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Australia Gets 8Mbit/s Broadband now, 20Mbit Soon
danwarne writes "Whirlpool is reporting the 'bad old days' of slow, expensive broadband in Australia might be over, with the large ISP iiNet unveiling broadband internet up to 8Mbit/s, from $29/mth. It has been installing its own DSLAMs into the exchanges of Australia's incumbent telco, Telstra, which limits internet access speeds to a maximum of 1.5MBit/s. iiNet boss Michael Malone says as soon as the ADSL2+ standard is approved for use in Australia (which should be in a month or two), he intends to switch the DSLAMs over to offering 20Mbit/s speeds. It looks like Telstra and Optus, the two incumbent telcos in Australia might have their duopoly on high speed broadband (10Mbit/s cable internet) challenged, with potentially great ramifications for price competition in Australia. The only downside noted by Whirlpool readers is that iiNet is forcing customers to take their long distance phone service as well to get access to the 8Mbit/s speeds, a move which is ironically reminiscent of the tactics used by Telstra and Optus."
5GB/month speed is about equal to 16kbit/sec speed.
Wow thats slow.
Morphing Software
and use up your bandwidth limit for the month within 10 minutes of using the thing at full speed.
You've never downloaded Bit-Torrents have you?
Life is not for the lazy.
The only downside noted by Whirlpool readers is that iiNet is forcing customers to take their long distance phone service as well to get access to the 8Mbit/s speeds
I live in the USA. For an 8Mbit/s line, I would not only gladly accept having to use their LD, I would also turn over my liver and owe them some unspecified favor involving dead bodies.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
too bad all the cool stuff is on the other side of the big pond, and australia is connected to it over an ISDN line.
Does this mean that our aussie friends won't be able to complain anymore?
No more "you americans whine about your crappy broadband but here in australia, we won't get internet for another 30 years" ?
Thank god.