Partial Service is a new term encountered in the DOCSIS 3.0 MULPI specification and realized in field deployments of DOCSIS 3.0 cable modems using upstream bonding. This was a topic that I touched on in this years SCTE Cable-Tec Expo, but will explore in greater detail in this article. Partial service can be considered a feature because the cable modem will stay online even when one or more upstream transmit channels goes offline.
I first heard of Intraway's products through a LinkedIn request to talk about DOCSIS security from Intraway's CEO, Leandro Rzezak. This immediately peaked my interest becuase today our DOCSIS networks are inherently insecure and many are unaware of this. What do I mean by insecure? No, not crying and sniffling in a corner. They are open to theft of service, illegal intercept of the data transmitted, illegal wiretapping of phone calls, etc. Even with Baseline Privacy Interface Specification (BPI+) DOCSIS is quite hackable as evidenced on a number of well known hacking sites. The cool factor in the Fraud & Network Usage Control module offered by Intraway is that they have developed effective algorithms which sit on-top of the most used provisioning systems, Cisco's CNR and Incognito's BCC.
When I first heard rumor that a knew company had a DOCSIS protocol analyzer floating around I had to see it! With full disclosure, many of you know that after 10 years in RF and fiber-optic transport equipment, I spent a few years designing, marketing and selling DOCSIS protocol analyzers. More specifically I focused on making them available to cable operators because I knew they could detect really difficult to isolate problems. Averna know owns the technology from my Sigtek days, so it is nice to see a new competitor in the space. What's more is that its nice to see this competitor at SCTE Cable-Tec Expo who is interested in cable operator's issues.
I admit that while I help my clients better understand the sources and negative impacts of RF ingress on DOCSIS in a cable plant, I have never found leakage/ingress detection itself particularly high-tech. That was until Daniel Babeux of VGI Solutions gave me a demo of their CPAT Flex Platform. The live demo was straightforward which made it so convincing and intriguing. It consisted of a truck-mount magnetic antenna that connected into a little green box (the brains behind the operation), and a piece of coax cable seemingly chewed upon by a squirrel. The latter connected back into the CATV plant. The awesome part of the demonstration was seeing the location of the antenna appear on Google maps at the Georgia Convention Center in Atlanta, GA. Next when the damaged coax was replaced, the leakage point on the map disappeared along with magnitude of the leakage entering the plant.
What first caught my eye by Televes H45 Spectrum Analyzer was the HDMI port feeding a flatscreen television. How cool is that? I also noticed the small unit was displaying a QAM "haystack" along with its power, MER, BER, and the demodulated picture just beside the measurements. The picture was on a high resolution display, not the low quality displays I've seen in the past, so tiling or macro-blocking would be apparent to the user. See the picture below:
At this year's Cable-Tec Expo, Rohde & Schwarz (www.rohde-schwarz.com) introduced a 1U Cable Load Generator (CLG) capable of simulating cable TV networks with full channel loading. This baby is not just limited to North America, but can do channel plans for the World over! Here are the highlights:
Press Release The Volpe Firm offering solutions, services and products for the broadband telecommunications industry The Volpe Firm gets Seal of Approval from Clients Alpharetta, GA November 14, 2011: The Volpe Firm offers solutions, services and products for the broadband communications industry with a focus in DOCSIS, data, video, and VoIP communications. We provide everything from specialized DOCSIS 3.0 seminars and or tailored DOCSIS training to high level hardware architecture engineering design and system troubleshooting. The Volpe Firm, with 30 years of combined telecommunications experience, specializes in DOCSIS,
SCTE Cable Tec Expo - Atlanta [list type="list2"] Advanced Troubleshooting in a DOCSIS 3.0 Plant Mon, November 14 – Thu, November 17 Presentation Workshop is Wednesday, November 16, 8:00am – 9:30am Repeated November 16, 11:00am - 12:00pm [/list]
John Downey and Brady Volpe will be speaking on November 2, 2011 at the Piedmont SCTE Chapter about DOCSIS 3.0 Troubleshooting, Implementation, and Planning. This is the first speaking engagement under my new consulting company The Volpe Firm, Inc., so I am truly vendor neutral and will be to field questions on any topic. Also, for those of you who will be at Cable-Tec Expo, I will be speaking on Advanced DOCSIS 3.0 Troubleshooting in the Plant. My presentation is on Wednesday November 16th and offered at the following times and locations:
The following article just released by Broadband Technology Report was written by Carl Weinschenk. A number of us from the industry contributed to Carl's piece, but it is a nice high-level summary article on the status of DOCSIS 3.0. Below you will find a snippet of the article with a link to the BTR website for the complete read. Enjoy. Rollouts Continue as DOCSIS 3.0 Matures There are just two areas of concern as the rollout of DOCSIS 3.0 continues: the upstream and the downstream. Observers seem satisfied
