Q. Why the I-Net?
A. Bandwidth
|
| Q. What is the "I-Net"? |
| A. The I-Net is short for Institutional Network. An Institutional Network
uses "high bandwidth" phone and cable lines to exchange information among
I-Net members and to and from the Internet. The Pittsburgh I-Net will
provide high bandwidth services to schools, libraries, non-profit organizations
and local government agencies. |
| |
| Q. What is "Bandwidth"? |
| A. "Bandwidth" is the amount of data (bits per second) that
a phone or cable line can carry per unit of time. It is comparable to
the size of a water pipe. Water pipes with larger diameters carry more
water per unit of time (gallons per minute) than pipes with smaller diameters.
|
| |
| Q. Why is Bandwidth important? |
| A. Audio and video involve more data than text. Geographic Information
Systems (GIS) and other data-intensive uses also require more bandwidth. |
| |
| Q. How does the Pittsburgh I-Net increase bandwidth? |
| A. With telecommunications, the amount of data that a line carries depends
upon the materials and technologies used with the lines. The Pittsburgh
I-Net will use the newly-installed fiber optic lines of the new AT&T
cable tv system instead of regular copper phone lines. Special electronic
equipment at each user’s site can increase the bandwidth even further. |
| |
| Q. How does I-Net bandwidth compare with standard bandwidth available
today? |
| A. |
Regular phone lines: |
56,000 bits per second (56 kbps) |
| |
ISDN lines |
128,000 bits per second (128 kbps) |
| |
T-1 phone lines: |
1,544,000 bits per second (1.5 mbps) |
| |
Pittsburgh I-Net: |
100,000,000 bits per second (100 mbps) |
|
| |
| Q. What additional functions does the I-Net make possible? |
| A. |
Regular phone lines: |
Email and web browsing |
| |
ISDN lines |
Email and faster web browsing |
| |
T-1 phone lines: |
Faster file downloads; streaming
audio and video;
limited videoconferencing |
| |
Pittsburgh I-Net: |
Full-screen full-motion interactive video- and audio
conferencing; motion picture quality streaming audio and video;
fast file downloads |
|
| |
| Q. How long does it take to download a large data file, such as the
movie "The Matrix"? |
| A. |
Regular phone lines: |
13 days |
| |
ISDN lines |
5.7 days |
| |
T-1 phone lines: |
11.2 hours |
| |
Pittsburgh I-Net: |
10 minutes |
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