3 ms·
POTS is not dependent on the ordinary house electric system, either.
by FabHK 7y ago
POTS is not dependent on the ordinary house electric system, either.
- lmm 7y agoIt's not supposed to depend on the ordinary electrical system. In practice that independence isn't always tested as often as it should be, and mistakes happen.
- FabHK 7y agoTrue, but at least it is supposed to. What about "the internet"? Which parts of that will still work when there's a power outage? Not your home Wifi, presumably. Mobile data? For how long?
- Piskvorrr 7y agoTens of minutes on average. Most BTSes are battery-backed, without generators. (Home wifi could work, but the usefulness of an island system is limited. Outer link also worked last time, but what good is that when the other end is not even on UPS? Next hop was optical, but who knows how that is powered and whence.)
- ascorbic 7y agoHow many people have their home wifi on a UPS?
- lmm 7y ago> What about "the internet"? Which parts of that will still work when there's a power outage? Not your home Wifi, presumably. Mobile data? For how long? The true-but-unhelpful answer is "depends on your ISP and what contract you have with them". A typical home user's "last mile" is almost certainly less reliable than POTS, agreed. But if you make it onto the backbone the internet is better at routing around disruption than the circuit-oriented phone system. So I wouldn't want to count on the phone system always being more reliable.
- iagovar 7y agoIt is, we just use batteries. Anyway I'm no expert of that, I just see batteries when I enter a BTS, but never checked if there was a separate power line or anything. I'm talking about one ISP in Spain though.
- Piskvorrr 7y agoUsually runs on the normal municipal grid.
- DonHopkins 7y agoYeah, the coffeeshops just kept selling it in the dark.
- stordoff 7y agoGenerally, no, but if you have a mains-powered wireless phone as your only phone (as my grandparents have for over a decade, it essentially is. This isn't necessarily something you can rely on (unless you specifically plan ahead for this).