Welcome to the self-proclaimed
Rural Ottawa High-Speed Internet Blog. High-speed Internet access is virtually
ubiquitous in the urban and suburban areas of Ottawa, but when I started this blog in 2005, only about 60% of the
rural areas of Ottawa have coverage.
However, even for rural citizens, high-speed Internet access is becoming as necessary as telephone service.
Happily, high-speed coverage for rural Ottawa has increased significantly, and not only is coverage
reportedly
above 90%, many rural residents and businesses now have more than one choice of high-speed ISP.
This purpose of this weblog is to track news and events related to high-speed (broadband) Internet access in the
rural areas of Ottawa and, to a lesser extent, in nearby townships.
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Postings & Moderation
I've opened up this blog to allow anyone to post to it. However, I continue to moderate and will remove any inappropriate content, e.g. anything not related to high-speed internet access in the rural Ottawa, the Ottawa Valley, Eastern Ontario, and the Outaouais.
In the October 2008 issue of Ottawa's own
Monitor Magazine, there's a feature article entitled
Portable Internet on page 26. The author, Eric Jacksch, tested Rogers Portable Internet service from his own home in Ottawa south and describes his findings, including upload and download speeds.
You can download the full October 2008 issue of Monitor in PDF format by clicking
http://monitor.ca/monitor/PDF/MONITOR_October2008.pdf.
Side note: I'm soooo glad that Monitor has started producing complete online issues (in both PDF and SWF (macromedia flash) formats). I've been having trouble finding the print copies, and although the feature articles used to be available on their webpage, the ads never were.
PC Magazine has published an
article about using unlicensed
white-space frequencies for high-speed Internet transmissions in rural areas.
In the USA, the government is requiring all TV broadcasters to convert their analog television signals to digital signals. This frees-up all the analog TV channels on VHF (channels 2-13; 54-216 MHz) and UHF (channels 14-83; 470-1002 MHz). These frequency spectrums (white-space) could be used for wireless high-speed Internet access, especially in rural areas where there is not a lot of white-space use to begin with. And because these are lower frequencies, especially the VHF range, the signals can travel much further, which also makes them suitable for rural areas.
I'm not sure how applicable the article is to Canada, since I'm not sure if the Canadian government is going to follow the USA's lead in the matter. If anyone knows for sure, please provide info.
Article: Slow road to high-speed Internet frustrating consultants
The October 10, 2008 edition of the
Manotick/Winchester EMC features a front-page article entitled
Slow road to high-speed Internet frustrating consultants. The article describes problems and frustrations associated with gaps in the high-speed coverage in the United Counties of Stormont, Dundas, and Glengarry. The counties are looking to access some of the $30 million budgeted by the provincial government to improve rural high-speed access.
Anyone wishing to report gaps in the rural high-speed access within the United Counties of Stormont, Dundas, and Glengarry should contact
Actionable intelligence at 613-535-2673 or actionable.intelligence@rogers.com.
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