Introduction to Broadband Technologies

  1. In a broadband context, what is the difference between synchronous and asynchronous communications?
  2. Asynchronous communications have different download and upload speeds, but in synchronous communication, the download and upload speeds are the same.

  3. What is latency?
  4. The amount of time it takes for a request to be sent, received, acknolwedged, and then delivered back to the point of origin.

  5. From Eli's point of view, what is the difference between business and residential service?
  6. A business service is more expensive, but has better customer service and will often provide uptime guarantees not available to residential services. Residential services are cheaper, but do not provide the same level of customer service. In Eli's opinion, residential services are more inconsistently paid and make less revenue for the ISPs than business services.

  7. Explain the difference between a static and dynamic IP address.
  8. A dynamic IP address can change often, such as everytime a connection is made, whereas a static IP address will always remain the same.

  9. Why might an organization want a static rather than an IP address?
  10. A static IP address makes it easier for a business to provide more consistently available services, and can also make it easier for network administrators to maintain configuration settings. Dynamic IP addresses are also more likely to be randomly blocked by some services, such as in email.

  11. Why would an ISP block a particular port?
  12. An ISP may not want a large amount of traffic coming into or out of a port, such as if you were hosting a web site or server from you home. They are able to control traffic coming into and out of your connection more consistently by being able to block ports.

  13. What is an SLA?
  14. SLA stands for Service Level Agreement, and are provided by some service providers to guarantee a service on a contractual basis. For example, a service provider may provide an SLA guaranteeing their customer 99.999% uptime for their connection.

  15. When would you use a T1 line?
  16. A T1 line is desirable if an organization prefers a more consistent and reliable connection over a fast one.

  17. What are two advantages of a T1 line?
  18. One advantage is that T1 lines can often be ran to areas that have limited access to services such as DSL. Another advantage is that they come with SLAs, guaranteeing a stable, reliable connection.

  19. What is the primary disadvantage of a T1 line?
  20. They tend to be much more expensive, despite their lower speeds.

  21. What is the primary advantage of carrier class Ethernet?
  22. Carrier class Ethernet provides high speeds and reliability via an Ethernet connection that comes with an SLA from the ISP.

  23. In wireless networking, what does 'unlimited Internet' mean?
  24. The service provider may advertise that the user has unlimited access to the Internet, however they will often be throttled or blocked after using a certain amount of data.

  25. In an old buliding, what could be a probelm source concerning DSL service?
  26. The telephone lines running into the building may be very old, and corroded or otherwise damaged to the point that they cannot provide a good quality connection.

  27. With a cable connection, what type of problem could be associated with a trunk line?
  28. The trunk can have many different users or households connected to it, meaning if many people are attempting to use a lot of data at the same time, there could be large drops in connection speed.

  29. From a business perspective, what is a potential weakness of cable?
  30. The risk of a slow connection at peak times is very real, since you would have to connect to a cable trunk.

  31. What is FIOS?
  32. FIOS stands for Fiber-Optic Services, which is a type of Internet connection that can provide extremely high speeds, exceeding the cabilities of DSL and cable.

  33. What is the rason that you probably don't want a satellite connection?
  34. Satellite can be expensive to install to a home, and suffers from high latency.