Internet Access Technologies: A (Personal) History
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A. HOME/RESIDENTIAL ENVIRONMENT

When     What             Data Rate       Description
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1980's   Dialup modem     9.6-56 kbps     D->A and A->D over landline telephone link (TDM)

1990's   DSL              300-1000 kbps   Digital Subscriber Line (voice and data FDM)

1990's   ADSL             1-5 Mbps        Asymmetric DSL (more download speed than upload)

2000's   Cable modem      1-30 Mbps       Coaxial cable; shared broadcast in your neighbourhood

2000's   HFC              10-100 Mbps     Hybrid Fiber-Coax; coax to house; fiber to neighbourhood

2010's   FTTH             100-1000 Mbps   Fiber To The Home; high speed, but very expensive!

2020's   Wireless modem   100-300 Mbps    WiFi inside house; coax or HFC to ISP

Glossary:
  modem: does modulation at sender, and demodulation at receiver
  modulation: converting digital data to analog signals for transmission
  demodulation: converting analog signals back to digital data
  analog (A): a signal with continuous range of values (e.g., voice, sunlight, dimmer)
  digital (D): a signal with a finite set of discrete levels (e.g., 0/1, on/off, tri-light)
  bps: bits per second
  kbps = 1,000 bits per second = 10^3 bps
  Mbps = 1,000,000 bits per second = 10^6 bps
  Gbps = 1,000,000,000 bits per second = 10^9 bps

B. WORK/RESEARCH ENVIRONMENT

When     What               Data Rate    Description
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1980's   Classic Ethernet   10 Mbps      Shared broadcast bus LAN; thickwire coax (U of S)

1980's   Fast Ethernet      100 Mbps     Shared broadcast bus LAN; thinwire coax (Stanford U)

1990's   FDDI               100 Mbps     Fiber Distributed Data Interface; loop (U of C)

1990's   ATM                150 Mbps     Asynchronous Transfer Mode; OC-3 fiber (U of S, U of C)

2000's   Switched Ethernet  100 Mbps     Star topology with Ethernet switches (U of C)
                                         (external Internet access: 12-30 Mbps shared)
					 
2010's   WiFi               11-54 Mbps   IEEE 802.11; lots of access points (U of C)
                                         (external Internet access: 100-1000 Mbps shared)

2020's   Gigabit Ethernet   1-10 Gbps    Star topology; high-speed switches (U of C)
                                         (external Internet access: 10-30 Gbps shared)