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CenterFuse Broadband Feasibility Report markets delivers less than 50 Mbps— in Ellensburg, almost Consolidated DSL speeds are at download speeds under 20 Mbps, with much of it delivering speeds under 10 Mbps. A lot of economists say that the cable companies have won the duopoly battle, due entirely to having faster broadband speeds. But this is not quite the case in Ellensburg where the Consolidated market penetration of 35% is not a huge amount lower than Charter's market share of 45%. Households favor Charter, but the market is still very much an example of duopoly competition. Technoloev Matters To a large degree, the broadband speeds available to customers is dependent upon the technology used to deliver the broadband. The report discusses various technologies used in Ellensburg in Section II.B. of the report. The general speeds available on various technologies is as follows: • DSL delivered on one copper pair can deliver speeds as fast as 25 Mbps for up to two miles from the DSL transmitter, assuming the copper is in good condition and other factors are ideal. There are slower versions of DSL deployed that might have maximum speed capability of 3 Mbps, 6 Mbps, 12 Mbps, or 16 Mbps. In Ellensburg it looks like the DSL is older technology, which is probably a legacy of when FairPoint operated the network. • The hybrid-fiber coaxial systems from cable companies can bring significantly faster broadband speeds. Networks using the DOCSIS 3.0 standard can deliver products up to perhaps 250 Mbps. Networks upgraded to the most recent DOCSIS 3.1 standard can deliver speeds up to a gigabit. Cable networks are limited due to the technology of offering upload speeds that can be not greater than 1/8 of the total broadband delivered. Most cable companies have elected to hedge the networks towards providing faster download, to the detriment of faster upload speeds. • High orbit satellite broadband can deliver speeds as fast as 50 Mbps. The problem with this broadband is that the satellites are so far above the earth that there is a lot of delay (latency) in the signal and it's hard to do real-time web activities like streaming video, connecting to a corporate WAN or a school server, making VoIP calls, or even shopping on some web sites. • Fixed point-to-multipoint wireless is capable of speeds up to 100 Mbps, although the equipment and configuration of most networks brings speeds significantly less than this, sometimes as slow as only a few Mbps. Four percent of the residents of Ellensburg are using this technology. • Fiber networks deliver the fastest broadband. The most common fiber technologies in use can deliver gigabit speeds to residential customers and speeds up to 100 Gbps for business customers. Fiber can also deliver symmetrical speeds (meaning the same speed up and down). The speeds delivered by some of these technologies will differ throughout the city. As an example, the speed of Consolidated DSL to a given customer can be affected by: • How far that customer lives from a DSL transmitter(called a DSLAM). • The size of the copper wire serving the customer(sizes typically vary between 16-gauge and 24- gauge copper). • The age and quality of the copper(copper wire slowly degrades over time, particularly if the copper comes into contact with the elements or with longstanding water). • The quality of the telephone wiring inside of a home (this varies a lot, particularly for wires that were installed by the homebuilder rather than by the telco). Page 34