Telephonic communications – Telephone line or system combined with diverse electrical...
Reexamination Certificate
1999-04-30
2002-11-19
Kuntz, Curtis (Department: 2643)
Telephonic communications
Telephone line or system combined with diverse electrical...
C379S093090, C379S093050, C379S171000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06483902
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to telecommunications and data systems, and, more particularly, to providing telephony and data network traffic over a single communications channel, such as a single two-wire telephone line.
2. Description of the Relevant Art
As newer telecommunications services have become more prevalent, existing buildings such as hotels, apartments and office buildings desire to offer these services to their inhabitants, e.g., hotel guests, apartment dwellers or office workers. However, existing buildings such as hotels and apartments have generally been unable to offer these newer telecommunication services due to the high cost of adding additional communications lines. The present cost of retrofitting existing buildings is $400 per room or more in many cases.
For example, the majority of hotels are wired such that only a single copper pair is provided to each room for a single telephone line. However, this is inadequate for standard services such as Ethernet, or simply providing two or more telephone lines to a room.
Even some recently built apartment complexes find that the wiring for their telecommunications services is underground with buried runs of several hundred feet, too far to provide Ethernet service. For example, consider an apartment complex comprising twenty small building with four to eight units per building. All wires for the telephones come to one collection point and then travel underground for about 300-m (1000-ft) to the clubhouse building. The 300-m run is in excess of the 100-m limit for Ethernet. The complex is pre-wired for telephones and cable but not high speed Internet access.
Additionally, many apartment complexes are now in the business of reselling primary telephone services using an in-house PBX. Many times, the apartment complex overcommits its telephony resources by leasing a small number of telephone lines for the PBX and providing telephone service to a larger number of apartments at a price slightly less than direct service would cost. As xDSL does not cross a PBX, being a direct connection from the central office to the end-user, the apartment complex is unable to provide xDSL to each apartment using the same method used to provide telephone service.
FIG.
1
—PBX Telephony System
100
FIG. 1
illustrates a basic analog two-wire telephone connection setup
100
in the prior art. The public switched telephone network (PSTN) lines
105
are provided from the central office to a main wiring distribution facility
110
in the general vicinity of an end-user. As illustrated, the end-user is shown at a location
130
A. Generally speaking, the illustrated embodiment is that of an office, hotel, or apartment complex, where the locations
130
comprises offices, hotel rooms, or apartments. Each location
130
receives telephone services through a local PBX
112
.
As shown,
FIG. 1
includes a main wiring distribution facility
110
including a PBX
112
coupled to receive digital telephony signals from the public switched telephone network (PSTN)
105
. Line
120
, shown here becoming line
120
, coupled the main wiring distribution facility
110
to a first one of a plurality of user locations, including user location
130
A. User location
130
A, as shown, includes a junction box
132
, e.g. a station jack
132
, coupled to line
120
. Station jack
132
couples to a first telephone
134
A and a second telephone
134
B. A modem jack
136
splits off of the wiring of station jack
132
to a data processing unit
138
, e.g. computer
138
.
Telephone signals from the PSTN
105
are routed from the PBX
112
as separate communications channels
120
. Each communications channel
120
comprises one telephone line, usually with dial tone and frequently with additional telephony services such as last number redial, call waiting, etc. The individual telephone lines
120
are typically cross-connected through so-called 66 boards (or 110 boards) to a two-wire telephone line
120
. The two-wire telephone line
120
runs from the main wiring distribution facility
110
to the end-user site
130
A. The two-wire telephone line
120
typically comprises two copper wires that meet the requirements of Category 3 of the ANSI/TIA/EIA-568-A Standard entitled “Commercial Building Telecommunications Cabling Standard”, and are often referred to as “Cat 3” wires.
At the end-user site
130
A, the two-wire telephone line
120
terminates at a telephone outlet
132
, including a junction box (usually a J box) and a telephone jack (usually an RJ-11 socket). Typically, an RJ-11 socket in the J box
132
receives an RJ-11 plug that connects a line to the end-user telephone
134
. A modem
136
is often also connected into the same line, either through an extension outlet in a duplicate J box, or by unplugging the telephone
134
and plugging in the modem
136
. The modem
136
provides data communications to a computer
138
over the telephone line
120
. It is noted that while newer telephony installations may include four-wire telephone lines (so called cat5 defined by the ANSI/TIA/EIA-568-A Standard referenced above), many existing telephone lines are still two-wire telephone lines
120
(cat3).
In a general way, the prior art system of
FIG. 1
operates as follows. Power for the communications over the communications channel are provided over the two-wire telephone lines
120
over which the communications are transmitted. To announce an incoming communication (i.e. a telephone call) coming in over the PSTN
105
, a ring voltage (such as 48 V DC) is sent from the central office to the PBX
112
. The PBX
112
sends ring voltage through the 66 box
114
A, over the two-wire telephone line
120
, through the RJ-11 socket in the J box
132
, and into the telephone
134
, which then rings. A ring may be mechanically or electronically generated. When the end-user answers the telephone call, the telephone
134
goes off-hook, and a full duplex communications stream of up to 64 kbps may be transmitted over the two-wire telephone line
120
back to the switching location
110
, through the PBX
112
, to the calling party.
Data communications between the computer
136
and an external network are over the same two-wire telephone line
120
as voice telephone communications. In general, data and voice are not multiplexed over the two-wire telephone line
120
, although this may be performed, usually through the computer
136
. The modem typically transfers data using the V.90 protocol, although other protocols (V.34, etc.) are also used. Data transfer rates are generally limited to 56 kbs downstream to the computer
136
and 53 kbps upstream.
Recent developments have led to some merging of multiple communications lines onto fewer numbers of communications channels. For example, ISDN (Integrated Services Digital Network) communications provides for simultaneous voice and data connections over the existing telephone infrastructure.
Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) provides for POTS telephony communications in the lower frequency band coupled with digital communications in the upper frequency bands. In Digital Subscriber Line communications (generally designated as xDSL), the communications channel is pinged to characterize the channel, typically a four-wire telephone line. The frequency spectrum of the channel is then divided into sub-channels or bins for data transmission. The number and division of the sub-channels may be determined by the channel response, up to the limits of the particular communications scheme chosen. The maximum data throughput on xDSL ranges from 128 kbps duplex using IDSL (ISDN DSL) to 52 Mbps downstream and 1.5 Mbps upstream using VDSL (Very high bit rate DSL). It is noted that SDSL (Symmetric DSL), also called HDSL (High bit rate DSL), uses a two-wire telephone line to deliver up to 2.0 Mbps duplex.
As another example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,844,596 teaches that two pairs of telephone wires may be used, along with a low pass filter and a high pass filter, to route a telephone line and a video connection
Stewart Brett B.
Thompson James W.
Conley Rose & Tayon PC
Kuntz Curtis
Ramakrishnaiah Melur.
Wayport, Inc.
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