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3 Megabit Cable Modems, Anyone?

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the quicker-than-the-passage-of-recess dept.

joelav22 writes: "I've got to move to San Francisco! RCN has upgraded current customers to 3 megabits of bandwith for no extra charge. In the days of all the bandwith chopping and caps, this is definitely a welcome trend. I hope ATT and Comcast can take a hint."

9 of 302 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Caching by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    I bet they're doing that on the 1.5 meg links already.

  2. upload speed? by gabriel_aristos · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I noticed that no mention was made of upload speeds. How much do you want to bet they're capped at 128Kbps...

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  3. Look like a good deal by Rogerborg · · Score: 5, Interesting

    But it leaves you with a tough choice:

    1. Use it responsibly to get faster downloads of the data that you actually want.
    2. Get your snout in the trough and suck down everything you can before they admit that it's unsustainable and cut it, cap it, or start charging sensible money for it.

    Incidentally, I'm in the first category, but I'm beginning to feel like I've been pretty stupid. Sure, I understand that "all you can eat" is just marketing blurb, and that the fees charged for retail flat rate services don't cover the ISP costs of using them to their full capacity. But why would the majority of customers understand or accept that? They're sold as always on, flat rate, all you can eat. A typical user (i.e. Joe Windows) would expect to be able to use them as such, which is why all of these schemes are doomed from the get go, and are just short term marketing schemes to attract customers (1. Burn money to attract customers away from other company's profitable schemes, 2. ..., 3. Profit!).

    And so I'm inclined to say go for it, and leech like you've never leeched before. I know that's unsustainable, but the first sin is being committed by ISP's allowing their marketing droids to sell services as being all-you-can-eat, when that's just not true. Perhaps when they offer services based on an actual sustainable model them then we could consider supporting them. But as long as they're selling services that we know aren't going to work, purely to attract customers in the short term, then there's little point in being the only guy on the block trying to play by the spirit of the rules, because the letter of rules are going to change in the mid term anyway.

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  4. BBB in Sweden by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

    If you already going to move, why not move to Sweden? :-) I've been using (among 50000 other households) Bredbandsbolaget for 2 years now. True 10Mbit transfer both upload and download. For this great service I pay just 225 SKR/month (approx. US$25). And _no_; I'm not resident of a Campus or something like that. Cable modems are just dull and slow.. ;-)

    1. Re:BBB in Sweden by DiscoBiscuit · · Score: 3, Interesting
      I have a friend in Sweden with this sort of connection. His apartment block shares 10Mbit and it would appear that he is the only person using it. His connection goes from his apartment down into the basement where its plugged into a switch. The switch has a 10Mbit fibre transceiver and a fibre cable which dissapears off to the telco through a pipe.

      His ISP is also quite happy to give as many IPs as he wants on his subnet. Add a new machine, and its DHCP just allocates you another address.

      I remember when he first told me he had broadband, and I said, "What type" and he said "Ethernet" and I said "No, which type of broadband have you got - not what your internal network is" (thinking he was being dumb), and he said "No, really, its 10Mb ethernet!"

    2. Re:BBB in Sweden by tetrode · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Same in Belgium, 10 MBit for 38 which must be around 40 $

      Mark

  5. Nice... yet sad! by kir · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It's really nice to hear that bandwidth in the USA is increasing... at least in San Fran.

    It's SAD that I'm writing this from Tokorozawa, Japan via my 8Mb ADSL (3500yen/month ~= $30) that I've had for 6 months (My modem currently says 6.2Mb down, .842Mb up - I don't negotiate at max, but I'll take it)!!! SAD! I guess that article the other day was right - Japan really DOES get all the cool stuff first...

    WAY FIRST! My sister-in-law, who lives about 10 minutes from me, can't get ADSL due to fiber in the middle. That's OK. She can get 2Mb Cable (again, about $30/month) or 100Mb FIBER ($90/month)! FIBER I SAY!

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  6. Re:10 Mbps in Finland, too by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Suddenly my 10 Mbps downstream/~256 kbps upstream cable modem connection (about $40/month) started to feel like antique. Well, actually it is, since it has been available in Finland since 1997 or so... :-)

    And _no_; I'm not a resident of a Campus or something like that.

  7. This is news? Try OOL. by op00to · · Score: 2, Interesting

    In the NYC Area, Cablevisions Optimum Online has been providing 10, yes, TEN megabit downlink speeds and one megabit uplink speeds. I can download from my computer at work (Rutgers University) at over 1,000 Kilo*BYTES* a second. Suck it, RCN. CABLEVISION RULES.