Found this story -- which, sadly, has become a common one -- lurking near the bottom of my "recent news" pile.
From the BBC News in the UK:
Gang rips out 1km of phone cable
Hundreds of people were left without their landline phone service for nearly 48 hours after thieves stole 1km (0.6 mile) of copper cabling....
...[Sussex Police] officers believe thieves posing as workers wearing uniforms or high-visibility jackets used a vehicle to pull the cable out of the ground and take it away...
...[Policeman] Thomas Stallard said: "Manholes running along the side of the road were used to access the cables and it appears the grass over some of the manholes was dug up to reach the sealed covers. The cable is 6in to 8in in circumference and is very heavy."
Every notice how there often seems to be some vaguely spectacular, caperish element to these copper theft stories? Thieves posing as workers used a vehicle to pull the cable out of the ground? Dang!
Or does the concept of "theft" just generally imply a certain amount of spectacle? Well...that's not a question for here. But here's what we can say: whenever the topic is copper, things get interesting. I can tell you that we here at the editorial desk certainly notice the popularity of such news, in terms of pageviews on the Web site.
And here's the thing about this rash of copper theft: it's absolutely becoming rampant, occurring every day all over this great country of ours, often causing considerable inconvenience.
So, finally, here's what I'm wondering: Are these stories just like belly buttons? Does everybody have one?
What say you, audience -- heard anything? Feel free to share any tales of copper theft, weird or otherwise, in the comments section below. Maybe from your town or region, maybe from a job site you've worked on, maybe from an installation you're involved in right at this very moment. We'd love to hear from you. -- Matt Vincent, Senior Editor
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Survey says: Data center virtualization an opportunity for cabling
Not long ago CommScope issued a report entitled Innovating in a Time of Change: Investment and Technical Trends in the Data Center. Some of the highlights from that report have been published in the November issue of Cabling Installation and Maintenance. Or they can be seen here, explained by CommScope's George Brooks.
I had the fortunate opportunity to speak with Mr. Brooks shortly after the report was issued. Our conversation involved many of the topics addressed in our November issue and in the aforementioned video. But following is an item from our conversation that didn't make it into either.
Globally, 72 percent of respondents to CommScope's survey said they had less than half their servers connected to a Fibre Channel SAN. Ten percent said their data centers had no Fibre Channel SAN at all, including 16 percent of those in North America.
At first glance that looks like an enormous opportunity to install new networks and the cabling that goes in them. But Brooks put those figures into perspective. He told me, "SANs are used for applications that require low latency and higher bandwidth. Transactional applications such as email, databases, and image transfer require and reside on a SAN. Other aplications, which do not require low latency and high bandwidth, generally are connected to NAS [network attached storage], which is generally a less-expensive form of storage. Putting those applications on a SAN is not cost-effective. My belief is that the large portion [of servers not connected to Fibre Channel SANs] are probably connected via NAS. The NAS is connected, but probably using Cat 6 cabling. If I had applications that didn't require high bandwidth and low latency, I wouldn't be spending a lot of money."
Great. So much for a cabling opportunity. But wait! Brooks further explained, "The opportunity is with virtualization. As servers virtualize, more of those applications will virtualize. They'll need a bigger pipe, and that's where the opportunity is."
So virtualiztion, then, which is feared in some camps as the beginning of the end of data centers, may actually boost the amount of cabling being deployed in those facilities. That's worth keeping an eye on.
I had the fortunate opportunity to speak with Mr. Brooks shortly after the report was issued. Our conversation involved many of the topics addressed in our November issue and in the aforementioned video. But following is an item from our conversation that didn't make it into either.
Globally, 72 percent of respondents to CommScope's survey said they had less than half their servers connected to a Fibre Channel SAN. Ten percent said their data centers had no Fibre Channel SAN at all, including 16 percent of those in North America.
At first glance that looks like an enormous opportunity to install new networks and the cabling that goes in them. But Brooks put those figures into perspective. He told me, "SANs are used for applications that require low latency and higher bandwidth. Transactional applications such as email, databases, and image transfer require and reside on a SAN. Other aplications, which do not require low latency and high bandwidth, generally are connected to NAS [network attached storage], which is generally a less-expensive form of storage. Putting those applications on a SAN is not cost-effective. My belief is that the large portion [of servers not connected to Fibre Channel SANs] are probably connected via NAS. The NAS is connected, but probably using Cat 6 cabling. If I had applications that didn't require high bandwidth and low latency, I wouldn't be spending a lot of money."
Great. So much for a cabling opportunity. But wait! Brooks further explained, "The opportunity is with virtualization. As servers virtualize, more of those applications will virtualize. They'll need a bigger pipe, and that's where the opportunity is."
So virtualiztion, then, which is feared in some camps as the beginning of the end of data centers, may actually boost the amount of cabling being deployed in those facilities. That's worth keeping an eye on.
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