On-&zwsp;site services IC - Seidl Technologies
1. Summary for readers in a hurry
2. Principles of our on-site services
3. Internet connectivity today
4. Infrastructure, parties, proprietors
5. Services, business relationships
6. Problems with subscriber's lead-ins
7. DSL statistics
8. Cable routing
9. Packet routing
10. Wi-Fi
11. Telephony
12. Image gallery
13. The end
1. Summary for readers in a hurry
In a certain area around Bleicherode, Seidl Technologies offers on-site services tailored to the needs of end consumers who have problems with their access to the Internet, their home network in general, or their telephony equipment. We assist our customers in fault finding and remedy, and support them in planning, installing, commissioning, extending, and optimizing their communications infrastructure. We also offer the aforementioned services to corporates and public institutions, as long as their installations match our profile.
Charges levied by us consist of labor costs, material costs, and costs to cover travel expenses. Besides, our pricing plan 2 of February the 5th, 2022, applies. Labor costs are calculated by taking the summed time every single employee or assistent spent at the customer's premises, multiplied by a fixed rate of €40 per hour and person. The latter amount contains approximately €6.39 of Value Added Tax (VAT) per hour and person. The use of material is subject to agreements, and the same applies to its prices. Costs to cover travel expenses are determined here by taking the total number of driven kilometers to and from the customer's premises, multiplied by the fixed rate of €0.50 per kilometer. That value includes nearly €0.08 of VAT per kilometer. Customers in Bleicherode are not charged for the distance traveled. Providing on-site services, the travel expenses can represent a significant part of the total costs. The following map allows one to gain a rough overview of the travel costs that are due. The red point in the center indicates the position of Bleicherode.
If you are interested in our on-site services, please endeavor to get a Customer ID in conjunction with an initial Customer password. You can get both by telephone or email. Telephone number and email address can be found in the Web imprint. Please note the indicated office hours for telephone calls. With the access data obtained in this way, please fill out the Customer data form. This should be done with some care. And you amiably imagine one more time what your problems are. We, on the other hand, can reasonably prepare ourselves for our on-site mission. Our undertaking strives to act according to the needs, what at this point above all means to avoid unnecessary costs. In exceptional cases, we will also fill out the customer data form together on the telephone. We later get in touch with you to make the necessary agreements concerning the commencement of works.
Please take note of our Terms and Conditions for this service type, given under T&C On-site services IC, as well as the information given under Legal notices.
Please amass such things as the contract with your telecommunications service provider, any access data, as well as the usernames and passwords of all your devices, and keep them handy.
Customers with high demands are offered to perform all the preparations in a conversation on their premises. But in this way, it is possible that several arrivals and departures cannot be avoided.
If you in the first place wish to remain anonymously, you have the possibility to fill out the customer data form using a test account. In this case nothing is stored.
2. Principles of our on-site services
When developing solutions for our customers, we take concepts from professional environments and realize them on selected consumer-level hardware. Our main focus is to create long-lasting installations that combine features such as extensive independence from providers and access technologies as well as robustness and reliability with low costs. We do not follow all the trends and advise against things that question the security of your installation. Efforts are being made to protect existing investments. This also includes that we look for defects and rehabilitate as long as the latter is reasonable. Finally, we also welcome customers who want the great solution and want to realize cost-intensive subtasks by themselves.
3. Internet connectivity today
With regard to the IT infrastructure held available in private households nowadays, driven by the requirements that now even the web shops of some vendors require, a fast and inexpensive Internet access plays a central role. This is also not derogated by the fact that now almost everyone too accesses content on the Internet with the help of a smartphone. The fast and inexpensive Internet access comes to the end consumer in the form of a copper telephone cable, a copper coaxial cable, or a fiber optic cable, less frequently via mobile network, satellite, long-range Wi-Fi or similar technologies. On the other hand, today, devices within the domestic environment hardly communicate via cable anymore. They communicate mainly via radio, more precisely over the relatively short range Wi-Fi, so that a complete Wi-Fi coverage is increasingly required in the living areas. Besides, smart devices also recognize Wi-Fi networks, having made known to them, and can preferably access those in order to save certain volume contingents on the side of the mobile network.
4. Telecommunications infrastructure, involved parties, ownership relations
Before the liberalization of the telecommunications market, the situation was very clear. There were the customers and the only provider of telecommunications solutions, a private or public monopolist. This provider was at the same time the owner of the entire telecommunications infrastructure and a customer rented the terminal devices. Connecting private terminal equipment to the provider's infrastructure required a permit, which to the normal customer has almost never been given. The market already knew at those times how to react to the comprehensible requirement of the owner, not to connect unauthorized equipment to its infrastructure, even though only with such terrible things as acoustic couplers for data transmission. Despite all this, the advantage of such a situation was the very simple business relationship with its clearly defined responsibility, the disadvantage was the absence of any competition.
Meanwhile, we are a few steps further. We have not only telephones, but also the Internet, stationary and mobile, by day and night, and often without any limitation as to the volume of data to be transported. To this end, the still ongoing liberalization of the telecommunications market has already brought several things. In the first place, millions of customers enjoy low prices. In Germany today no one has to get along without a reasonable Internet access, although not all access technologies are available everywhere. With all the euphoria, what has remained in many places, however, are the old lines. So there are also customers who suffer. These are, on the one hand, those who fail to get a DSL connection, having been ordered, in operation above all. The ones who belong to the latter can focus on the following remarks, to develop a certain understanding for the causes of some problems. This understanding will surely help that a suitable solution is found at last. The presentation of the relationships is simplified and is limited to the circumstances surrounding the copper telephone cable. Despite their diverseness in detail, things are not fundamentally different in the cable television or FTTH business. Who is, on the other side, one of those who have their DSL connection basically running and are less interested in the following, this one can skip some paragraphs and can continue reading at DSL statistics.
Wire-bound Internet connections require that the cable is working. The question arises as to who is responsible for the operativeness of this cable. The one who is responsible first is the owner of the cable. However, today we have no longer just a single owner as before the deregulation of the telecommunications market. Today, our cable is divided into at least three sections being in possession of at least two different parties. Who are these owners now and at which point of the cable do they change? The owner of the farthest cable section, seen from the customer's point of view, is the incumbent local exchange carrier. The incumbent local exchange carrier is typically the successor of the former private or public monopolist mentioned above, or is the successor of a partition of the latter. The incumbent local exchange carrier is the owner of the telecommunications infrastructure up to the building of the customer and maintains it. So, if you dig a hole in your garden and thereby damage the telecommunications infrastructure, you will get a problem with the incumbent local exchange carrier. The ownership and therefore also the responsibility of the incumbent local exchange carrier can end at a demarcation point that is called distribution point and can typically be found in the cellar or in some outdoor area of the building. The distribution point itself is in any case still owned by the incumbent local exchange carrier and may only be opened by authorized staff. In the picture everything can be seen well. The thick black cable with the imprinted telephone icons, which leads here six twin wires, as well as the gray box belong to the incumbent local exchange carrier. The thin gray cable with two twin wires belongs to the next cable section. The latter cable would today be performed using category 5e cable.
Toward the customer, it follows a second cable section. For the moment this section is here referred to as inhouse telephone network. There is now a consensus that the inhouse telephone network has to be considered as a part of the building cabling. Controversy is discussed, however, to whom this inhouse telephone network belongs and who can be held responsible for its correct functioning. Nonetheless this question is very easy to answer. The inhouse telephone network belongs to the one who commissioned its installation and paid for the latter, or a respective legal successor. Normally only two candidates are qualified here. Thus, the inhouse telephone network belongs to the property of the incumbent local exchange carrier or the owner of the building. This means that either the incumbent local exchange carrier or the owner of the building can be held responsible for the correct functioning of this section. But to immediately anticipate the appropriate question, correct functioning of the inhouse telephone network first of all means that analog telephony works, no more, but also not less. From a technical point of view, the classic inhouse telephone network consists of one or more twin wires called subscriber's lead-in. Each of these lines, called subscriber's lead-in, connects the aforementioned demarcation point, the distribution point, to a second demarcation point in the premises of the customer, called master socket. In Germany, this master socket contains the so-called Passive Test Termination, which can be used to assess the state of the telephone line from the exchange. Since this test termination is now no longer mandatorily localized at the property boundary of the incumbent local exchange carrier, but only at the end of the subscriber's lead-in, the incumbent local exchange carrier need get along well with the owner of the subscriber's lead-in. The latter is, of course, assured from the outset if the incumbent local exchange carrier is also the owner of the subscriber's lead-in. On the other hand, the interests suggest that the incumbent local exchange carrier and the owner of the subscriber's lead-in generally get along well with each other also in the other case, and that though there seems to be little regulation compared to electricity, gas, and water. It can first of all be stated that, today as in the past, the incumbent local exchange carrier and the owner of the building do in principle not have to maintain a business relation with one another. A common interest, however, will very likely be to provide the telecommunications customer with adequate services. Furthermore, homeowners who do not want to spend too much money are extremely satisfied with the situation, in which the incumbent local exchange carrier claims the subscriber's lead-ins that still originate from the age of the private or public monopoly, and do certainly also not want to get anything to do with these things in the future. And finally, owners of a building who reconstructed their property, including the building cabling, did that most likely in such a manner that the subscriber's lead-ins meet current standards and will not pose any problem in the next future. Thus, the incumbent local exchange carrier got the from its point of view most unpleasant part of the telephone line upgraded without having spent one euro, and at the same time he got rid of the responsibility for this part. The search for a fault in a subscriber's lead-in in a large apartment building can be quite intricate. Also the laying of a new subscriber's lead-in can entail considerable costs, particularly in large buildings or when aesthetic aspects play a role. On the other hand, in a single-family house it might be useful to have the subscriber's lead-in consist of only half a meter of telephone cable, that is, to have the master socket installed in the cellar right next to the distribution point.
In Germany, the telephone mainline is not a performance owed in the context of the tenancy
law, unless otherwise defined by the contract of tenancy or the standard of the rental apartment.
Interestingly, however, the possibility of gaining access to a landline, more precisely, the existence
of a distribution point which is assigned to the tenement house, seems to be one of the minimum
requirements for rented dwellings, which the tenant may regularly rely upon and trust
in. So, in Mietrecht 08 - 2015 Mietrechtslexikon , retrieved on December the 19th, 2016, it can be read.
The tenant's right to freedom of information is constitutionally protected (…). The handover point in the house (meaning the demarcation point that is
called distribution point) is established by the telephone company
(meaning by the incumbent local exchange carrier), and the landlord/owner must tolerate the installation and collaborate for
it. If there are no cables routed from the handover point to the
apartment (meaning there is no subscriber's lead-in), the tenant has a legal claim to install the lines necessary for
the telephone connection (that is exactly one line being the subscriber's lead-in), as well as other technical
facilities (meaning the master socket), at least himself.
These are facilities which the tenant can remove after the end of the
tenancy and, at the request of the landlord, also must remove. As
long as the cable routing requires only a minimal intervention in the structure of the building, the
landlord's consent is superfluous. The landlord can also not refuse
to grant his consent. This applies even if the contract of tenancy
has been agreed otherwise. (…). Thus, it should be noted that in Germany, in an extreme case, a subscriber's
lead-in can be owned by a tenant, too.
The third and last cable section toward the customer starts at the master socket. This last cable section can quite differently be designed. Since after August the 1st, 2016, there is no legal possibility in Germany to directly or indirectly impose telecommunications terminal equipment (customer premises equipment) on a consumer, the customer can largely decide for himself how this last cable section, the customer cable section, appears. At the same time, he is, of course, held fully responsible for its operativeness, too. Young people who move into a rental apartment will probably opt for a chic home center as a router and hope that they get along without any additional cable. The opposite is a single-family house with several independent cablings, each with the topology of a star. Perhaps, in the first instance, there are two cablings routed using Cat x and coaxial cable. All cables lay in empty tubes with large bending radii, so that nothing stands in the way when it comes to replace the one or the other cable with a glass fiber at some point. Such an installation is a great pleasure already for that reason, that almost every new requirement can be met with ease and elegance. Even the kids of the family are usually thrilled when they notice how a Wi-Fi at home, built up from several smartly arranged access points, performs compared to an anemic installation elsewhere.
5. Telecommunications service for end consumers, business relationships
The telecommunications service provider or service provider comes into play. In the context of the copper telephone cable, the telecommunications service provider generally maintains two business relationships that are interesting for the telecommunications customer. It first of all sells telecommunications services to this customer and presents invoices to him. The telecommunications service provider is thereby the only contractual partner the customer maintains a business relationship with. An interesting aspect of this business relationship is that, in Germany, the telecommunications service provider owes the provision of its service at the master socket. This means that German courts are meanwhile extinguishing all clauses and formulations that are found in the general terms and conditions of telecommunications service providers for the purpose of attaching the provision of their service to any other point before the master socket. The second business relationship of the telecommunications service provider, which is interesting for the telecommunications customer, is the one with the incumbent local exchange carrier. Namely, if the telecommunications service provider and the incumbent local exchange carrier are not one and the same company, then, in many countries, the incumbent local exchange carrier is forced by laws and regulations to rent a certain part of its infrastructure to the telecommunications service provider, but no longer unconditionally, as the discussions around VDSL2-Vectoring in Germany show. The duration of this renting corresponds to the duration of the contract between the telecommunications customer and the telecommunications service provider. The incumbent local exchange carrier, however, retains control over its property and also maintains it appropriately. And now comes the problem. The part of the infrastructure that the incumbent local exchange carrier has to rent to the telecommunications service provider in Germany, that is the part whose operativeness need be provided, too, this part ends at the distribution point. This in turn means. Apart from one possible exception, a telecommunications service provider neither owns the subscriber's lead-in nor has a contract that ensures the operativeness of this line section toward the customer. With that, the telecommunications service provider hangs by quite a thin thread. A service need be delivered at the master socket without having the complete line up to there under contract. Certainly, during the contract period, no one else than the telecommunications service provider is interested in the subscriber's lead-in, but also no one else cares if it does not work. But, the telecommunications service provider could also not simply send a technician, since this technician has from the outset no right to set his hand to the building cabling, that is to say to other people's property. The only possible problem-solving procedure would therefore be to find the actual owner of the subscriber's lead-in and negotiate with him how to proceed further. In this way, such an operation begins to become expensive. Whatever is left is the hope that the subscriber's lead-in is in order. And the latter is in fact generally the case.
6. Problems with the subscriber's lead-in, what different parties do
The provision of telecommunications services for end consumers is a mass business, which usually runs unobstructed. In the following, it is now asked what may happen in the case that a subscriber's lead-in is actually defective. Finding the answer to such a question is not easy. Nevertheless, it is tried here. Among all possible telecommunications service providers a customer can have a contract with, there is first of all a distinguished one, namely, the one which at the same time appears as the incumbent local exchange carrier. If this particular telecommunications service provider also still owns the subscriber's lead-in, then the subscriber's lead-in is repaired, certainly economically, but everything will work thereafter. The customer will not be charged. So the thing goes in the direction one imagines. In the following, we assume that the telecommunications service provider does not own the subscriber's lead-in, but is, on the other hand, willing to provide the owed services. Then the telecommunications service provider will seek out the owner of the subscriber's lead-in to agree with him how it is to be repaired. The owner can not refuse to repair the subscriber's lead-in. The telecommunications service provider can now require the owner to repair the subscriber's lead-in at his own expense. In this case, however, the telecommunications service provider cannot expect more than the subscriber's lead-in is made suitable for analog telephony. The telecommunications service provider would however typically like to sell DSL and has thus immediately again the problem that the subscriber's lead-in is, after the repair, of course suitable for analog telephony, but perhaps not for DSL. So the telecommunications service provider can only hope again. The second chance is that the telecommunications service provider pays for the repair itself. Only in this case the telecommunications service provider can really be sure that the subscriber's lead-in will fulfill its purpose. Again, the customer will not be charged. A less responsible telecommunications service provider solves the problem differently. Such a provider considers itself first as a victim of adverse circumstances. After determining a failure in the subscriber's lead-in, such a provider will simply terminate the contract with the end customer. Such a practice does not help the customer any further, but is not considered unfair. On the other hand, it is unfair to stall the customer and let things slide at the same time. And then there is the clever telecommunications service provider. This maintains an availability database, from which all buildings with faulty subscriber's lead-ins are removed over time. Hence in the future, to customers who live in such buildings will not be submitted an offer any more, so there will be no more trouble with them.
One may ask oneself why in Germany certain things are more difficult than in other countries. Well, Germany is a nice country. Comparatively many cables are laid underground or concealed in the walls. That is why all activities on the cable infrastructure are much more painful than in other countries, where perhaps everything is fastened to the outside of the building wall at a height of about three meters. And, to quickly route a subscriber's lead-in outside along the façade once, this is not at all in Germany. In addition, more than half of all Germans live in rented accommodations, and tenants usually have nothing to do with the infrastructure nor have anything to approve. In rental apartments of the upper price class, it is very likely that everything is in order. If, therefore, there are conflicts of interest that escalate necessary changes in the cables to a crucial test, then those are likely to be observed in the lower rental price segment.
Wire-bound Internet connections, this may include copper coaxial and fiber optic cable connections, are a fine thing, and only if there is no way to get them, radio-based access technologies should be envisaged. But the way to get them can yet be stony. What is now to be advised, if a commissioned connection does not get running? One possible course of action looks as follows. If a telecommunications service provider fails to establish a functioning Internet connection within a reasonable period of time, it should not be waited too long to replace this provider by another. If the current telecommunications service provider acts reasonably, it will immediately accept the cancellation of the contract because it does not provide the service it owes. It does not interest anyone to know whether or not it is its fault. If, on the other hand, the current telecommunications service provider behaves unflexibly, the matter should be handed over without hesitation to a law firm. This saves a lot of time and money in the end. Once freed, the next telecommunications service provider can be tried as a new customer, benefiting all bonuses associated with that. Nevertheless, one might not get off quite as favorably as with the one just discharged. But the goal must be kept in mind. It is therefore recommended to consider whether or not that telecommunications service provider should be chosen that appears at the same time as the incumbent local exchange carrier. Especially since there seem to actually be any problems, it is further recommended to buy the installation service, which is often offered at a fixed price. This purchase gives the order a special status, with which it clearly stands out from the crowd. For those, who live in their own house, the course of action looks much easier. The subscriber's lead-in is repaired at the expense of the houseowner and that is it. Should you, as a telecommunications end customer who has possibly been left alone, are eventually convinced that it might be better to consult with us about the next step, just contact us. We have measuring instruments available to search for faults in subscriber's lead-ins in a straightforward manner.
7. DSL statistics
If a DSL connection is running once, a great step has been made. This allows one to inspect the status of a connection from the modem's point of view. The displayed data rates should meet the expectations. They should change slightly when the modem is turned off and then back on again. The existence of minor data rate changes allows to suppose that the hardware, belonging to the telephone exchange, is not too old. If, however, the data rate changes considerably when the modem is switched off and on again, that is, the data rate negotiation procedure does not provide a reproducible result, then the line must be assumed to have some problem. The latter is usually accompanied by fairly high values for the frame and bit error rates. You can ask us to determine in whose area of responsibility such line problems fall and, if you are held responsible for these problems, also to remedy them.
8. Cable routing
Your network and all the accessories have been in operation for some time. Also, on the whole, everything works fine. You have however the feeling that far too many cables, switches, adapters and, above all, wall plug power supplies are lying around. Furthermore, you are too often busy creeping under the tables to restore a broken connection, of course, after spending some time figuring out why this and that does not work once again. And you have long ago understood that the cables on the floor, belonging to your communications infrastructure, have four enemies: uncharitably acting cleaning staff, pets looking for attention, interested small children, and upset spouses. Tidying up and tying up all the cables are a good beginning, cable raceways are better. In many cases far above fixed surface mounted cable raceways can be tolerated and they allow, provided they are sufficiently amply dimensioned, to maintain order for decades. Of course, it happens at some point that, if always something is added only, even the largest cable raceway is once full. If the covers can simply not snapped into place anymore, then the moment has come to revise the entire installation. Please, ask us about cable raceways. We install cable raceways and we can also tell you how 20 meters of DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort or USB can reasonably be bridged and how things look with loudspeaker cables. Besides, we have experience with various technologies and media to transmit Ethernet packages, which range from adapters for PowerLAN to media converters for glass fiber and POF. And, as long as any metallic conductor is routed to another location, topics as galvanic isolation, earth and ground loops, shielding, electrical bonding and grounding, as well as propagation conditions for external electromagnetic excesses, are of relevance. Therefore, the method of cutting through galvanic connections at carefully chosen points and bridging the resulting discontinuities by means of optical connections in the several meters range or even with the help of Wi-Fi is still welcome.
9. Packet routing
In Germany, ADSL was introduced around the turn of the millennium and thus also the consumer-level routers. These consumer-level routers were initially small and modest devices that consumed only a few watts of power. They worked fine until complex Wi-Fi encryption algorithms came into fashion, which in general could no longer be executed on the processors. This is why DSL routers today contain much more and, above all, much faster silicon than in the past, and are therefore able to provide, besides the realization of the Internet connection, a variety of services based on it. Also the user interfaces have been improved more and more, so that the mechanisms, which are quite complex in themselves, can be understood and configured by many users. In particular, routing is completely preconfigured today, so that a normal user has almost nothing to do. The situation is different as soon as you run several networks and want to make equipment off the shelf, such as a printer, visible in all these networks without giving up the separation of the networks. Under such conditions, routing begins to become interesting. We would be pleased to assist you in this regard.
10. Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi, a registered trademark of Wi-Fi Alliance, stands for fully developed and highly complex technologies as well as for certified products to undertake Wireless Local Area Networking (WLAN) based on the IEEE 802.11 standard family. Today, Wi-Fi is present in practically every household, in which notebooks, smartphones or similar devices are operated. Phenomena in regard to Wi-Fi connections, which occasionally escape one's attention, are the following ones. With worsening transmission conditions, it is first of all possible that it is switched back to lower data rates. If the transmission conditions deteriorate further, the proportion of incorrectly transmitted packets grows dramatically and, in the end, the connection drops every now and then. Every now and then, because in limit cases it is constantly tried to reestablish broken connections. Thus, the machinery gives up very late. Such occurrences are in addition obscured by protection mechanisms of superordinate protocol layers. Consequently, inattentive users do not perceive the activities that actually happen, such that they do not understand why their data transmissions are unbearably slow in some cases. If the data rates do not meet the expectations at locations somewhat more distant from the access point, then setting up several access points generally provides a solution. We will be glad to analyze your situation, advise you and provide you with environments with more than one access point. We use, for example, this Wi-Fi access point to make the guests of our garden parties happy with their smart devices.
11. Telephony
Meanwhile, VoIP has been widely enforced. Since the turn of the millennium, VoIP on SIP basis has gone from better than nothing to works quite well. It looks as local exchange carriers are now prioritizing VoIP packets sufficiently high. It further looks as VoIP works perfectly in well-managed intranets. Finally, it looks as privately established VoIP connections suffer less from insufficient prioritization than they used to, which has to do with ongoing network development, but are of course still vulnerable. Nevertheless, there is still a lot to be done and there are a number of things to consider. For example, telecommunications service providers in Germany guarantee end customers 97 percent availability for VoIP telephony, which means nothing other than being without a phone for eleven days a year at worst. Regarding analog telephony, one remembers availabilities greater than 99.7 percent, or one day a year without a telephone. Even such things, that without additional expenses ordinary VoIP-based telephony equipment fails to work on electrical power outage, need at least be considered. No question, VoIP is the future and it is getting better and better. Seidl Technologies has many years of experience in this field. Ask us if you want to know what to do in which case.
12. Image gallery
13. The end
Once you have arrived here and feel that your Internet access, your network, your Wi-Fi, and your telephones are all right, then sit
back and enjoy the content the Internet provides for you 
. Otherwise, please work once again through the above summary 
.