"Is TDM going the way of dial-up?"

Fri Mar 26 16:43:23 UTC 2010

Rick Ernst <nanog at shreddedmail.com> wrote:

> I've noticed over the last 3 years or so that TDM, specifically T-1, access
> and transport has been in a steady decline.  Customers are moving to FTTH
> and cable, or going WiMAX and Metro-Ethernet.  Ethernet seems to have taken
> an even bigger bite out of DS-3.  The bigger pipes seem to favor ethernet. A
> recent upgrade from OC-3 to GigE transport actually saved us a large chunk
> of money.
>
> I'm wondering if others are seeing the same behavior, if it's
> market-dependant, or if I'm just imagining things.

Unfortunately what you are seeing is indeed where the world is going,
and it is extremely painful to watch.  My personal preference is the
direct opposite of that: Ethernet for non-LAN use is my very antithesis,
I hate it to the core of my being.  V.35/HDLC forever for me!  I will
continue using HDLC over traditional synchronous serial WAN media for as
long as I am alive.

MS

P.S. This message is being sent from a VAX running a variant of 4.3BSD
(Quasijarus).  Almost the entire ARPA Internet software stack that's
running on my VAXen is mostly unchanged from how it was in 1988.