Nice story!! Check out some of this quotes...
americasnetwork.com
Anticipating ADSL
The RBOCs' and GTE's xDSL trials are well under way. What lessons have
carriers learned and how will they apply them to their commercial
services?
David Kopf
ow that the RBOCs' and GTE's technical and market trials of Digital
Subscriber Line (DSL) technologies are winding down, the deployment
clock has started ticking. Networks have been tested and tweaked, and
now carriers must apply the lessons they've learned to their ultimate
goal: offering commercial xDSL service.
Those lessons are as varied as the purposes, technologies, vendors and
scale of each trial. From line qualification techniques to network
management to simply outfitting a user's PC, no two trials have been the
same.
QUOTES:
" To attract enough users, the price for consumer ADSL service should
be less than $50, according to Glynn director of product marketing for U S West's Megabit Services, which is
conducting the trial.
GTE has tested both CAP- and DMT-based ADSL to determine the merits of
each, she says. "Our goal is to pick a technology that works best and
works seamlessly for the user," Nogueira says. "Both CAP and DMT have
performed beautifully."
Noll says that BellSouth has set a target date of first quarter 1998 for
commercial service deployment. The number of users targeted will depend
on how well the market trial performs. Where BellSouth will start
offering services and to how many users will depend largely on loop
demographics and the supply of network and CPE equipment.
In any case, GTE's Nogueira says that GTE will do everything it can to
ensure that ADSL is easy for customers to order and that lines are
quickly qualified and installed. "We are going to do this, and we are
going to do it well," she says. "We're not going to have another ISDN."
GTE's approach to managing its xDSL network has been a simple one,
according to Nogueira. A mini network management system was set up at
GTE Laboratories that can track the network as well as "ping" users'
PCs. So far, she says the network and the modems have performed well.
"Microsoft's modems have been on for six to seven months without having
to turn off one modem," she adds.
Where long-term rollout of ADSL is concerned, Nogueira says GTE is
looking at a spotty rollout in late 1997 with more focused efforts in
1998, and widescale efforts in 1999. Reinman says that by 2000, 85% of
the U.S. population should have access to ADSL.
During the past year each carrier says it has learned that xDSL services
can work, that customers like them and that there is profit to be had
from a variety of xDSL-based offerings.
Nogueira sums up that potential thusly: "We see a tremendous opportunity
to not just sell ADSL, but create a new platform to drive things people
will want." |
