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Race is on for faster internet access Ameritech ups ante against Comcast
By Vic Caleca
STAFF WRITER
INDIANAPOLIS (Feb. 24, 2000) -- Call it
Speed Wars.
On one side is Ameritech, the local telephone company. On the other is Comcast, the local cable television company.
The two are about to battle over one of the most competitive -- and lucrative -- areas in
the communications industry: high-speed Internet access.
The local battle was engaged in earnest Wednesday with Ameritech's pledge that it will make high-speed Internet connections possible over phone lines for about 400,000 of its Indianapolis customers by year-end.
During the next few months, Ameritech officials say they'll be installing equipment at 11 switching offices throughout Marion County that will allow them to provide
Digital Subscriber Line service.
The service, commonly known as DSL, will be available to customers who live within a
three-mile radius of those central offices.
By 2002, Ameritech intends to have additional equipment in place to make the service available to the rest of its customers.
Skeptics point out that they've heard promises of the imminent arrival of DSL for years.
But Ameritech officials say this is the real thing. It's part of a $6 billion national initiative called "Project Pronto" undertaken last year by SBC Communications Inc., which recently
acquired Ameritech.
"This is a priority of theirs," says Jeff Kagan, an Atlanta-based telecommunications industry analyst. "And there's a reason for that. You have to be out in the marketplace quickly or you lose out to cable."
In Indianapolis, cable's already out of the gate. Comcast announced last November it
would begin offering Internet access over its cable system.
"We've got about 2,000 subscribers in Indianapolis right now, and we have done
absolutely no marketing," says Troy Bruinsma, sales and marketing manager for Comcast Online.
"We're at the very crux of beginning our marketing push. In the next week to two weeks, we will begin an aggressive rollout."
What's all the fuss about?
In the case of DSL, it's about technology that will allow Ameritech to use more of
the capacity that's available in the copper phone lines feeding into your home or
business.
Ameritech will be installing devices known as DSLAMs -- Digital Subscriber Line
Access Multiplexers -- at its Marion County switching centers. Those devices will
separate data traffic from normal voice traffic and feed it into different portions of
your phone line.
To complete the package, consumers will need some special equipment: DSL modems and a filter to plug into their phone jacks.
"We're taking the existing phone line and we're splitting the spectrum already there,"
says Jason Few, vice president of broadband communications for SBC, based
in San Antonio.
"Voice will use part of that spectrum, and data will use another part of that
spectrum," he said.
The end result: Your computer can stay logged onto the Internet continuously and
your access to Web pages will be up to 200 times faster than conventional modems.
Consumers can surf while simultaneously talking on the phone.
In the immediate future, DSL availability will be limited to homes within three miles
of Ameritech's switching stations because speed begins to degrade beyond that distance.
The next phase of Ameritech's DSL deployment will address that by installing remote terminals in areas further from the switching facilities to handle DSL chores.
Specific pricing -- and just when customers can start signing up for the service -- still
must be worked out, Ameritech officials say.
Typical DSL pricing in other parts of the country, though, ranges from about $40 to
$60 per month.
Cable Internet access uses much the same principle as DSL -- it splits the cable's
capacity between television transmission and Internet data transmission.
As with DSL, the Internet connection is always on -- and it's lightning fast in
comparison to standard modems.
Ameritech officials say there's a catch, though. Access times can slow during peak
usage because the cable is shared with other users -- the more crowded it becomes, the slower the access.
Bruinsma says that if technicians see areas clogging up, they'll step in and reroute users.
Pricing for Comcast's service is comparable to typical DSL pricing -- between $40 and
$50 per month, depending on whether you're a cable TV subscriber.
So, who has the advantage?
Kagan, the telecommunications analyst, says cable has a head start.
"But now that DSL is starting to roll out, I think you'll see it competing and coexisting
very successfully."
© 2000 Indiana Newspapers Inc. AP materials © 2000 Associated Press. All rights reserved.
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