4 ms·
It is insane how reliable landlines are, though. When the power goes out, you can make "candles" by connecting a 0.47 uF capacitor to a LED leg and connect both
by throwawaaarrgh 3y ago
It is insane how reliable landlines are, though. When the power goes out, you can make "candles" by connecting a 0.47 uF capacitor to a LED leg and connect both ends to the red and green phone wires; there's enough voltage to power a couple of them without the phone going off the hook.
In an emergency, the lines don't get clogged like cell phone towers, and the Telco infrastructure is much more protected than wireless (you'd have to bomb a pretty big building with no windows to take out a small area's lines). It's probably fine in the grand scheme that we lose these properties. We'll just reinvent them later if it turns out we miss them.
- vel0city 3y ago> In an emergency, the lines don't get clogged like cell phone tower Back in landline days I was in a couple emergencies where my phone only gave error tones or recorded messages of being too busy. Even in the ancient circuit switched times one could have easily run into a situation where whatever destination out you were trying to go would have been totally full. This idea POTS would never get clogged is a myth. They could handle a lot more capacity than cell phones at the time, sure, but they did still eventually get flooded. And in one of those times, I couldn't get a POTS call out but I could send an SMS and it would eventually get through.