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Where does the internet cable go? (lemmy.ml)

submitted 3 days ago by kayzeekayzee@lemmy.blahaj.zone to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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My house gets internet via a magical coax cable that is, I assume, connected to the rest of the world via my Internet Service Provider. This cable connects directly into my router, which links to all the devices in my home.

My question is: Where does this magic cable go?

Some followup questions: How long is the cable?

How does so much data go through a single-pin coax cable? Wouldn't it be better if there were more pins, like in a twinax configuration?

There are also other houses in my neighborhood. Are their cables connected to mine? Can their routers see the packets sent by my router, similar to ethernet?

How has your day been?

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[-] pivot_root@lemmy.world 9 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

The magic cable typically goes into ISP-owned hardware sitting in a box somewhere down the street. From there, it's either converted into fiber optic signals or repeated until it reaches an ISP-owned building where the data can be exchanged with the wider internet.

How does so much data go through a single-pin coax cable?

It uses multiple channels (frequency ranges) in parallel, bonding (combining) them to increase throughput.

A surprising amount of bandwidth can be achieved this way. DOCSIS 4.0 can do 10 gigabits per second in download and 6 gigabits per second in upload.

this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2025

123 points (97.7% liked)

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