Chicago, IL – Arris has over 15 million HD voice-capable cable endpoints deployed, according to a senior executive for the company. The catch is that the interface is analog-based.
Arris Senior Vice President Derek Elder said the company had embedded hardware in its line of EMTAs and other devices some time ago to support a 7 kHz analog channel through the RJ-11 port, along with enough processing power to support G.722.
Supporting HD voice through the analog interface requires a firmware upgrade to the device, along with a “$20 to $30” analog HD voice handset and cabling to plug into the EMTA.
Elder said that there were “15 million” HD voice capable Arris endpoints deployed at cable companies today and the company had demonstrated a proof of concept a few weeks ago in its Atlanta lab, including the firmware upgrade and an HD voice analog phone.
When would the feature be deployed? “Maybe never,” said Elder. Cable companies would have to order the firmware upgrade.
Elder noted the solution was one way to build “critical mass” for HD voice callers, since the Arris equipment was already in place and didn’t require the additional expense of a DECT/CAT-iq base station to be deployed to every household.
Can Arris confirm that there are no physical RF chokes or LPFs built into EMTAs that are designed to intentionally limit to toll quality 3khz.
Then I could believe that HD Voice for EMTAs is just a firmware upgrade.
–JB
Arris isn’t the only one doing/saying this. SMC had a lot more info on it.
Apparently Intel has done a software release within the last two weeks or so for the Puma 5 silicon (formerly TI product, bought by intel) that enables 7 kHz wideband plus analog across the phone ports, plus rolls G.722 to move it VoIP.
Am going to try to post a follow up shortly.
Has Arris also tested what will happen when a customer connects his “legacy” phone to the RJ11 port?
Most of those 15M customers will not upgrade their phones to benefit from the HD quality but as an operator you don’t want to have different firmwares per customer depending on their handset.
1) Legacy phone gets you narrowband. The you-have-to-buy it HD analog phone collects/delivers 7 kHz through the RJ-11 port.
2) Firmware will likely be upgraded as a push-update on a carrier-by-carrier basis, so if Comcast decides to do it, it will roll out the firmwire upgrade to all of its devices as part of its normal update cycle.
@Doug
I assume the eMTA will always present a wideband signal on the RJ-11 port regardless of the type of phone connected? Presenting wideband signal to a narrowband phone can cause problems. The echo canceller and/or filters in the legacy phone could react very badly to this signal. It should be tested thoroughly before comcast can roll out the firmware mass market.