High speed broadband internet has been heavily debated in Australia over recent times, especially in conjunction to the upcoming new National Broadband Network project. It's been established that super fast broadband internet will become a valuable and useful tool in the future for our individual needs and business prosperity. The question is, how fast is fast enough and what type of upgradeable, efficient and environmentally sound Broadband technology should we adopt?
Internet speed and technology leaders, on a global scale, appear to have always emerged from Asia, such as Korea, Taiwan and Japan. Other countries currently researching potential broadband technologies for future use could possibly look toward these respective nations for the lead . After all it's these countries who, for years, have previously developed and utilised the likes of FTTN & FTTH broadband networks over a national coverage to achieve speeds in excess of 100Mbps.
One of these technological leaders, Japan, is reaching for the stars by currently trying to harness the potential of satellite broadband technology and is making substantial progress. Forget about wired, fixed or wireless internet because according to the Japan Exploration Agency and the National Institute of Information, a 1.2 gigabits per second satellite speed was achieved in a recent test which is believed to be a record for satellite communications.
In the test conducted back in May this year, a combined up and down satellite speed transmission was recorded at 1.2Gbps (1244Mbps)! In actual terms this figure equates to a whopping 622Mbps each way! Although speeds of this magnitude might not be available to us mere peasants anytime soon, Japan, nonetheless, is intending to offer satellite broadband services to homes and businesses in remote areas (in the event of disaster) along with providing satellite broadband speeds up to 155Mbps by this coming July. This invigorating news makes Australia's plans for a FTTN network already look outdated. A satellite network of this type appears to have the potential which would be ideal for Australia's conditions and it's vast regions whilst providing an 'environmentally friendlier' and 'wire free' environment that would sufficiently meet all our personal and business requirements. However the underlying issue here could revolve around network (load) sustainability. Could the future mean satellite broadband? Didn't we kind of already envisage this the whole time?
In the tests done on May 2, data was transmitted on two 622 Mbps channels, both up to the satellite and down to a receiving antenna. Together, the combined data transmission speed was 1.2 Gbps, according to PC World. Japan launched the Kizuna satellite in February and plans to use it to offer broadband services to homes and businesses in remote areas in the event of disaster. The aerospace agency said it should be able to provide homes with speeds up to 155 Mbps by July.
source: Japan tests super fast satellite broadband