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Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

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Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#351

Post by rtsil »

ryandrake wrote: post #222
wannacboatmovie wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Should I be surprised that the reactions posted here range from "I stretched a cable across the ceiling like two tin cans and a string" to "I will fly a drone into my attic". Instead of: "I took my $500k/year tech salary which I formerly spent on Teslas and cardboard apartments and just hired a competent electrician or other tradesman to pull cable to every room."

You should not be surprised. A lot of us are DIYers, and see no need to pay someone to do something we can do ourselves. Running low-voltage ethernet through an attic or crawlspace is within the skills of anyone with functioning limbs. There is zero reason to pay someone to do it. I don't really understand people who pay others to do every little thing they need done around the house, but I suppose they have differen…

> I don't really understand people who pay others to do every little thing they need done around the house

I realized that it is cheaper for me to pay someone do some things than doing them myself. Instead, I can either work or do something fun or more interesting.

Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#352

Post by hnlmorg »

stephenr wrote: post #306
hnlmorg wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A 4K UltraHD Bluray (that's 100GB for one movie) has a maximum bitrate of "just" 144Mbps. If you're suggesting online streaming services have some swathe of content that's (checks notes) in excess of 7x the bitrate used for 4K Bluray discs, I'd love to hear about it. We are still a long way off the parity with what our eyes can process so there's plenty of room for bitrates to grow. Plus the average internet connec…

> Plus the average internet connection isn't just streaming a video. It's kids watching online videos while adults are video conferencing and music is being streamed in the background. Probably with games being downloaded and software getting updated too. That's exactly the scenario I gave where 2.5G WAN would be useful, but a 1G LAN to each machine is likely enough for most tasks, for most people - multiple users si…

> That's exactly the scenario I gave where 2.5G WAN would be useful, but a 1G LAN to each machine...

You're moving goal posts now because your original comment, the one that sparked this discussion, neither mentioned 2.5G WAN nor that your 1G comment was specific to each machine rather than internet connectivity as a whole.

> but a 1G LAN to each machine is likely enough for most tasks, for most people - multiple users simultaneous use.

For today, yes. But you're demonstrating a massive failure of imagination by assuming those needs are going to be the same in a few years time. For example, the 4k figures you're quoting are fine and dandy if you don't take into account that TV manufacturers are going to want to sell newer screens. Which means more emphasis on content with high colour colour depths, refresh rates and resolutions. This isn't even a theoretical point, there are already 8k @ 120FPS videos on YouTube.

Heck, I've already hit the 1GbE limit for a few specific bits of hardware in my home set up. Mainly my home server and some "backbone" wiring between two core switches which join two separated buildings on my property. But if I'm hitting that limit today then it's not going to be many more years before other people start hitting it for far less esoteric reasons than mine.

You're also overlooking that fact that if you have router providing GbE to desktops and WiFi 6 to other devices, it's very unlikely to be powerful enough to switch all of those devices at gigabit speeds, let alone routing at 2.5G to the WAN. And that's with regular IPv4 packages, never mind the additional overhead that IPv6 adds. Underpowered consumer networking equipment is already impacting home users right now. So again, we are seeing limits being hit already.

---

Lets also not forget all the other noise being introduced into homes. Smart speakers uploading voice recordings for speech-to-text analysis. Smart doorbells and over security devices uploading video. Smart lights, fridges, plugs, plant pots and whatever else phoning home. Set top TV boxes, and other multimedia devices phoning home, downloading software updates and streaming adverts. In fact have you ever run wireshark on your average home network recently? There is a lot of noise these days and that's only set to grow exponentially.

Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#353

Post by trillic »

gwbas1c wrote: post #297
stiray wrote: post #247

I had my mileage in wifi/routers development and I will say you just a proverb: "The one who knows how wireless works, uses cable." ;) When renovating an apartment I have put a shitload of ethernet sockets everywhere, there is no place in 80m2 apartment, where you would be more than 2m away of nearest (including toilet) and as 4 of them were not enough behind TV, I have added a router there. Wifi is just a patch if y…

> where you would be more than 2m away of nearest (including toilet) When I visit you and poop, do you have a way for me to connect my phone to your wired network? I'm going to be honest with you: Modern WIFI is really awesome. I don't have problems with reception now that I bought a powerful router. (And "just run a wire" isn't a solution; the devices that had reception problems don't support wired ethernet.)

Non-sarcastically, yes. The USB-C hub I use to connect my laptop works perfect charging my iPhone and Android my phone while providing gigabit speeds to the android and USB 2 speeds to my iPhone!

Not in my bathroom yet though, I'm still renting.

Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#355

Post by ksec »

Really wish 5Gbps Ethernet could replace 1Gbps Ethernet. I dont know why the industry went for 2.5Gbps instead ( Ok I do, cost savings ), and WiFI 7 could already make faster real world transfer than 2.5Gbps.

Instead of further pushing mesh, we could have educated the market about putting Ethernet links, or we could have wired the house as if they were good old telephone cables.

Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#356

Post by ForkMeOnTinder »

ihattendorf wrote: post #350
ForkMeOnTinder wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IPv6 also required hardware in the wild to be replaced, but that's not a reason to give up and let things ossify. Over the next 30 years most hardware will be landfilled and replaced anyway. Let's get these improvements into the software stack of new devices now, and then let nature take its course.

> IPv6 also required hardware in the wild to be replaced I understand that, but it was (is) able to do that in a mostly backwards compatible manner. My question is: how is that possible with different MTU sizes? Have ISPs support 9000 byte frames and fragment to 1500 bytes for compatibility with the wider internet? Then something like PMTUD can be used to bypass this fragmentation when supported? To be clear, I would…

Also not a network engineer. But I'd imagine first the Tier 1 ISPs (Level 3 etc) could enable jumbo frames and make sure they work smoothly amongst each other. After a few years of waiting, new consumer devices/OSs can start trying to send jumbo frames, while setting the Don't Fragment flag. If some router in the path doesn't support 9000, it will signal back ICMP Fragmentation Needed, and the device can transparently resend with 1500. Then add some local caching to avoid the roundtrip for subsequent connections to the same noncompliant network/endpoint.

And since it's a big change anyway, why stop at 9000? Why not 65000? Packets don't have to fill the entire MTU after all. If 65000 is supported, you can choose to send 1500, 9000, or 65000 based on your desired latency/throughput tradeoff.

Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#357

Post by charlie0 »

eikenberry wrote: post #285
charlie0 wrote: post #279

Earlier quoted context omitted.

MoCA is really expensive. You're better off just hiring someone to wire the house up. Id

How cheap are electricians where you live? MoCA adapters are around $50/each where electricians are around $200 just to visit + hourly and materials (US, west coast). That's a lot of MoCA devices.

Yes, but you need 2 to start ($100), that's the cheaper version of the MOCA adapters (the high use cost $80/each) that's just one room. It's an extra $50/$80 per room. If you're only looking for one connection, MOCA seems alright, but if it's going to be multiple rooms, it's better (and cleaner) to just do the in-wall wiring.

These prices are also recently reduced. Without them you're looking at $150/170 a pair depending on the version you buy.

https://www.amazon.com/Actiontec-MoCA-Network-Adapter-Ethern...

Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#358

Post by balderdash »

ryandrake wrote: post #222
wannacboatmovie wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Should I be surprised that the reactions posted here range from "I stretched a cable across the ceiling like two tin cans and a string" to "I will fly a drone into my attic". Instead of: "I took my $500k/year tech salary which I formerly spent on Teslas and cardboard apartments and just hired a competent electrician or other tradesman to pull cable to every room."

You should not be surprised. A lot of us are DIYers, and see no need to pay someone to do something we can do ourselves. Running low-voltage ethernet through an attic or crawlspace is within the skills of anyone with functioning limbs. There is zero reason to pay someone to do it. I don't really understand people who pay others to do every little thing they need done around the house, but I suppose they have differen…

I generally feel the same way having spent a lot of my childhood on a farm, but when I started adding up the cost of all the random tools I would buy (now that I can’t skip out to a barn with 50 years of accumulated tools) to complete a task, and the time for the multiple Home Depot runs/missed steps I’ve started to realize it’s easier and cheaper (in some cases) to have someone else do it. Though there are still some tasks I can’t help doing myself just because I enjoy the challenge, catharsis, or I just want done properly.

Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#359

Post by petepete »

ksec wrote: post #355

Really wish 5Gbps Ethernet could replace 1Gbps Ethernet. I dont know why the industry went for 2.5Gbps instead ( Ok I do, cost savings ), and WiFI 7 could already make faster real world transfer than 2.5Gbps. Instead of further pushing mesh, we could have educated the market about putting Ethernet links, or we could have wired the house as if they were good old telephone cables.

Normal people just don't need a home network any faster than their internet connection.

Re: Ethernet Is Still Going Strong After 50 Years

#360

Post by maccard »

IshKebab wrote: post #258
brazzledazzle wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're willing to put the work in you can use the coax drops and runs as pulling line for cat, new coax (if you want to keep it) and real pulling line (to leave tied at the top and bottom of each drop if you ever need to run something else). Same idea if you have POTS copper run throughout. Most of the time even the ancient drops and runs have enough space cut out for a number of cables since doing runs is general…

Maybe for plasterboard and timber construction. My house is mostly brick with the coax chased into the wall.

This has the nasty side effect of rendering WiFi pretty much unusable too.
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