Cable provider Comcast has rolled out DOCSIS 3.0 and 50 Mbps "wideband" speeds to the cities of Baltimore, Chicago, and North Fulton County, part of Atlanta's suburbs; the rest of Atlanta will be wideband-ed throughout 2009. It's all a part of the company's wider scheme to speed up more than 10 major markets and nearly 10 million homes.
Comcast customers in the areas will get the choice of two new faster speed options, while most existing customers will get double the speed for no additional cost. At the high end, customers will have access to the Extreme 50 service with up to 50 Mbps of downstream speed and up to 10 Mbps upstream for $139.95 per month. At roughly half the cost - $62.95/month - customers can get Ultra with (roughly half the speed) 22 Mbps downstream and up to 5 Mbps upstream.
With Extreme 50, Comcast customers will be able to download a 2 GB standard-def move in about 5 minutes and a 6 GB high-def movie in about 16 minutes; the company doesn't mention bandwidth caps in their announcement.
Existing broadband customers will get 12/2 Mbps and 16/2 Mbps accordingly, while business customers can get Deluxe 50/10 Mbps for $189.95 per month, but Microsoft Communication services and static IP addresses are thrown in at the higher price. Like the consumers, the intro level service has its speed doubled and there's a new Premium Tier built around the 22/5 Mbps speed for $99.95/month.
It'll be interesting to watch how fast Comcast rolls DOCSIS 3.0 into head-to-head competition with FiOS and how soon Verizon will pull the trigger on upgunning to 100 Mbps speeds in competitive markets.
For more:
- Straight from Comcast about the new DOCSIS 3.0 speeds and pricing. Release.
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