredit them.

:shrug:
 
Well I still get 'gross Pollution' from Taxi Radios', the occasional ham, CD radio, 'modern' manufactured electrical interference from mowers, drills, hedge cutters, pond pumps, car and motorbike ignitions, washing machines, spin dryers, and other applience's known to us all.

That is without the 'noise pollution' that is the off shoot of this modern man made 'gross pollution' ban the aircraft as well. :nod:

All this modern gross pollution should not be allowed, I want it banned now, none of it should have been invented in the first place neither should it have been licenced.

Did they not listen to the lone voices of complaints?

I think I vote for 'PlC say no' for our next president as our current president is getting long in the tooth and has always sat on the side of logical reasoning.

Yes El presidenti PLC say no.. has good ring to it..ring!!? oh dear the telephone just rang..more gross pollution. :( :rolleyes:
 
Web Buddy said:
The Powerline technology has moved on as does technology in general. Powerlines are now suitable for Broadband communications as the various trials have proved.
The challenge is not the technology, although there is as with any new technology scope to improve it further, but is for it to prove itself commercially. Clearly this presents a challenge as most telecom markets are dominated by an incumbent Telco. Fortunatly the EU is very supportive of Powerline and see's Powerline as a way of breaking the current telco's monopoly of the market.

It is the commercial issues that are the challenge. The EMC issues are resolved.

Critics keep quoting massive interference but have yet to come up with a single documented case of interference by Powerline. I think that shows quite clearly that this is not an issue.


But there is documented cases of interferences from test areas as others have posted. It has not been deployed widely enough to produce large numbers of interference complaints. Your previous customer figures are wrong.

The challenge is the technology, period. We're in the second round of trials worldwide and this still hasn't been widely deployed. How many years have they been trying to get this to work ? You have to ask yourself, if this is so great, why hasn't it been deployed faster than DSL and cable ? The demand for broadband is higher than it ever was, and utilities are falling all over themselves to invest in this. Rosy press releases are everywhere and this is the greatest broadband solution ever. But its deployment has been floundering and there's massive controversy over it. DSL, cable, and wireless never had this kind of uproar. Again, why is this so ?

You'll inevitably answer that it's because this is "disruptive technology" that threatens incumbent broadband carriers and will "force competition", and the same naysayers who said the earth was flat are saying this can't be done. When your education in this is brochures and press releases, this is an easy, obvious wrong conclusion. Press releases didn't get mankind into space, and it certainly won't change the physical properties of power lines.


I am sure that you can look forward to Powerline coming to your area soon where you will be able to see the benefits of it for yorself.

I have never disputed the benefits of broadband in any of my posts. I've had broadband in my home for nearly four years now so I'm acutely aware of its benefits, so you can stop harping on this. This is a typical BPL proponent tactic -- focus on the generic benefits of broadband while ignoring the specific faults of the underlying solution. This is what has gotten BPL to this point and has prevented it from being outright dismissed by regulatory agencies that are technically lacking.

It's not my goal to deny anyone broadband and I do not have a financial interest in this. I am merely interested in protecting valuable radio spectrum in which you have a vested interest as well. I'd welcome power companies offering broadband as I and millions others would have a choice of multiple carriers or have broadband for the first time. But the power companies are attempting to jury rig a system and avoid the entry costs of a real broadband network.
 
Bartman said:
Then so what?? Why all this doom and gloom? Its no skin off your back, if it does produce all the effects you say it does, then it will flop and thousands will be dissapointed and you will be happy.

You must have some pretty seroius issues with them to go to this effort to discredit them.

:shrug:

I don't think we are trying to deliver a message of doom, but rather bring the truth to light. One would hope that if the technology is proven to interfere in real life that it would be stopped and dismantled, but this may not be the case especially in this day and age with lobbyist pressure and politics.

I for one will not be happy as you suggest if this goes far and then fails. We've seen too many investors lose money in bad technology and/or bad business plans. I lost plenty of money in tech stocks :-) The telecom industry in general has a black eye, and it doesn't need another. We feel the time to stop it is now, and that's we we're so adamant.
 
Well we are still waiting for you to come up with documnted cases of Interference to other equipment. Somehow I think it will be a long wait.

I am sure evrey one must be aware of the thousands of complaints from Creiff, Campbelltown, Stonehaven and Winchester.

Strange though I don't seem to have heard anything of them, nothing in the papers , national or local nothing on TV, perhaps this massive interference issue does not really exist.
 
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I've been watching this debate for some time now, and I must admit that every time Web Buddy asks for evidence, he gets it, and then goes on to ignore it :)

You can't compare ADSL and PLC. Two different technologies, and two different methods of delivery. Telephone cables in the UK are 99% underground, and therefore won't radiate any significant interference. The story is quite different with power cables - 90% of the power distribution in the UK is over ground, on pylons which make very efficient radiating antennas.

I'm appalled at the poster who said "I want broadband, and I don't care about the interference". I hope that none of your friends or family ever has to take a long-haul flight, because when aircraft are outside the range of VHF transmitters (which are fairly resilient to PLC), all aircraft use short-wave radio to stay in contact with the ground. On the same frequencies that PLC uses.

Please, let's stop "glossing over" the evidence to support your point of view. Everybody wants broadband, but it should not be done by risking the safety of others. I'm sure that if PLC is safe, the UK will adopt it. We should bear in mind that in some countries in the world, the worth of a human life often outweighs commercial interests, so it's not a good idea to say "Well, the xxxxxxx have introduced it, so it must be OK."
 
My thoughts exactly. Your not going to stop them from bringing it out by going on about it in the forums, and the way you do really makes it look as though its a personal issue.

If it does effect equipment then it will be stopped. Its when it effects people only that is the hard part to prove.

Have you ever seen reports on how people cannot sleep who live near mobile fone antennas?
 
There is no Evidence of Interfennce by PLC, various tests carried out by non accredited agencies are quoted but non against the Compliance Standards.

So the simple facts are.

PLC complies with all required Standards. These are excactly the same standards ADSL, Cable etc have to meet. The EU would not permit the product to go on the market without compliance.

There have been no incidences of actual interference by PLC ie interference to other users.

PLC as well is still in the Trial stage.


What these other posters are saying is they want more stringent testing applied to PLC then other products.

Currently the EU is looking at the whole Broadband arena with regards to bringing in an update specification but that is a while off and you cannot qualify a product against a non existant standard.



Elmer said:
I've been watching this debate for some time now, and I must admit that every time Web Buddy asks for evidence, he gets it, and then goes on to ignore it :)

You can't compare ADSL and PLC. Two different technologies, and two different methods of delivery. Telephone cables in the UK are 99% underground, and therefore won't radiate any significant interference. The story is quite different with power cables - 90% of the power distribution in the UK is over ground, on pylons which make very efficient radiating antennas.

I'm appalled at the poster who said "I want broadband, and I don't care about the interference". I hope that none of your friends or family ever has to take a long-haul flight, because when aircraft are outside the range of VHF transmitters (which are fairly resilient to PLC), all aircraft use short-wave radio to stay in contact with the ground. On the same frequencies that PLC uses.

Please, let's stop "glossing over" the evidence to support your point of view. Everybody wants broadband, but it should not be done by risking the safety of others. I'm sure that if PLC is safe, the UK will adopt it. We should bear in mind that in some countries in the world, the worth of a human life often outweighs commercial interests, so it's not a good idea to say "Well, the xxxxxxx have introduced it, so it must be OK."
 
Elmer said:
I'm appalled at the poster who said "I want broadband, and I don't care about the interference". I hope that none of your friends or family ever has to take a long-haul flight, because when aircraft are outside the range of VHF transmitters (which are fairly resilient to PLC), all aircraft use short-wave radio to stay in contact with the ground. On the same frequencies that PLC uses.

Not entirely accurate. It is true that a lot of aircraft operating in what we term 'remote and oceanic regions' as defined by FAA notice 8110-60 could use HF for Communication. However with Satcom technology becoming prevalent, most aircraft large enough to operate in these regions are moving to satcom based solutions.

The other fundemental flaw in that argument is; anywhere you are out of range of VHF COMM, there aren't going to be many overhead power cables carrying PLC, to interfere with HF COMM.
 
There argument would be that HF signals can travel around the world depending on power, frequencies, weather & sun spot activity and using a high gain arial. A lot of if's.

As you say HF is not really used by aircraft anymore other then possibly a backup. Most planes don't even carry HF radio kit.


The chances of PLC intefering with radio communications to planes is remote. They also have a number of frequencies to use.

In any case for aircraft to rely on HF radio for navigation would be crazy.

Its possible that HF may be still used for some longe range navigation beacons but these would be narrow band signals and not suceptable to interference.

Both ADSL & PLC are treated by the Approvale regime exactly the same. ie they are classed as unintentional radiators. This means that if they cause interfernce to other licenced users they have to rectify the problem.
 
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Web Buddy said:
There argument would be that HF signals can travel around the world depending on power, frequencies, weather & sun spot activity and using a high gain arial. A lot of if's.

The power needed by HF transmitters is imense. HF transmitters on an aircraft will actually burn you if you get too close when they're transmitting. I doubt PLC interference could radiate anything like the power needed to travel any kind of distance.

Web Buddy said:
As you say HF is not really used by aircraft anymore other then possibly a backup. Most planes don't even carry HF radio kit.

Correct.

Web Buddy said:
The chances of PLC intefering with radio communications to planes is remote. They also have a number of frequencies to use.

ICAO annex 10 was designed to harden aircraft VHF equipment against interference like this amongst other things, FM Immunity etc.

Web Buddy said:
In any case for aircraft to rely on HF radio for navigation would be crazy

The closest thing could have been ADF. The policy now for ADF is that if a station breaks, it won't be fixed, that's just short of total decommisioning.

Web Buddy said:
Its possible that HF may be still used for some longe range navigation beacons but these would be narrow band signals and not suceptable to interference.

It isn't. There used to be VLF-OMEGA and LORAN-C but they were decommissioned years ago. Basically, we're headed for just GPS, DME and VHF NAV.
 
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Web Buddy said:
There argument would be that HF signals can travel around the world depending on power, frequencies, weather & sun spot activity and using a high gain arial. A lot of if's.


It's not a rare or semi-rare occurance (like sporadic E propagation in VHF bands), but rather common. There's a rather large following of radio amateurs that use low power (less than 5 watts) to communicate around the world. Many use rather simple wire antennas and not high gain antennas as you suggest. It's obvious you haven't experienced what goes on in these bands.

As you say HF is not really used by aircraft anymore other then possibly a backup. Most planes don't even carry HF radio kit.


The chances of PLC intefering with radio communications to planes is remote. They also have a number of frequencies to use.

In any case for aircraft to rely on HF radio for navigation would be crazy.

Its possible that HF may be still used for some longe range navigation beacons but these would be narrow band signals and not suceptable to interference.

You're failing to take into the account of HF propagation characteristics and the noise floor, again. Narrowband signal or not, if there's an emission on my receiving frequency and the interferer is strong by x dB, I'm not going to be able to copy the intended signal.

Both ADSL & PLC are treated by the Approvale regime exactly the same. ie they are classed as unintentional radiators. This means that if they cause interfernce to other licenced users they have to rectify the problem.

This is most factual statement you've made in awhile. <opinion> But watch how the PLC carriers will argue about what interference actually consists of. I predict their figure will be tens of dB higher than the incumbant users in the HF bands and they will move at glacial speeds in resolving interference if they get this out of trials and there are significant numbers of customers. </opinion>
 
Bartman said:
My thoughts exactly. Your not going to stop them from bringing it out by going on about it in the forums, and the way you do really makes it look as though its a personal issue.

If it does effect equipment then it will be stopped. Its when it effects people only that is the hard part to prove.

Have you ever seen reports on how people cannot sleep who live near mobile fone antennas?

When I worked in deploying microwave equipment at tower sites, I had to deal with people saying the tower obstruction lighting was affecting the milk production of cows in the fields surrounding the tower :-)

There's plenty of opposition movements against technology that are not based on sound scientific evidence. The cellular arguments were rarely, if ever supported by evidence.

I reassure you, this isn't housewives and farmers (no offense) that are opposed to BPL. By the very nature of the issues at hand, it's engineers and radio amateurs who are quite educated and experienced in this who are objecting.
 
This is amazing - on one hand we have Web Buddy, claiming that the few milliwatts of power that ADSL uses has been known to cause interference, and on the other we have splatteredcat claiming that PLC is not a worry, because you need immense amounts of power to cause interference.

That is complete nonsense. Next time you see spots on your terrestrial TV receiver caused by ignition interference, just work out how much power it took to generate that interference.

As has already been said, it doesn't take a lot of power to transmit a long distance on HF radio. That has been proved by millions of radio amateurs over many years. I know a guy who held quite a long conversation with a New York taxi driver on CB radio, using just a few watts of power.
 
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