Technology - Infrastructure - Last Mile 1 - Twisted Pair, POTS, ISDN

Synopsis

The twisted pair copper cables of the Plain Old Telephone Service are also used for ISDN services and for Digital Subscriber Line technologies. We describe twisted-pair’s characteristics, POTS analogue phones, modems and Basic and Primary Rate ISDN. We also discuss the widely deployed pair-gain systems which extend the number of analogue services which can be carried over one pair, but which prevent the deployment of DSL and ISDN services.

Table of Contents

• 1. Synopsis
  
• 2. Introduction and historical perspective
  
  • 2.1 Twisted pair copper
    
• 3. Twisted pair copper for analogue telephony
  
  • 3.1 Twisted pair cables
    
    • 3.1.1 Frequency response
      
    • 3.1.2 Wires twisted to ensure privacy
      
    • 3.1.3 Pair gain systems
      
  • 3.2 Analogue telephones, modems and fax machines
    
    • 3.2.1 Analogue telephone
      
    • 3.2.2 Modem
      
    • 3.2.3 Modem standards
      
• 4. Twisted pair copper for ISDN
  
  • 4.1 Basic rate ISDN
    
    • 4.1.1 2B1Q - North America
      
    • 4.1.2 4B3T - Europe
      
    • 4.1.3 TCM - Japan
      
  • 4.2 Primary rate ISDN and HDSL
    
  • 4.3 ISDN historical overview
    
• 5. Related reports