Copper: Just Two More Things
Bandwidth is the name of the game today, and it's usually a choice between fiber and wireless. But in remote areas, or for high-reliability circuits, copper stubbornly remains a key third choice, which upon comparison, can offer two (and possibly more) surprising advantages.
Copper has suffered a bit of stigma over the years. Reasons vary, and are mostly well known (cost to deploy, cost to maintain, overall bandwidth, and even theft and recent disincentives to customers). That's a little unfortunate, because ironically, copper technology is the best its ever been, in some cases even rivaling moderate fiber speeds. There are also still millions of homes which do not yet have service from fiber or high-speed wireless. Many important infrastructure services also still rely on copper, regardless of weather conditions, congestion, or fiber cuts.
What sort of advantages does copper really offer?
1. It's everywhere. Billions of dollars of it. The rights-of-way for copper runs have also existed for decades, helping to prevent impacts to the network from dig-ups and cuts, while speedy fiber deployment has sometimes meant that it wasn't always buried deeply enough. Refurbishing and maintaining smaller regions, with limited bundles of pairs, can be relatively easy work, as equipment and skills are still plentiful.
2. Copper is a conductor. It inherently can send both duplex communications and electrical power at the same time, a key feature for survivable communication systems.
Yes, it would be nice if the customer could provide their own uninterruptible power supply, so the telco doesn't have to provide power. Yet, no other utility service can offer this feature (traditional cable operators do offer a powered signal, but it is not used to power customer equipment like a POTS landline, and it often requires additional power at the prem to keep the signal usable).
Not that we are saying anyone should pick a copper circuit over a 1G-to-the-prem fiber connection, but where that isn't possible, modern ADSL2+ and VDSL2 technology can provide real-world speeds between 25-100Mbps+, even over relatively long loops and in the presence of crosstalk. What's more, most xDSL systems can be deployed with minimal planning, power, or expense, often just requiring a small cabinet and single-phase 120V AC power source. If you need to move equipment 2 or 3 miles closer to the customer for better speeds, it isn't hard to do, being able to repurpose existing cabinets that are closer to the access point.
Of course, then there are the special services like FAA radar circuits, water pumping stations, hospitals, schools, and alarm monitoring circuits, to name a few of the circuits that aren't always easy to replace with fiber or wireless, even if such alternatives exist. Unfortunately, fiber cuts are still all too common, and many of these end users know it.
Upgrades to the fastest technologies are understandable, desirable, and given some time are inevitable. Newer options exist such as SpaceX's StarLink®, and more like Amazon LEO are coming, but these are usually at a different price point than typical communication utilities have been set, plus they can suffer from higher latency or signal degrades.
If fiber or wireless are the best options, go for it. But in the meantime, don't let stigma cause you to give up on copper so quickly, with the billions of dollars of infrastructure already in the ground and on poles, which are increasingly being left dormant as a wasting asset. In many cases, all it might take is a relatively small investment to maintain a few good pairs to supply a small region of users with decent connection speeds, plus the lifeline services needed by both residential and business users. In many cases, its either this or loosing the neighborhood to a competitor, shrinking your company's reach and size.
Usable DSL from 2026 On
Whether you are trying to provide service to a remote region, or keep competition from eating in to your territory, xDSL deployments can keep customers happy and provide surprisingly good data rates, plus they have also dropped in price. A fiber-fed DSL cabinet can easily house hundreds of customers at 20-100Mbps rates, for a fraction of what it cost a few years ago. Customers in remote regions already have copper to the prem, yet where fiber-to-the-prem isn't cost effective. Why not consider a small, inexpensive DSL shelf to the last mile or two?
Below we show several offerings from equipment vendors which we know well, and have deployed ourselves. Any of these systems can be dropped-in place quite literally within hours, with the largest delays due more to permitting and work schedules.
The Tellabs 1000® (previously the AFC UMC1000® and DMAX 1120) remains a highly-versatile system for POTS, T1/T3 and up to VDSL2 speeds of 100Mbps, with rate training backwards to lower speeds that automatically change due to line conditions. Pair bonding is also supported. Equipment costs are modest, where the latest VDSL2 plug-in upgrade can potentially earn back its cost in just a couple of months.
Tellabs still actively supports the T1000, and even added a 10G uplink plug-in relatively recently, with four 1G & two 10G uplink ports, providing a very high speed data pipe for a typical deployment of less-than 1000 lines. In places where fiber isn't economical or practical, the T1000 is offers high-performance via copper, yet remains very cost-effective.
The T1000/UMC1000 system has remained one of the most recognizable and widely deployed systems in North America, with widespread familiarity of its plug-in units and craft menu. After damaging weather events, fires, and accidents, a new T1000 system can often be deployed in just hours, due to its straight-forward, universal design, even when it's replacing equipment from another vendor.
The Adtran Total Access® 5000 remains one of the premier access-facing platforms supporting both copper and fiber, which allows easy upgrades as the outside plant is upgraded. GPON, Active Ethernet, ADSL2+/VDSL2, and other service capabilities are supported in a single chassis design that is widely adopted across the industry. Trunking can also be performed as either copper or optical, supporting T1/T3, SONET and Ethernet. Adtran also continues to support nearly all facets of the Total Access® series of equipment, giving service providers confidence that both their existing and future investments will continue to be supported.
The Total Access® 3000 (not pictured) supports HDSL T1, and is among the most reliable and modern hardware systems available today for T-carrier circuits. Offering 4-wire and 2-wire T1 circuit options, the "TA3000" also offers visibility of the entire span via Adtran's Administration and T-Scan® features. For customers requiring a robust T1 or Digital Data Service (DDS) solution, the Total Access 3000® remains one of the most popular systems within the industry today.
The Calix C7® (top) and E7® (bottom) are ubiquitous with telco service providers. Both remain a common sight in central offices today, with the ability to support bonded DSL over copper, plus fiber-to-the-prem as BPON, GPON, Active Ethernet, and on the latest AXOS version of the E7, also as XGS-PON (NG-PON2 was also offered but discontinued in favor of the E9's NG-PON2 offering).
Calix's copper DSL circuits support advanced vectoring technology, allowing for significantly higher speeds over a given run of copper due to greatly improved crosstalk rejection. Vectoring is built into every Calix DSL card, but can be improved by adding dedicated Vector Control Processors (VCP) where needed, allowing the service provider to determine how to best roll-out DSL based on cable bundle size, take rate, and the type of DSL technology in use. The enormously popular E7-2 chassis is light, small, and low power, allowing for dense DSL or fiber deployment in even the smallest cabinets.
T1 systems can also be directly supported via the C7, or via certain ONTs as non-powered DS-1 ports, or even as Pseudowire (Ethernet Edge-to-Edge Emulation, often called PWE3) on the E7. The latest version of E7 (running AXOS) does not directly support DSL, but does retain the Pseudowire option for T1.
Calix's hardware has been very popular, where either option shown here is highly scalable, taking up little space for the number of circuits provided, yet are easy to deploy.
The century-plus of telecom networks using copper infrastructure is certainly well past its peak, and the trend to move away from copper is clear. However, to move away from all copper means the loss of always-on circuits, plus the relinquishing of billions of dollars of rights-of-way and existing copper plant, and the loss of telco territory, shrinking its reach. Much of this copper can still be used cost effectively, such as by refurbishing a smaller number of pairs from specific cables. While bandwidth will usually never be as high as with fiber optics, nor as direct as a wireless signal can travel, copper is still usable — and almost ideal — for many lower-bandwidth services that must stay on, or where no immediate alternative exists.
Copyright, AG Advice and Support, 2026.