[Tfug] DSL curiosity

[George Cohn]

From: Earl

> During the last major rain, our phone went out but the DSL kept 
> active for another 2-3 hours. Then it went out too. The neighbor's 
> phone and DSL both worked all of the time.
> 
> Later the DSL came on and a couple of hours later, the phone worked 
> again. Qwest said it was a problem in a major junction box.

Dial tone and network connections may be handled over two different routes.

The dial tone may reach the DSLAM in your neighborhood via copper while the network is usually fiber.  They get combined on one pair to your house from that point.  

That's why they can now offer high speed DSL in so many neighborhoods.  The distance limitation for DSL over copper is something like a maximum of 15,000 feet and at those distances, it may only be 256K.

They probably lost something at the central office which killed your dial tone while the DSL problem was probably the result of the UPS batteries running down at the DSLAM.  I think they only spec the DSLAM power for a couple of hours.

I've heard that in an emergency, they have a couple of generators that they can power the DSLAMS from if needed, but not nearly enough to cover all of them.

George Cohn