When turned on in January, it will be able to accommodate 500Gbps of data per second - the equivalent of 750 DVD quality movies per second worth of data. -- PHOTO: BERITA HARIAN
STARHUB'S new undersea cable system, which will increase its overseas Internet bandwidth by 30 per cent in January, will deliver smoother Youtube videos and speedier BitTorrent downloads to its 2 million broadband users.
Built over three years at a cost of US$500 million shared by 19 telecommunications companies, including Singapore's StarHub, America's AT&T; and Malaysia's Telekom Malaysia, the 20,000km long Asia-America Gateway (AAG) cable system runs from the eastern shore of Singapore to the Philippines and then across the Pacific Ocean to the United States.
Internet submarine cable systems connecting Singapore to the rest of the world, like the Asia-Pacific Cable Network-2 (APCN2) used by both SingTel and StarHub, traditionally run past typhoons and earthquake-prone sites near Taiwan and Japan. Seismic shifts on the sea bed where these cables lie can cause them to snap, cutting off Internet connections for days before the cables can be repaired.
The AAG was officially launched at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel on Tuesday by Minister of State for Trade & Industry and Manpower Lee Yi Shyan. 'The ability of our infocomm and media industry to grow vibrantly hinges on us having strong connectivity with major centers of the world where knowledge and new ideas are being exchanged and created in million or terabytes bites by the second. As IT and media technology evolve rapidly, we must continually improve Singapore's connectivity with the world,' said Mr Lee.
As AAG offers a shorter, more direct route to the US, access to US-based Internet websites and other online content like YouTube, Facebook and World of Warcraft will be faster, said Mr Clontz, who added that American sites have traditionally been the single largest online destination for StarHub Internet users.
When turned on in January, it will be able to accommodate 500Gbps of data per second - the equivalent of 750 DVD quality movies per second worth of data. The AAG can take up to 1.92 terabits per second, Mr Clontz added.
