Does Vumatel get its bandwidth from Telkom?

[Priapus]

At some stage, it seems Telkom's monopoly over the SAT-3 cable ended around 2007. I can't find anything more recent to say that this has changed. Does this mean, Fibre and ADSL providers are no longer just re-sellers of the bandwidth they get from Telkom? For example, Vumatel is in a partnership with Telkom, and I can't seem to find anything to say they they (Vumatel) get their bandwidth from SAT-3 or from Telkom still ?

 

[paul5186]

Vumatel are a layer 2 provider so there is no need to buy international bandwidth.

Isps can buy from whoever they like on any undersea cable, either directly or through a bigger tier1 provider.

 

[Sinbad]

Vumatel's telkom partnership is for last mile connectivity as far as I know.

 

[Priapus]

Vumatel are a layer 2 provider so there is no need to buy international bandwidth.

Isps can buy from whoever they like on any undersea cable, either directly or through a bigger tier1 provider.

I don't understand the whole, 2 layer Vs 1 Layer thing. Could you elaborate please?
I was under the impression (Until I did some Googling) that all or most of the bandwidth in SA in provided by Telkom - SAT-3 connection.

Vumatel's telkom partnership is for last mile connectivity as far as I know.

Thanks for that.

 

[paul5186]

Layer 2 is just providing the access medium to an Isp. The Isp then provides the international and local bandwidth. E.g vumatel just lays the cable and provides a vlan over their own or leased fibre to the Isp.

There is also many more undersea cables now. WACS, Seacom, easy, safe, and a new one that is going from Africa to the USA soon.

 

[pinball wizard]

Vumatel's telkom partnership is for last mile connectivity as far as I know.

What does that mean?

 

[Priapus]

Layer 2 is just providing the access medium to an Isp. The Isp then provides the international and local bandwidth. E.g vumatel just lays the cable and provides a vlan over their own or leased fibre to the Isp.

There is also many more undersea cables now. WACS, Seacom, easy, safe, and a new one that is going from Africa to the USA soon.

That clears it up, thanks. So who would be the ISP to Vumatel? (I assume, the likes of, Cool Ideas, Afrihost, etc) who then get the bandwidth from the various underseas cables?
Would this be one of the main reasons, Fibre is becoming cheaper, and more easily accessible? (I did not expect to see Fibre in my home for another two years, before I move to an area with Fibre. But they busy installing it in my complex as we speak)

 

[Priapus]

What does that mean?

It means that Telkom use the Vumatel network, from the local "exchange" to your house.

Whilst we are talking all things Fibre; does Vumatel and other provides have local "exchanges" like your typical Telkom exchange?

 

[pinball wizard]

It means that Telkom use the Vumatel network, from the local "exchange" to your house. (1)

Whilst we are talking all things Fibre; does Vumatel and other provides have local "exchanges" like your typical Telkom exchange? (2)

(1) you mean when telkom is your ISP on the vumatel fibre?

(2) no. not in the telkom sense. Fibre providers have aggregation nodes in suburbs and from there it's straight back to the data centre to hand off to the ISP. An exchange is very copper (adsl) world terminology and nor really translatable to the fibre world.

The overall idea is that the fibre from the ONT in your living room all the way back to the data centre can be looked at as a single network belonging to the fibre provider (eg Vumatel). In the DC, the fibre provider has a cross connect in place with your chosen ISP (eg CISP) at this point the traffic is passed to the ISP and they provide the bandwidth (in this sense I mean bandwidth as in data) and caps and shaping and so on and so forth.

 

[paul5186]

That clears it up, thanks. So who would be the ISP to Vumatel? (I assume, the likes of, Cool Ideas, Afrihost, etc) who then get the bandwidth from the various underseas cables?
Would this be one of the main reasons, Fibre is becoming cheaper, and more easily accessible? (I did not expect to see Fibre in my home for another two years, before I move to an area with Fibre. But they busy installing it in my complex as we speak)

Vumatel is not an Isp, e.g you cannot buy a 100mbps uncapped Internet account from them. They are the cabling and provisioning provider to all the other Isps, much like openserve.

 

[PBCool]

So our network is a Hybrid one, we have layer2 via SAT3 and WACS to London where we peer at LINX and get further upstream bandwidth and we also get IP Transit services from IS locally which is a layer3 service. IS uses Seacom mostly but has capacity on every undersea cable: SAT3, WACS, SEACOM and Eassy

 

[Priapus]

(1) you mean when telkom is your ISP on the vumatel fibre?

(2) no. not in the telkom sense. Fibre providers have aggregation nodes in suburbs and from there it's straight back to the data centre to hand off to the ISP. An exchange is very copper (adsl) world terminology and nor really translatable to the fibre world.

The overall idea is that the fibre from the ONT in your living room all the way back to the data centre can be looked at as a single network belonging to the fibre provider (eg Vumatel). In the DC, the fibre provider has a cross connect in place with your chosen ISP (eg CISP) at this point the traffic is passed to the ISP and they provide the bandwidth (in this sense I mean bandwidth as in data) and caps and shaping and so on and so forth.

(1) Possibly. From what I understand, Telkom gains access to Vumatels network to push out their own offerings. I'm not sure how this partnership is different to say, CISP. Maybe @Sinbad can clarify?

(2) Very informative, thanks. So, where do the likes of CISP, Afrihost, etc get the bandwidth from? (To supply to the customer) ?

Vumatel is not an Isp, e.g you cannot buy a 100mbps uncapped Internet account from them. They are the cabling and provisioning provider to all the other Isps, much like openserve.

I think you misread what I was saying. It's clear to me that Vumatel just provides the physical connection all the way back to the DC. Thanks though.

 

[Priapus]

So our network is a Hybrid one, we have layer2 via SAT3 and WACS to London where we peer at LINX and get further upstream bandwidth and we also get IP Transit services from IS locally which is a layer3 service. IS uses Seacom mostly but has capacity on every undersea cable: SAT3, WACS, SEACOM and Eassy

Thanks for jumping in on the discussion.
So, you guys do not go through Telkom at all then?

 

[pinball wizard]

(2) Very informative, thanks. So, where do the likes of CISP, Afrihost, etc get the bandwidth from? (To supply to the customer) ?

See Paul's answer in post #11

 

[Priapus]

See Paul's answer in post #11

Yeah I saw that just after my post.

Nice to know Telkom don't hold the monopoly anymore in this country with regards to internet services.

 

[Nithan15]

My question is why are the MAC addresses of devices locked on the CPE- makes it difficult if you want to change routers like you would do on ADSL.

 

[Sinbad]

My question is why are the MAC addresses of devices locked on the CPE- makes it difficult if you want to change routers like you would do on ADSL.

Why would you change routers?
And if you do, it's just a matter of logging it with your ISP.

 

[Sinbad]

That clears it up, thanks. So who would be the ISP to Vumatel? (I assume, the likes of, Cool Ideas, Afrihost, etc) who then get the bandwidth from the various underseas cables?
Would this be one of the main reasons, Fibre is becoming cheaper, and more easily accessible? (I did not expect to see Fibre in my home for another two years, before I move to an area with Fibre. But they busy installing it in my complex as we speak)

Vumatel have agreements with several ISPs.
Check out http://shop.vumatel.co.za to get an idea.

Vumatel run the fibre from your side to the ISP of your choice's network. Their involvement pretty much ends there.

 

[Nithan15]

Why would you change routers?
And if you do, it's just a matter of logging it with your ISP.

Its an extra step - tend to change routers regularly for some reason or the other but its no train smash logging it, thought there was a reason that this was done.

 

[Sinbad]

Its an extra step - tend to change routers regularly for some reason or the other but its no train smash logging it, thought there was a reason that this was done.

It's to do with DHCP/IP addresses as far as I know. Only one lease per fibre line.