With labor turmoil (Qwest and it's unions have a 12:01 a.m. MT Sunday deadline for a new contract) and its battles with the FCC for forbearance from wholesale pricing [0] regulations, the fact that Qwest is putting on its Sunday best for the upcoming Democratic National Convention this month in Denver and the Republican Nation Convention in Minneapolis in September has pretty much gone by the wayside.

But Qwest is geeked -- in a big way -- about the role it's playing when the DNC comes to the company's backyard Aug. 25-28.

"Qwest is well prepared to handle all of the data content that will be streaming through the Democratic National Convention," said Chuck Ward, Qwest's president in Colorado. "Never before has speed played such an important role in a national convention, and Qwest is excited for the world to see the capabilities of our network infrastructure."

How much data? Qwest says the aggregate data capacity of its network is about 50 billion bits per second. That means:

• An entire HD movie could be transmitted in about two seconds;
• Over the course of the convention more than half a billion (514 million) 4 Mbps MP3s could be transmitted; and
• Using an estimate of 20 Terabytes (1 Terabyte equals 1 trillion bytes) for the Library of Congress' print holdings, the entire collection could be transmitted in less than one hour (58.7 minutes).

Qwest has installed video equipment with capacity to handle 130 simultaneous video feeds at both the Pepsi Center and INVESCO Field at Mile High. It's also upgraded its infrastructure, adding approximately 3,344 miles of single strands of fiber and 140 miles of single strands of copper and coaxial cable.
It also added approximately 2,600 additional data lines and 3,400 voice grade circuits to serve both venues.

For more:
- See the release [1]

Related articles:
Qwest scrambles as DNC nears DNC report [1]
Qwest promises 'world class' service at DNC. Qwest report [1]