From gnu@cygnus.com Tue Feb 2 16:51:25 1993 Received: from relay1.UU.NET by fido.wps.com (5.67/1.34) id AA01965; Tue, 2 Feb 93 16:51:19 -0800 Received: from cygnus.com by relay1.UU.NET with SMTP (5.61/UUNET-internet-primary) id AA21290; Tue, 2 Feb 93 19:52:08 -0500 Received: from localhost.cygnus.com by cygnus.com (4.1/SMI-4.1) id AA23600; Tue, 2 Feb 93 16:52:06 PST Message-Id: <9302030052.AA23600@cygnus.com> To: tomj@fido.wps.com (Tom Jennings) Cc: fair@apple.com (Erik E. Fair), gnu@cygnus.com, grossman@cygnus.com Subject: Re: The Little Garden In-Reply-To: Your message of "Tue, 02 Feb 93 15:02:42." <9302022302.AA01799@fido.wps.com> Date: Tue, 02 Feb 93 16:52:05 -0800 From: gnu@cygnus.com Status: OR Erik Fair asked: > What are the little garden's rates for dedicated IP connections? > In particular, how much for 56Kb/s into TIS, Mountain View? I think > I'm on the same CO. Currently the way it works is that the high speed members split the bill that remains after the low speed members have paid in. Each member also pays for their own link to their Garden neighbor, plus any internal links that they operate. (E.g. Cygnus operates internal links to Palo Alto and SF). Garden traffic can piggyback on those links, and we're starting to work out ways to pay back the member whose link bandwidth is being used (to make it possible to upgrade the link, in particular, before it saturates -- giving better service for everyone including the high speed member). Current monthly dues for TIS and Cygnus are somewhere near $325. We're splitting down $1000/mo Alternet bill. That bill is expected to rise to $2000/mo as our overall average traffic nudges over 56K. Since Cygnus's upgrade to T1 will cause this rise, Cygnus will cover it in the short term (paying $1325). As more 56K or T1 members join, I expect that we'd keep charging them in the $325 range until the monthly total again covered the Alternet bill more evenly -- maybe $650 for T1, $325 for 56K, $70 for 14.4K. Your connection could either go to TIS or to Cygnus, both are in Mt. View. I think we currently have a router port available at Cygnus, but none at TIS. Startup fee to join TLG for modem users has been $250, which buys a share of the PC clone needed to route four users. You supply the phone line, the modems on both ends, and whatever equipment you need on your end. Startup fee for 56K service would cover the same cost, which'd be half a Livingston 2-port router at about $1200; you supply the CSU/DSU's at both ends, and your own equipment. The biggest lump is actually the phone installation: $1000/end as I recall. (We'd actually hook you to the 2nd port on our 3Com router currently at Cygnus, since your $1200 would be the "first half" of a Livingston that doesn't exist yet.) A leased line to Mercy St. would probably cost under $100/mo. You might be able to do better if you could get copper wire between there and TIS (and use line drivers rather than CSU/DSU). Tim Pozar knows how to order copper wire, since he uses it for his radio stations. > > If I can get ISDN, how much for 2B (128Kb/s)? > It would be our first ISDN, certainly. We would need to work out different > costs/shares but it's not a problem. We'd love to get an ISDN link in and working, especially with someone like you who knows what they're doing. If you can find equipment that handles the setup and teardown, and just provides a 64kbit or 128kbit sync clock to the router, we can plug it into the 3Com. If it's more exotic than that, you'll be supplying the router too...or we'll need to do some custom work with the router vendor. (For that I'd recommend that you buy a Livingston -- with what you save in 56K line installation fees! -- and work with their tech support on any firmware changes required. They were pretty responsive to us with previous problems.) I haven't seen any routers that talk ISDN advertised -- the only stuff I've seen was bridges, and those (in the Black Box catalog, I think) were pricey. Also note that ISDN requires another box at each end, which translates the central office interface to the local modular-jack interface. I think these are under $500 but am not sure. With ISDN service you also have to worry about per-minute charges, too -- I don't think Calif has adopted a residential ISDN tariff that eliminates them -- so you'll want equipment that hangs up the phone when no packets are passing, etc. Ideally the telcos would offer fixed cost leased lines at current leased-line monthly prices, with ISDN interfaces on both ends (instead of DDS DSU interfaces), at current ISDN installation prices, but that's not available, as far as I know. At the moment DSU's are probably cheaper than ISDN interfaces anyway, but I expect that to change Real Soon Now. Re 128k, our pricing started off as straight division of the $1000/mo by bandwidth available, but has gotten more complicated now that we're paying Tom Jennings to maintain the net and since TIS has grandfathered in as a 56K user though they are on a T1 pipe. For 128 kbit ISDN rather than 64kbit, make us an offer :-)... John