Being on the road has its advantages; the freedom is the biggest one. One draw back was the Internet Service, but having done much study on the mobile Internet Satellite Systems and future technologies; I was able to become a beta tester of the MotoSat system in 1999. I have used the system ever sense.

My company, the Car Wash Guys had joined forces with a Strategic Alliance of GM Hughes Satellite Division to beta test the First Fully Self contained, fully Networked Mobile Corporate Office, taking advantage of the newest in WiFi technology. We were the first in the world to have this powerful capabilities which at the time nearly blew away the Pentagon’s Performance with their 77 million dollar investment and Iridium Bailout.

Mobile Corporate Offices are the Wave of the future, where Network Centric Warfare (Net-Centric) in the marketplace combined with strategic mobile command centers used to create a network of networks, which will eventually dominate all of their market sectors. Corporate Giants are slowly learning the game is changing. And we are the ones teaching them. We are the leaders in technology and they will have to learn the hard way. Car Wash Guys are leading everyone's industry this time. As far as the car wash industry is concerned we left them in the dust a decade ago. Today we use 20 times less water, a third of the labor and spend less than a tenth of the capital to do it. We now have much bigger fish to fry as we go for the gold. To work with this technology you must move your business at the speed of thought.

We at our Bravo research team of WashGuys, had been studying the newest in satellite technologies. Most of our recent studies have been on satellite data transmissions and as many of you know we have become very knowledgeable over the years with satellite communications, I happened to live next door in Malibu from a physicist who worked at the Rockwell Research Center in Thousand Oaks CA. First we would like to talk about actually data transmission speeds and problems associated with relays and problems of security of data when data jumps from satellite to satellite or from satellite to ground. Also with the problems of relay where any and all data can be recorded. As everyone knows the Pentagon bailed out the Iridium project, which is good since we have learned so much from this. The 75 million dollar contract helped pay the bills of 7 million a month including the 40 million per year to Boeing who flies the satellites. Iridium was nice in that it covered the whole Earth, all oceans and remote areas, with spare satellites ready just in case. Iridium had 66 satellites in orbit in use at about 485,000 up. Very close and helps with data lag associated with satellites which is normally a half second or more. The data can be transmitted at 1Mbs, which is slow considering the Wash Guys data transmission capabilities of 10-12.265 Mps up load and the 1Mbs download, faster than that of the US Department of Defense. The other problem we see with their system is the relay in Tempe, AZ home of Motorola, which is unsafe due to the newest wave of possible terrorist devices such as the brief case electronic impulse devises which work from building tops and could easily destroy its relay station. This is why other systems, which are not voice systems and generally web based and data use satellites are much better such as the Globalstar System.

With Globalstar, which is in debt and filed bankruptcy, due to small amount of debt to Qualcomm who is also in trouble and Loral, it may cease to exist. EuroCom has a neat system, which is used in the shipping industry and there is an interesting article in Professional Mariner this month about them and a few others. It is similar to Imersat and supports PBX and PABX systems on ships. Of course the bent pipe approach by GlobalStar is worth considering its 48 operational satellites and the four spares. Only real problem is the range of 70 degrees north to 60 degrees south. And also the gaps if you let’s say in the middle of the ocean at sea level in the South Atlantic and or middle of the Pacific. Several satellites can transmit the coded signal but unlike the Iridium system the Satellites do not talk to themselves. But all in all Global Star data transmissions are still about 9.6 KBPS and actually slightly less than the Iridium system, which does not have the lapse in service.

The Iridium of course is the Arthur C. Clark theory in practice and is worthy of note; the big problem right now with data transmission is the problems with direct sight to satellite, which we have encountered. Hard for submarines, and below decks on vessels or in buildings. Good for catching bad guys who have to go out in the open to use the phone, they do not work in caves either. Iridium like all of Microsoft software has triple redundancy, and uses CDMA technologies to gateway the data from transmission point into the terrestrial system. Inmarsat Systems include the I-4 system, which can transmit data at 432 MBPS turns out to be excellent for things like video conferencing. The newest satellites by Inmarsat are said to be able to 10 times more communications than the current ones. Since the Inmarsat satellites are at 22,300 miles up three satellites cover the Earth with 3 back-ups. But remember with that altitude there is a time delay. You will notice this when you see video feed from the Middle East Wars on live broadcasts on TV, CNN.

The Internet, as most people know it, is history.

It just seems like yesterday the Internet was just one big mass of wires and cables; a glorified file sharing warehouse with more than a few too many lines sticking out. One enormous LAN party that just got out of hand, causing a ruckus and spilling out down the block and around the world; creating too many millionaires for no good reason and causing too many sleepless nights surfing the neon pink.

The Internet quietly crept into every facet of our lives... no subject or topic was left unexplored in this binary medium. Suddenly, there it was, the authority on everything. Our lives encyclopedia-ed to death by bits and bites.

But the Internet has always been perceived as a connected medium; tied together by cables, servers and networks. Until now that is, because now everything has changed. And it's about time, the Internet has been tied to the ground for far too long, it's time for liberation. Independence Day. Bring it on!

The Internet is going Wireless -- for real this time.

There were a few false starts; you can Bluetooth yourself silly, but you won't get much further than 30 feet or so. The BlackBerry is great but a little limiting. And Wi-Fi services have been around for a long while but those were not really convenient, if you have to find something; it's not convenient. Finding a 'hot spot' is the space age equivalent of finding a 'needle in a haystack'; takes way too much time.

What changes things, what has finally given the Internet its liberation?

Verizon Wireless 3G EV-DO (evolution-data optimized) and other companies offering similar services around the world. This new technology will change how we view and use the world wide web. Verizon Wireless began commercial operations in Oct. of 2003 and is now expanding to over 125 million US consumers by the end of 2005.

With download speeds of 400 to 700 kbps and bursts up to 2 Mbps, 3G has really given us wireless Internet this time. It has or will turn the Internet into a truly wireless system that's devoid of any cables or lines and really make it omnipotent. It will be everywhere. No space within our biosphere will be without the Internet very soon.

For now Verizon Wireless or 3G is mainly located in the USA but this will quickly change as other 3G companies and systems start up to fulfill the demand. Wi-Fi may play a role too but will it go the way of the 'Beta'?

However, this wireless universe could not be possible without one other key element. The one element that also helped give the Internet its wings. The answer might or might not surprise you. What really gave the Internet its groove? Can you guess? Give up?

Finally, we come to the last element of this brand new liberated Internet -- the little notebook computer. Don't underestimate the power of this great little revolutionary device, it is doing for the Internet what the cell phone did for the phone industry -- making it wireless, portable, and accessible anywhere.

It could even be argued that it was the little notebook computer that gave the Internet its freedom. Finally cutting the cable and freeing the web, once and for all.

Once we had a portable computer that we could tuck under our arm and take anywhere; we naturally wanted to take the Internet along with it. After all, a computer without the Internet is like having Mickey Mouse without Disneyland -- a real downer -- any kid can tell you that!

Once the notebook or laptop computer gained in popularity, the demand for a wireless Internet grew right along with it. The portability factor being a strong selling point for both the notebook and the Internet.

Likewise, in order to take full advantage of each of them; for business operations, for personal communications, for emailing, for web surfing... a wireless portable Internet was the obvious next step. They compliment each other perfectly and one is not completely whole without the other.

Technology has created this unholy trinity (the Internet, wireless connections and the notebook computer) to fulfill our need for a portable communication system that we can take and access anywhere. Until now, the Internet was limited, tied to cables and wires...it never really got off the ground!

Internet Service Provider or ISP is a company that provides access to the Internet.

Before choosing an ISP, it is important to assess your company's business and marketing goals. You should find out what your organization will be using the Internet for. Once you've determined this, you can contact ISPs that serve your geographic area and ask them about their services. Those questions below will help you better understand that your local ISP offers.

Technical Questions About Reliability

1. Does the connection work at all hours of the day?

2. When are you busiest?

3. Does the connection support the speeds/types of hardware/software you want to use? Have specific questions to ask them. Know your operating system and the software that you need to use. Does the provider support 56K? Does it use the U.S. Robotics' x2 or Rockwell/Lucent's K56flex standard or both of them?

Technical Support and Troubleshooting

1. Is support part of normal service or an added cost?

2. What are the hours of coverage for network operations?

3. Is telephone support available via a local call, 800 number, or long distance?

4. Is there technical help available via e-mail? If yes who answers the questions and how soon?

5. Is there help and/or manuals available online?

6. Is there a user-friendly interface to Internet resources?

7. What software is provided and/or required?

8. Are the Internet tools that you need (such as e-mail, telnet, FTP, Usenet/News, Gopher, WAIS, WWW, or Lynx) available?

Business Arrangements and References

1. Are free trial connections available?

2. What local and 800 phone numbers are available for you to use?

3. Can multiple users access the same billing account simultaneously?

4. Can multiple user IDs/mailboxes use the same billing account?

5. Are there surcharges for any types of connections or particular hours of the day?

6. What kind of contract or services agreement is required?

7. What options are available for billing and payments? Discounts for pre-payments?

8. Are there refunds for early termination or if service is not satisfactory?

9. Are there any options that will reduce (or increase) your costs?

10. Are group discounts available? (Start your own group!)

11. After placing an order, how long does it take to make the connection active?

12. Are there charges for file storage?

13. Is space for Web pages included?

14. If you travel and want to access the Internet while you are on the road, ask about accessing your ISP from the cities you visit.

15. How long has the provider been in business?

16. Can you get answers to your questions in writing?

17. Ask for names of two to three similar users and check with them regarding their experience.

Often too many people get confused with all the definitions, here we have explained in easy to understand terms.

ADSL:
Asymmetric Digital Subscriber Line - asymmetric meaning it's faster downstream than upstream.

ASAM:
Advanced Services Access Manager -Whether you have a DSLAM or ASAM in your exchange doesn't really matter. They do the same thing. See DSLAM's as well.

ATM:
Asynchronous Transfer Mode - a method of encapsulation which is capable of many virtual circuits. With these, providers (ISP's) can split an ATM connection (155Mbit or 622Mbit) up into many connections. ATM isn't just used for DSL but in the case of DSL it's used to provision each customer.

Contention Ratios:
A contention ratio is the number of users to xMbit of bandwidth. For example some providers offer 2Mbit DSL, with a ratio of 50:1, meaning 50 users to 1Mbit of bandwidth.

CPE:
Customer Premises Equipment, the term that describes the equipment used on the customer end of a connection, for example your DSL modem/router or cable modem.

DSL:
Digital Subscriber Line.

DSLAM:
Digital Subscriber Line Access Multiplexer – They are placed in DSL enabled Telecomm exchanges, when your modem syncs up and the DSL light comes on, it means you are connected. When data travels down your connection, it goes from the CPE -> DSLAM -> RAN -> ISP

ERX:
Edge Routing Exchange. See RAN.

IPNet:
Telecommunications backhaul networks for carrying traffic from the customer to the ISP, i.e. carrying traffic from RAN's to ISP's.

Ping or Latency:
A ping measures the time in milliseconds that it takes for a packet to travel from your computer to a remote computer and back to you again. Just because you can't ping a given host, quite a lot of providers are beginning to filter ICMP (pings come under this protocol) traffic because it is commonly used to attack hosts and wastes a lot of bandwidth. Many providers also give low priority to ping (ICMP) traffic which may mean your ping at a command line isn't very good, but in say a game, things may be fine.

RAN:
Regional Access Node These aggregates many DSLAM's connections and then feed the data to an ISP

RTT
Round Trip Time - the time it takes in milliseconds for a packet to go from A to B and back again. See ping.

SDSL
Symmetrical Digital Subscriber Line - symmetrical meaning the same speed up and down.

Units

There is a major difference between UPPER and lowercase

MB = MegaBytes
Mb = Megabits
kB = KiloBytes
kb = Kilobits

MB/s = MegaBytes per second
Mb/s = Megabits per second
kB/s = KiloBytes per second
kb/s = Kilobits per second

There is 8bits to a Byte, 8kb = 1kB

1Meg connections only transfer at 128kB/sec or an 8Mb connection only transfers at 1024kB/sec or 1MB/s

Okay, so you are finally tired of those slow dial-up internet connections, and you want to go broadband. Good deal. But first, you may be wondering which type of broadband connection is best- DSL or Cable? Or, at least, which of the two gives you more speed for the price? Here we take a look at these two popular broadband connections and try to determine which one is better: DSL vs. Cable.

Cable Speed vs. DSL

The most common question that comes up is which type of connection is faster, DSL or Cable? To answer this, it is important to compare both upload and download speeds. Now, so you have something to compare these speeds to, your average dial-up connection is about 28 - 56 Kbps. Most often, however, you won't be able to get 56k through dial up, as most services can not handle this speed.

The average speed of a DSL download is 1.0 - 1.5Mbps. That's megabytes per second - about 20 times as fast as the fastest dial-up connection. This is fast, but consider Cable, which can give you up to 2 - 3Mbps. Thus, at least for downloading, cable can give you almost twice the speed of DSL - that's impressive. On the upload side, however, cable and DSL are pretty evenly matched. They both provide about 100Kbps - 400Kbps. It seems that cable has won this battle.

What about Price and Quality of Service?

There is more to discuss here besides the speed of the connections. Take price for one. Cable and DSL connections are both going to be more expensive than dial-up. But, DSL seems to be the cheaper of the two at the moment. You can get a good DSL internet connection for about $35 - $45 per month. Cable modem will cost you about $45 or $50 (this price may be included in a cable TV package). These prices, however, are really close and they change almost from month to month.

DSL is nice because you can talk on the phone and be online at the same time. In addition, business-level DSL service provides guaranteed data rates, so your connection speed is never a surprise. On the other hand, DSL speed tends to decrease the further you are away from the data center, and it is typically not as widely available as Cable. Cable speeds are not dependent on distance from the data center, and is occasionally cheaper than DSL when included in a cable TV rate. A cable modem, however, may require costly professional installation, and there may exists some limitations on downloads and uploads. All of these factors should be taken into consideration when choosing either broadband service.