Tuesday, July 27

Brian McWilliams of Internet News Radio hosts a vigorous debate between Milo Medin of @Home and Mar Jacobson of Prodigy over the subject of open cable access. (RealAudio required.) The interview is also a great introduction to issues surrounding cable modems and DSL.

A new home networking standard allows local networking speeds up to 10 megabits per second - the same as 10BaseT Ethernet - using existing household phone wires. The new Home Phoneline Networking Alliance (HomePNA) 2.0 standard is backwards compatible with the original 1 megabit HomePNA 1.0 standard. The speed of HomePNA networks is expected to hit 100 megabits by 2001.

Dell is bundling a year's worth of Internet access with a new sub-$1000 Celeron PC.

Australian Financial Review looks at the Optus@Home cable modem network and their prospects for gaining customers, despite charging twice what analog modem ISPs are charging.

AOL is partnering with Ameritech to provide DSL service.

The latest Network Computing has a roundup of options for implementing a remote access server solution.

If your RAS is a Microsoft-free zone, you may be interested to know that Ariel now offers a 60-port CompactPCI card for RedHat Linux (and NT, too). 

 

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Friday, July 30

News.com looks at the effect telephone company equipment has on modem speeds, as telcos struggle to provision more customers without laying new lines. News.com's "High-speed pipe dreams" examines issues surrounding high speed modem deployment.

Cirrus Logic won a US$20 million patent infringement judgment against OPTi Inc. The patents covered technology used to convert analog and digital signals in audio and modem products.

In "Look Ma, No Palms" Stephen Manes of Forbes Digital Tool test drives the wireless data access in 3Com's Palm VII, and presents some wireless alternatives that are cheaper or more comprehensive. It's the first mention I've seen of something called CDMA 2000, which promises to deliver wireless speeds of up to 384 kilobits per second. (Regular CDMA is the digital cellular system currently used in PCS cell phones.)

Panja is building a home router to distribute diverse Internet data - particularly entertainment - to consumer electronics in the home.

Conexant Systems (formerly Rockwell Semiconductor Systems) has voted in favor of version 2.0 of the Home Phoneline Networking Association standard, which will provide of up to 10 megabits per second for home networks. Conexant is a founding member of the HomePNA.

If you're shopping for remote access hardware - be it 56K modems, ISDN or frame relay - visit Network Computing's Interactive Buyer's Guide.

Weekend update - CERT has issued an advisory of a security issue with Cobalt Networks RaQ2 web servers that allows remote users to add arbitrary software to the server.

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