Re: verizon FIOS +linux

Amadeus W. M. wrote:
On Wed, 09 Aug 2006 23:41:57 +0000, Jean-David Beyer wrote:

Amadeus W. M. wrote:
Slightly off-topic...

I got an offer in the mail from verizon for a fiber optics internet
connection, which advertises 5Mbps upload, and between 5 and 50 Mbps
download. That's very tempting.
That is not the terms around here in New Jersey.

When I signed up the speeds offered were

5 Mbits/sec down, 2 Mbits/sec up
15 Mbits/sec down, 2 Mbits/sec up
30 Mbits/sec down, 5 Mbits/sec up.

I took the middle option. That was last spring sometime.
Since then they have raised the speed to 20 Mbits/second down and 5
Mbits/second up.

Right now, the actual speeds from near Red Bank, New Jersey to NYC are:

Last Result:
Download Speed: 20074 kbps (2509.3 KB/sec transfer rate)
Upload Speed: 4257 kbps (532.1 KB/sec transfer rate)

Before I subscribe, are there any known issues under linux?
Do I have to run some proprietary program in windows first, to
sign-up (as I had to when I installed dsl)?
Sort-of. You must register at their site to activate the service, and their
site stupidly insists on using ActiveX. Stupid because all it asks is
something simple like your name and password.

Now the techie(s) that install the service for you should bring a laptop
with them that runs Windows so that they can do it for you. But mine did
not, claiming the batteries were dead. Luckily my other machine (the one not
directly connected to the Internet) does have a Windows XP license, wo we
temporarily hooked the Verizon stuff to it, booted Windows on it (it is dual
boot), diddled the networking to talk to the Verizon-supplied D-Link router
(DI-624) router and activated the service. Then I had to put it all back.
But it is no big deal if you are allowed to run Windows on your machine(s).
You need do this only on one machine and only once.
I imagine I still get an IP address through dhcp, right?
Right, or you can pay a lot more and get a static IP address if you want one.

Is it stable? Reliable? Fast? Any gotchas?
Stable and fast. Reliable. No gotchas.
Thanks!

All this sounds fantastic. The offer I got was 5/2Mbps for $34.95,
which is less money, for more upload speed than what I have now.

That was the official terms when I signed up. But if you get your local and
long distance through them as well, they drop the rates so I pay
$39.95/month for the 15/2 service, and they just speeeded it up, gratis, to
20/5.

That's just to lure me in, they do have 15/2 for ~$45 and
30/2 for a LOT more. Probably the 15/2 would be the best deal.

Since I posted, I read on a blog though, that

1) It's pppoe, not dhcp. Is that true? Not sure if the guy
who posted that knew the difference. If pppoe, I'd need a phone
line, which I don't have.

Yes and no. The stuff coming out of the box on the side of the house is
pppoe, but you need not know that because they supply a free router (their
version of the D-Link DI-624, called a VDI-624) that talks pppoe to the
outside box, but talks just plain ethernet to your computer(s). You do not
need a dial-up line for pppoe in any case, but your computers will never see
it anyway.

2) You have to use their d-link router, although there are
reports that other people have replaced it with their own.
Don't know why the d-link would be so special and why another one
would not work.

Other ones will work, but with problems if maintenance is required. The
D-Link they supply has custom firmware in it so Verizon can remote test
everything all the way to the router. One thing (least important, but
obvious) is that they can tell you when it is time to replace the battery in
the ups part of their box. The techie says they can tell when you are going
to have trouble before you even know it.

3) Most importantly, they won't let you run any sort of server.

They will if you pay more.

I absolutely have to have sshd running permanently.
Do they do anything funny in their routers? Do they allow
incoming connections to your computer?

They do not do it in the router. Probably at the central office. They do
allow me to run the ntpd even though it is technically a server. But you
will not be able to run servers anyway unless you get a static IP address,
and these are normally for the more-expensive business accounts.

I know that they do not block all connections to ports <1024, which is what
I thought they might do. I suppose they block port 80 so you do not run a
web server.

Thanks!



--
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