Comment by caf
13 years ago
The numbers in this story do not add up. For a connection to be made within 3ms, there needs to be a round-trip within that time, which reduces the maximum possible radius by half.
13 years ago
The numbers in this story do not add up. For a connection to be made within 3ms, there needs to be a round-trip within that time, which reduces the maximum possible radius by half.
He followed this up sometime later.
http://www.ibiblio.org/harris/500milemail-faq.html
Also, don't both photons in fiber and electrons in copper wire travel around 60% of the speed of light?
In most fiber optic cable photons travel at about ~65% of c. The exact number depends on the refractive index of the fiber.
For electricity: Paraphrasing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_of_electricity
The 'Current' travels along a wire at anything between 97% and 60% of c (depending on insulation; more insulation == slower).
Individual electrons in copper wire travel much more slowly. The 'drift velocity' is roughly proportional to the voltage; for low voltage DC it is the order of millimeters per hour.
For AC voltage individual electrons don't have any net movement since they're oscillating back and forth with the alternating current.