As we speak, the wireless telecommunications industry is booming. Thus, it’s no secret that with the constant introduction of products, solutions, and applications to networks, traffic congestion is a top concern of wireless telecom operators. To overcome multiple bandwidth related problems, operators all over the globe are searching for an innovative way to ramp up their network’s capabilities by leveraging current copper infrastructures.

DSL bonding and other robust technologies including vectoring and G.INP are assisting in this process of enhancing the network. In a recent EXFO video, the company revealed how recent updates to DSL testing are assisting operators with implementing the most up-to-date technology.

When asked about what recent changes have been made to DSL, Chris Dunford, product line manager for the Access Business Unit of EXFO (News - Alert) said, “Over the past decade, we have seen a rapid global adoption of DSL technology. However, subscribers are continuously pushing their service providers to deliver more services over the existing copper plant and desiring greater speeds over these greater distances. This means adapting to do more, so techniques such as bonding and vectoring have been introduced.”

Service providers are utilizing these new technologies for multiple reasons. Most importantly, the subscriber has an undying thirst for more services, higher speeds and the desire to add more devices to the home network. Secondly, competition is always present within the service provider space, but when reusing the current copper infrastructure, providers can cut capital expenses, and by adopting bonding and vectoring, will be able to offer more services to more customers at higher speeds. Therefore, providers will see an increase in their revenues.

In essence, bonding enables a service provider to reuse copper pairs by bundling two pairs together, helping to ramp up the data rate for existing customers or to attract new customers. Additionally, vectoring helps service providers to mitigate foreign noise by fully managing the cable bundle.

Dunford added, “By mitigating noise, providers can see an increase in the available data rates to the customer.”

Testing is affected by these relatively new technologies due to the fact that previously these solutions were solely focused on single paired DSL and services that run over these connections, such as IPTV (News - Alert). These new techniques for delivering high speeds over greater distances require a change in testing, and in the case of bonding, this means testing two pairs instead of one. While on the other hand, for vectoring, you must be able to manage cross talk in the cable bundle. If a test set does not support vectoring, it will negatively impact adjacent copper pairs and the test set must never be the cause of a network’s service disruption.

Although these new techniques bring many benefits to DSL, they will not eliminate all issues related to this type of connection.

“Unfortunately there is no DSL magic pill. However, these techniques are aimed at increasing rate reach and mitigating noise to increase performance to the customer. To assist service providers in the mitigating of underlying issues, EXFO can help quickly locate cable faults so that physical impairments can be removed. It’s only once these physical impairments are removed can we start to mitigate issues related to DSL performance,” Dunford commented.

In conclusion, these DSL techniques will allow service providers to significantly reduce Opex and Capex, while simultaneously remaining competitive and cutting down customer churn.