Comcast To Offer Wireless Service

PHILADELPHIA — Comcast Corp. will become the first major cable TV operator to roll out wireless broadband outside of Wi-Fi hotspots as it launches the service in Portland, Ore., on Tuesday, with at least three other cities to follow this year.

Comcast will offer speeds of up to 4 Megabits per second, faster than any other comparable, non-Wi-Fi service currently being marketed. The service is for use with laptops, but not other mobile devices.

Comcast's wireless broadband, which lets users surf the Web on the go with their computers, pits it squarely against the mobile data offerings of phone companies.

But the cable operator is coming out first with the market's fastest wireless broadband, using WiMax technology. Phone companies have lined up behind a competing technology called LTE, with Verizon Communications Inc. planning to deploy it next year.

Comcast, which is the nation's largest cable operator, plans to offer the wireless service in Philadelphia, Atlanta, Chicago and other cities later this year.

The service will be carried over the 4G network of Clearwire Corp. where it's offered. Clearwire, a joint venture involving Comcast, other cable operators and technology companies, is currently in Portland and Atlanta, with plans to deploy in Las Vegas, Chicago, Charlotte, N.C., Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, Honolulu, Philadelphia and Seattle this year.

Elsewhere, the service will use Sprint Nextel Corp.'s 3G network.

Consumers can sign up with either a plan that lets them surf wirelessly within a city using Clearwire's network, or nationally switching between 4G and Sprint's 3G network.

Comcast, along with Intel Corp., Time Warner Cable Inc., Google Inc. and Bright House Networks, have hitched their wireless Internet aspirations on WiMax. Together, they invested $3.2 billion in Clearwire last year for a one-fourth stake. Sprint owns a 51 percent stake.

Comcast High-Speed 2go Metro service over Clearwire's network is on promotion for $49.95 a month for a year, including Comcast's wired Internet home service and a Wi-Fi router. The regular price is $72.95 a month. The national version, using Sprint, costs $20 a month more.

Shares of Comcast were up 14 cents, or 1 percent, to close Monday at $14.36.

Comments

[Dots]

Comcast is in line for yet another huge corporate scandal.
We pay dearly for crap.

[thtrmgr]

Absolutely can't WAIT to ditch Comcast... have signed up for notification if either FIOS or UVERSE comes to my small burg of a town. Had Insight Cable until Comcast bought them out; ever since, crappy service, uncaring representatives, ridiculous fee hikes. Dropped them recently, hoping to rely purely on Verizon Wireless's data plan, but it couldn't keep up with my personal and business needs so unfortunately was forced to sign back up with Comcast. At least my company is paying now (unlike before), but I don't even want to send THEIR money to them, much less my own if I can help it.

[MESGAIN26]

they lied to the people of phildelphia it was supposed to be free for building their tower there iam boycotting comcast they are over rated and over price its a darn shame and to boot they offer nothing on their tv networt but reruns they are a corporates ho's

[lee4]

I will do without before I give Comcast a penny. They are the greediest company (cut channels and up price), so as soon as Verizon Fios was available in my area, I switched. I get so much more for my $.

[Antifascist-08]

I will eventually "retire" to a more remote area, probably n the Northwest. I do, however, teach via live video chat, so I need something more than just basic cable or current wireless.

I am very much looking forward to any advances in wireless access. Sounds like it may be arriving just in time for me.

I would like it to be some company other than Comcast, though.

[gallimaufry03]

comcast sucks

[DestinationsUnknown]

Comcast High-Speed 2go Metro service over Clearwire's network is on promotion for $49.95 a month for a year, including Comcast's wired Internet home service and a Wi-Fi router. The regular price is $72.95 a month. The national version, using Sprint, costs $20 a month more.

Shares of Comcast were up 14 cents, or 1 percent, to close Monday at $14.36.


Sooooooooo­oooooooooo­oooooooooo­ooo

April 3, 2009
World’s Fastest Broadband at $20 Per Home
By Saul Hansell

If you get excited about the prospect of really, really fast broadband Internet service, here’s a statistic that will make heart race. Or your blood boil. Or both.

Pretty much the fastest consumer broadband in the world is the 160-megabi­t-per-seco­nd service offered by J:Com, the largest cable company in Japan. Here’s how much the company had to invest to upgrade its network to provide that speed: $20 per home passed.

The cable modem needed for that speed costs about $60, compared with about $30 for the current generation.

By contrast, Verizon is spending an average of $817 per home passed to wire neighborhoods for its FiOS fiber optic network and another $716 for equipment and labor in each home that subscribes, according to Sanford C. Bernstein & Company.

Telecommunication Contributions?

[ipv4]

Not sure what your point is or if it even makes any sense??

[RobinSeattle]

In other words, we in the U.S. are getting screwed because the telecoms have such a hold on Congress. I would call that relevant, especially as how Comcast, which has crappy service, is part of the problem, being too inefficient and costly.

[gallimaufry03]

That american companies are ripping off american consumers.

[Antifascist-08]

We were supposed to rewire our internet access over ten years ago. The big companies took the huge tax cuts they got in what was supposed to be in exchange for them "bringing high speed broadband" to the whole country and did nothing for many years. This was the legislation that helped coin the famous bogus quote of Al Gore saying he invented the internet. In the meantime, many Eastern European built networks faster than ours, not to mention Japan and Korea.

They just changed to definition of "broadband to something a little faster than dial-up. This is just one of the many scandals involved in our cable companies. They also spent millions of dollars suing small companies or municipalities for doing what they were supposed to do. They claimed "restraint of trade."

Now we face attacks on Internet freedom and control by the cable companies. There are private companies out there, in Sacramento CA for example, that offer up to 100 meg speed right now. The greater part of this country has been duped and ripped off for almost 15 years. Finally they throw us a bone.