I need general info on T1 or T3 lines. Where to buy(Links to suppliers would be cool), how much, speed difference. Anything you can put is helpful.
Need info on T1-T3 lines
- Thread starter zShowtimez
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Garion
Platinum Member
- Apr 23, 2001
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There's a special on T1's at my local Frye's electronics - Take one home for $19.97!
Now, back reality..
A T1 is a data circuit that runs at 1.544Mb/s. It can also be broken up into "fractions", so you can get lower speeds, generally in 64Kb/s chunks.
A T3 is a much larger circuit - It runs at 45Mb/s, the equivolent of 28 T1's bundled together. You can also get fractional DS3's.
What do you want it for? An Internet connection? A private line between two offices? Makes a big difference.
In general, you get your circuits either from the ISP, from your local Telco, or from a long distance provider. It totally depends on what you want and where you want it to go.
- G
Now, back reality..
A T1 is a data circuit that runs at 1.544Mb/s. It can also be broken up into "fractions", so you can get lower speeds, generally in 64Kb/s chunks.
A T3 is a much larger circuit - It runs at 45Mb/s, the equivolent of 28 T1's bundled together. You can also get fractional DS3's.
What do you want it for? An Internet connection? A private line between two offices? Makes a big difference.
In general, you get your circuits either from the ISP, from your local Telco, or from a long distance provider. It totally depends on what you want and where you want it to go.
- G
Need it for internet access for a small business.. Itll be split up between around 60 computers. Needs to be quick on them all, but i dont forsee a problem with that. What are some companies that I can look into about the lines?
Generally you can go directly through your local phone providers to get a T1, but there are also other providers. Some DSL companies provide T1 service as well (actually a form of DSL line I believe, made to function with a T1 interface). Speakeasy DSL has such services, as well as Covad directly. Quite inexpensive really, compared to some providers. Covad is only $750 a month for a full T1. Speakeasy is $700. You can also search google for simply "T1 internet providers" and I'm sure you'll find some. Bandwidth.com seems to have a price quote system available.
Does the service need to be highly reliable? Like, if their connection is down for a day or two, will they go out of business? (When I worked for an ISP, one business DSL customer claimed to have lost something like 275 million dollars by being down for 2 days.)
If they can handle the possiblity of some downtime, then DSL is certainly a cheaper way to go. You could really get two DSL lines, providing for some measure of redundancy in case one does go down. Two SDSL 1.1Mbps lines is about 600 dollars a month total. If you get two lines though, you'd need to specify that you need them going to different central offices, since you lose the redundancy if they both take the same path. You'd also want to ensure that the provider can give you what you want, either a load balanced service, or a backup service in which all the IP information can fail over to the working line.
What sort of performance do they actually need? Will the people simply be needing occasional email and web access? Or will all 60 machines be doing lots of data transfer?
You can figure out what speed connection you need in either a "forward" or "reverse" way.
For example, if all 60 machines transfer about 1GB of data per day, then that's 60GB per day total. Assuming an 8 hour day, that's 7.5GB per hour. That comes out to about 2MBps, or 16Mbps. Each user's total time for transferring the data (I'm assuming a simple one way transfer) would be about 8 minutes.
That's a lot more than one T1 can handle. A fractional DS3 (T3) could handle it, but DS3's are very expensive. That's also a number based on the average usage during the day, assuming a continuous use of the line in order to get the usage as low as possible by spreading it out. The actual usage will vary considerably.
The other way of figuring it out is to consider how long their transfers will take, depending on the speed of each line. If you have 10 users, each needing to transfer 200MB of data outbound, and a T1 line, then that will take a total of about 3 hours for them each to finish. That's at peak usage, assuming no other traffic is competing. If all 60 users had 200MB of outbound traffic, that's 18 hours of continuous, total usage of the T1 line. Getting three T1 lines, and using load balancing on them, would result in 6 hours of continuous usage.
But, even with 3 lines, you may get grumbling from the users about how long their transfers take. You're unlikely to have people trying to do their transfers in groups of 10 or 20 or 30. There may be times only 2 people are transferring, and times when 25 or 45 are transferring. They may only be transferring web requests, or a large group may want to transfer 100MB each all at the same time. If 1 person needs 100MB done, with 3 lines it'll take about 3 minutes. Then you've got 5 people doing the same thing, and they wonder why it takes them 15 minutes each. And while they're doing that transfer, people trying to do other things notice that "the Internet is slow".
It's all a balancing act.
If all they're doing is some light web browsing and email, then a T1 will probably be fine, since the access will be sporadic, rather than long periods of continuous transfer. But keep in mind that NO company is able to police their users continuously. Someone always installs a file sharing program, or opens a virus/worm-infected email, and ends up flooding the Internet connection, resulting in you having to track down what machine it's coming from.
Does the service need to be highly reliable? Like, if their connection is down for a day or two, will they go out of business? (When I worked for an ISP, one business DSL customer claimed to have lost something like 275 million dollars by being down for 2 days.)
If they can handle the possiblity of some downtime, then DSL is certainly a cheaper way to go. You could really get two DSL lines, providing for some measure of redundancy in case one does go down. Two SDSL 1.1Mbps lines is about 600 dollars a month total. If you get two lines though, you'd need to specify that you need them going to different central offices, since you lose the redundancy if they both take the same path. You'd also want to ensure that the provider can give you what you want, either a load balanced service, or a backup service in which all the IP information can fail over to the working line.
What sort of performance do they actually need? Will the people simply be needing occasional email and web access? Or will all 60 machines be doing lots of data transfer?
You can figure out what speed connection you need in either a "forward" or "reverse" way.
For example, if all 60 machines transfer about 1GB of data per day, then that's 60GB per day total. Assuming an 8 hour day, that's 7.5GB per hour. That comes out to about 2MBps, or 16Mbps. Each user's total time for transferring the data (I'm assuming a simple one way transfer) would be about 8 minutes.
That's a lot more than one T1 can handle. A fractional DS3 (T3) could handle it, but DS3's are very expensive. That's also a number based on the average usage during the day, assuming a continuous use of the line in order to get the usage as low as possible by spreading it out. The actual usage will vary considerably.
The other way of figuring it out is to consider how long their transfers will take, depending on the speed of each line. If you have 10 users, each needing to transfer 200MB of data outbound, and a T1 line, then that will take a total of about 3 hours for them each to finish. That's at peak usage, assuming no other traffic is competing. If all 60 users had 200MB of outbound traffic, that's 18 hours of continuous, total usage of the T1 line. Getting three T1 lines, and using load balancing on them, would result in 6 hours of continuous usage.
But, even with 3 lines, you may get grumbling from the users about how long their transfers take. You're unlikely to have people trying to do their transfers in groups of 10 or 20 or 30. There may be times only 2 people are transferring, and times when 25 or 45 are transferring. They may only be transferring web requests, or a large group may want to transfer 100MB each all at the same time. If 1 person needs 100MB done, with 3 lines it'll take about 3 minutes. Then you've got 5 people doing the same thing, and they wonder why it takes them 15 minutes each. And while they're doing that transfer, people trying to do other things notice that "the Internet is slow".
It's all a balancing act.
If all they're doing is some light web browsing and email, then a T1 will probably be fine, since the access will be sporadic, rather than long periods of continuous transfer. But keep in mind that NO company is able to police their users continuously. Someone always installs a file sharing program, or opens a virus/worm-infected email, and ends up flooding the Internet connection, resulting in you having to track down what machine it's coming from.
The only caveat I'd toss in on Lord Evermore's *excellent* post is that it is unusual for two Central Offices to be close enough to a single location to provide DSL. Most folk / businesses are lucky to be near ONE.
To get the max speeds, you need to be within ~ 13,000 feet of the CO. It's gonna vary a little depending on the equipment the provider is using; 13,000 should be a fairly safe number. If you go to www.broadbandreports.com and go through the elegibility checker, it'll tell you which CO services your location, the distances, and the speeds that are likely to be available (and some pricing info).
I'd give the possibillity of getting diverse (Two COs, Two Paths) as being pretty slim. Not absolutely out of the question, but unlikely.
Good Luck
Scott
To get the max speeds, you need to be within ~ 13,000 feet of the CO. It's gonna vary a little depending on the equipment the provider is using; 13,000 should be a fairly safe number. If you go to www.broadbandreports.com and go through the elegibility checker, it'll tell you which CO services your location, the distances, and the speeds that are likely to be available (and some pricing info).
I'd give the possibillity of getting diverse (Two COs, Two Paths) as being pretty slim. Not absolutely out of the question, but unlikely.
Good Luck
Scott
You know, with 60 hosts...
I don't know what sort of business this is or what their needs are, but I'm thinking that cable/dsl might not be a good solution.
It's possible that your situation might be such where a leased line to the Frame Relay cloud might be a cost effective way to get the bandwidth you need.
I don't know what sort of business this is or what their needs are, but I'm thinking that cable/dsl might not be a good solution.
It's possible that your situation might be such where a leased line to the Frame Relay cloud might be a cost effective way to get the bandwidth you need.
Why not get 2 dial up connections, 2 dsl connections, a satellite connection, and a cable connection. Just teach users or learn yourself how to switch which adapter to use on the fly. You could probably even write a macro for the change over.
(2) Dialup Account + Phone Line = $50 per month each
(2) DSL Connections = $50 per month each
(1) Satellite Connection = $500 for hardware + $75 per month
(1) Cable connection = $60 per month
Total =
About $750 up front for everything
About $350 a month
If Cable goes out, you still have satellite, dsl, dialup
If Phone line goes out, you still have cable
If satellite goes out, you still have dialup, dsl, cable
If DSL goes out, you still have dialup, satellite, cable
(2) Dialup Account + Phone Line = $50 per month each
(2) DSL Connections = $50 per month each
(1) Satellite Connection = $500 for hardware + $75 per month
(1) Cable connection = $60 per month
Total =
About $750 up front for everything
About $350 a month
If Cable goes out, you still have satellite, dsl, dialup
If Phone line goes out, you still have cable
If satellite goes out, you still have dialup, dsl, cable
If DSL goes out, you still have dialup, satellite, cable
The circuits themselves will typically be provisioned for you by the ISP and that's the way you typically want it. Most of the time, the T1/T3 circuits really come from your ILEC, and your ISP is a big customer of theirs, while you're not -- guess who gets better service?
It is extremely important to understand where you're get a >= T1 connection to. A cheap T1 to a mom and pop ISP is likely to give you performance problems, because they likely don't have enough upstream bandwidth. A T1 to a tier-1 ISP is likely to not. You get what you pay for here. (uh, hint, any ISP that goes around advertising that they're "tier-1"... isn't) I can set up a T1 from your business to my basement, and it'll be a T1 as far as you can tell, but you aren't going to get a useful amount of public Internet bandwidth out of it.
UUNet is an excellent T1 provider and these days their pricing is not so bad -- the Worldcom bankruptcy means they're in major disarray but the network works. Sprint is also a good T1 provider.
T1s are the bread and butter business IP connection. They are not perfect but are usually pretty reliable. One T1 for 60 PCs should be reasonable, and sounds like a good place to start.
SDSL is okay, too. Distance sensitivities are annoying -- if you can get it, it's more cost effective than a T1, and maybe almost as fast (1.1Mb/s). If you can't get it, then it's a non-issue
DS3s are much more fun but probably overkill for your scale.
Multiple connections introduces a good deal of complexity -- hire a networking wizard before going there.
It is extremely important to understand where you're get a >= T1 connection to. A cheap T1 to a mom and pop ISP is likely to give you performance problems, because they likely don't have enough upstream bandwidth. A T1 to a tier-1 ISP is likely to not. You get what you pay for here. (uh, hint, any ISP that goes around advertising that they're "tier-1"... isn't) I can set up a T1 from your business to my basement, and it'll be a T1 as far as you can tell, but you aren't going to get a useful amount of public Internet bandwidth out of it.
UUNet is an excellent T1 provider and these days their pricing is not so bad -- the Worldcom bankruptcy means they're in major disarray but the network works. Sprint is also a good T1 provider.
T1s are the bread and butter business IP connection. They are not perfect but are usually pretty reliable. One T1 for 60 PCs should be reasonable, and sounds like a good place to start.
SDSL is okay, too. Distance sensitivities are annoying -- if you can get it, it's more cost effective than a T1, and maybe almost as fast (1.1Mb/s). If you can't get it, then it's a non-issue
DS3s are much more fun but probably overkill for your scale.
Multiple connections introduces a good deal of complexity -- hire a networking wizard before going there.
I used to deal with Covad as an SDSL provider. Based on experience with them, 13000 feet from the CO is only likely to get 384k on a very reliable basis, though 768k could be functional if the line is clean. Usually it's line problems more than the distance that causes lower speed availability. But of course, 13k is just an example. But ScottMac is right, if you're close enough to one CO to get 1.5Mbps service, you probably won't be close enough for a backup DSL line to another CO. However, a backup ISDN line for critical information transfer would be possible, and highly recommended. I got so tired of hearing from customers how it was our fault their business was going to fail because their Internet service was down.
Frame relay is a somewhat cost-effective solution, but not always. Frame-relay service is usually passed over a physical T1 line, so you're just running a T1 line and putting the frame-relay protocol on it, and not terminating it to a specific T1 on the other end. That means you (or your ISP) is paying the same costs as a T1 service when it comes to the physical line charges, and then you end up being connected to a variable-availability frame relay cloud. Working with Bell Atlantic (now Verizon) with frame relay lines was hell, with people in certain areas getting terrible performance due to overloading of the frame cloud.
The upshot of frame relay is that you can get full T1 burst speeds sometimes (or even higher, since you can also use frame-relay on a DS3 if you wanted). If the telephone company's frame relay cloud is underutilized (which I'd bet is rare), and you're contracted for say a 768k frame relay with a burstable speed of 1.5Mbps full T1, then you can send or receive traffic for short periods at the full speed rather than just 768k. I'd personally consider frame-relay only as a solution for occasional high bandwidth needs.
Frame relay is a somewhat cost-effective solution, but not always. Frame-relay service is usually passed over a physical T1 line, so you're just running a T1 line and putting the frame-relay protocol on it, and not terminating it to a specific T1 on the other end. That means you (or your ISP) is paying the same costs as a T1 service when it comes to the physical line charges, and then you end up being connected to a variable-availability frame relay cloud. Working with Bell Atlantic (now Verizon) with frame relay lines was hell, with people in certain areas getting terrible performance due to overloading of the frame cloud.
The upshot of frame relay is that you can get full T1 burst speeds sometimes (or even higher, since you can also use frame-relay on a DS3 if you wanted). If the telephone company's frame relay cloud is underutilized (which I'd bet is rare), and you're contracted for say a 768k frame relay with a burstable speed of 1.5Mbps full T1, then you can send or receive traffic for short periods at the full speed rather than just 768k. I'd personally consider frame-relay only as a solution for occasional high bandwidth needs.
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