Broadband Internet Speed test

At the end of the third quarter of 2005, there were a total of 1.132 million broadband clients in Portugal, with penetration reaching 10.8 percent, a value which reflects a growth of 0.8 percentage points compared to the second quarter, according to figures released by Portugese telecoms regulator Anacom. Compared to Q3 of 2004, the increase in clients amounted to 51.4 percent. In the period January-September 2005, ADSL access registered a quarterly increase of 11.8 percent, while cable modem access grew by 3.5 percent. Compared to the same quarter in 2004, ADSL access clients increased by 84.7 percent, to 640,800 subscribers, while cable modem connections grew by 22.7 percent, for a total of 488,400. In the third quarter, ADSL added 68,000 new clients and cable 16,000. Due to a 10 percent fall in interconnection prices, local calls dropped by 6 percent, while regional calls, national and fixed-mobile calls fell by 20-30 percent. Voice and broadband offers have become 50 percent cheaper for end consumers. On the other hand, 2 Mbps internet access is already responsible for 50 percent of ADSL accesses.

From TelecomPaper.

The Radio Regulatory Council of the Japanese Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) have made a recommendation to allocate the 2GHz spectrum to IP Mobile Incorporated (IPMobile). With this decision, IP Mobile will enter the mobile broadband market using TD-CDMA (also known as UMTS TDD), a 3G IMT-2000 technology. By introducing TD-CDMA, as well as a new business model, IPMobile hopes to create a ‘mobile data communications market’ in Japan.

The company plans to introduce the said servcies in three cities — Tokyo, Nagoya, and Osaka — in October 2006, with nationwide coverage by 2012. Upon initial launch in October 2006, IP Mobile plans to offer flat rate Mobile Broadband services with downlink speeds of up to 5.2Mbps and uplink speeds up to 858Kpbs.

Coverage will be planned according to regions with high demand for data communication services and areas with low broadband penetration, the company said. The commercial rollout plan calls for 3,000 base stations to be deployed by the end of 2007 and 8,500 by 2012.

IP Mobile further revealed that a variety of high speed data communication terminals will be available, including card-type, embedded, modem devices and portable devices.

Snipped from Digital Media Asia.

According to an article on ZDNet, a company in San Diego, California by the name of Nethercomm is developing a way to use ultra wideband wireless signals to transmit data at broadband speeds through natural-gas pipes.
The company claims its technology would deliver 100 Mbps to every home.

Excellent! Unfortunately, Nethercomm has no working product yet, and no field tests have taken place. Development is still in an early phase, and the company is trying to raise venture capital to start a pilot program with broadband providers and gas companies next summer.

So how does broadband in gas pipes work? Nethercomm is adapting ultra wideband radio transmitters and receivers to send wireless signals through the natural-gas pipe at the same time the pipe is delivering gas fuel. Ultra wideband, or UWB, is a developing communication technology that delivers very high-speed network data rates, but at higher power levels it can interfere with other wireless signals.

That’s not usually a problem when ultra wideband signals are transmitted in pipes buried underground. As a result, tremendous amounts of data could be transmitted through a gas line without causing problems.

RetroCoder, maker of surveillance software SpyMon, wants SunBelt, maker of CounterSpy, to stop flagging Spymon as spyware. According to RetroCoder, SunBelt is in violation of the End User License Agreement (EULA) of SpyMon.

The EULA forbids its use by a researcher for an antivirus or anti-spyware company, or business related to these.

Further, the EULA continues with a legal condition: “If you do produce a program that will affect this software’s ability to perform its function, then you may have to prove in criminal court that you have not infringed this warning.”

RetroCoder claims that SunBelt broke this agreement; “In order to add our product to their list, they must have downloaded it and then examined it. These actions are forbidden by the notice”.

Not posted on the website yet, but Release Candidate #2 of the open source web browser Firefox 1.5 is out.

Available for Linux (i686), MacOS X and Windows.