Connection Chart

Carrier Technology Speed Physical Medium Application
GSM
(mobile telephone service)
9.6 Kbps to 14.4 Kbps RF in space (wireless) Mobile telephone for business and personal use
 HSCSD
(High-speed circuit-switched data service)
Up to 56 Kbps RF in space (wireless) Mobile telephone for business and personal use
POTS
(Plain Old Telephone Service)
Up to 56 Kbps Twisted-pair Home and small business access
Dedicated 56 Kbps on Frame Relay 56 Kbps Various Business e-mail with fairly large file attachments
DS0 64 Kbps All The base signal on a channel in the set of Digital Signal levels
GPRS
(General Packet Radio System)
56 Kbps to 114 Kbps RF in space (wireless) Mobile telephone for business and personal use
ISDN BRI: 64 Kbps to 128 Kbps PRI: 23 (T-1) or 30 (E1) assignable 64 Kbps channels plus control channel; up to 1.544 Mbps (T-1) or 2.048 (E1) BRI: Twisted-pair
PRI: T-1 or E1 line
BRI: Faster home and small business access
PRI: Medium and large enterprise access
IDSL 128 Kbps Twisted-pair Faster home and small business access
EDGE
(Enhanced Data GSM Environment)
384 Kbps RF in space (wireless) Mobile telephone for business and personal use
Satellite 400 Kbps (DirecPC) RF in space (wireless) Faster home and small enterprise access
Frame relay 56 Kbps to 1.544 Mbps Twisted-pair or coaxial cable Large company backbone for LANs to ISP
ISP to Internet infrastructure
DS1/T-1 1.544 Mbps Twisted-pair, coaxial cable, or optical fiber Large company to ISP
ISP to Internet infrastructure
UMTS
(Universal Mobile Telecommunications Service)
Up to 2 Mbps RF in space (wireless) Mobile telephone for business and personal use
EV-DO
(Evolution Data Optimized)
400-700 Kbps (but capable of 2.4Mbps) RF in space (wireless) Mobile telephone for business and personal use
E-1 2.048 Mbps Twisted-pair, coaxial cable, or optical fiber 32-channel European equivalent of T-1
T-1C (DS1C) 3.152 Mbps Twisted-pair, coaxial cable, or optical fiber Large company to ISP
ISP to Internet infrastructure
DS2/T-2 6.312 Mbps Twisted-pair, coaxial cable, or optical fiber Large company to ISP
ISP to Internet infrastructure
 DSL
(Digital Subscriber Line)
256 Kbps to 8 Mbps Twisted-pair (used as a digital, broadband medium) Home, small business, and enterprise access using existing copper lines
E-2 8.448 Mbps Twisted-pair, coaxial cable, or optical fiber Carries four multiplexed E-1 signals
Cable modem 256 Kbps to 52 Mbps Coaxial cable (usually uses Ethernet); in some systems, telephone used for upstream requests Home, business, school access
Ethernet 10 Mbps 10BASE-T (twisted-pair); 10BASE-2 or -5 (coaxial cable); 10BASE-F (optical fiber) Most popular business local area network (LAN)
E-3 34.368 Mbps Twisted-pair or optical fiber Carries 16 E-l signals
DS3/T-3 44.736 Mbps Coaxial cable ISP to Internet infrastructure
Smaller links within Internet infrastructure
OC-1 51.84 Mbps Optical fiber ISP to Internet infrastructure
Smaller links within Internet infrastructure
HSSI Up to 53 Mbps HSSI cable Between router hardware and WAN lines
Short-range (50 feet) interconnection between slower LAN devices and faster WAN lines
Fast Ethernet 100 Mbps 100BASE-T4 (twisted pair); 100BASE-TX (twisted pair); 100BASE-FX (optical fiber) Workstations with 10 Mbps Ethernet cards can plug into a Fast Ethernet LAN
FDDI 100 Mbps Optical fiber Large, wide-range LAN usually in a large company or a larger ISP
T-3D
(DS3D)
135 Mbps Optical fiber ISP to Internet infrastructure
Smaller links within Internet infrastructure
E4 139.264 Mbps Optical fiber Carries 4 E3 channels
Up to 1,920 simultaneous voice conversations
OC-3/STM-1 155.52 Mbps Optical fiber Large company backbone
Internet backbone
E5 565.148 Mbps Optical fiber Carries 4 E4 channels
Up to 7,680 simultaneous voice conversations
OC-12/STM-4 622.08 Mbps Optical fiber Internet backbone
Gigabit Ethernet 1 Gbps Optical fiber (and "copper" up to 25 meters) Workstations/networks with 10/100 Mbps Ethernet will plug into Gigabit Ethernet switches
OC-24 1.244 Gbps Optical fiber Internet backbone
SciNet 2.325 Gbps (15 OC-3 lines) Optical fiber Part of the vBNS backbone
OC-48/STM-16 2.488 Gbps Optical fiber Internet backbone
OC-192/STM-64 10 Gbps Optical fiber Backbone
OC-256 13.271 Gbps Optical fiber Backbone