On 2024-01-16 23:20, Evan Leibovitch via talk wrote:
On Tue, Jan 16, 2024 at 2:00 PM James Knott via talk <talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
On 1/16/24 07:16, Evan Leibovitch via talk wrote:
> CO-powered phones are still available

Are they still CO powered?

My home internet is still metered and charged as a DSL line (by Teksavvy), though I know my neighbourhood has fibre. (I watched it being laid.)
The line coming in is an RJ-11 cable that split between my home's internal phone wiring and the DSL modem. No telco-supplied UPS on anything.

I don't know whether my dumb phone is powered by the CO or an UPS in a neighbourhood Bell box.
I just know it's powered from outside the house, functioning the same way as it has for decades, and it has done well during extended power outages.


A phone line with a dial-tone will connect back to a CO or a Remote CO.

DSL is some times served from the CO or Remote but more often in populated areas it is served from a little box close to the curb.

If its from the little box then what happens is that the line to your house from the CO is split and the DSL is added in at that point along with filters to allow the phone signal from the CO to keep going to your home.

As a general rule the CO will have batteries and a generator whereas the Remote COs will only have battery.

DSL has distance limitations so that once you start getting more than 2km from the Bell end you start having links that are speed limited and at distances of 4km or so you are lucky to get 1Mb.

Also this is cable distance and not point to point distance so with all the right angle streets and infrastructure the distance can add up fast.

The distance reason is why Bell and the other Telcos rolled out fibre into neighborhoods and placed the little boxes all over the place.

When DSL first started you could easily be 5-6KM from a CO while still being in downtown Toronto.

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