RSSAT&T will add more HD content to U-verse
By Tim Conneally | Published December 17, 2007, 5:50 PM
AT&T announced today that its U-verse TV package will include eight more high definition channels, bringing the service a total of 40 HD channels.
The rollout of U-verse appears to be gaining some momentum after a period of what some would call clumsiness and lackluster uptake, especially when compared with Verizon's FiOS. AT&T re-affirmed its commitment to the all-in-one (internet, cable, phone) service last week, saying it anticipated one million subscribers by the end of 2007.
Perhaps to entice reluctant potential subscribers before the end of the year, AT&T has claimed it now has more HD channels than its market competitors. The new additions include: Animal Planet HD, CNN HD, Discovery HD, Science Channel HD, Starz Kids & Family HD, Superstation WGN HD, TLC HD, Versus HD, and Golf Channel HD.
To add these 40 HD channels, an existing subscriber must pay an additional $10 monthly fee to his U-verse programming packages, which already include the HD-ready equipment and DVR. Base costs for U-verse TV range from $59 to $114 per month without additional options.
When compared to FiOS HD service, which currently includes half the channels for the same price, AT&T's U-verse may at last prove attractive.
AT&T currently provides U-verse service in San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, Santa Clara, Riverside, and Orange County California, Indianapolis, Detroit, Kansas City, Cleveland, Oklahoma City, Milwaukee, Austin, Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, and Fairfield County, Connecticut.
I wonder how many realize the close ties there are between U-Verse and the cable company?
There are other areas but the wires in the home for U-Verse to work IS coax, just like the cable co. Infact, U-Verse installers will use the very same coax that was formerly for cable. Many of the problems people have with cable is due to the in-home cables and the splitters on those cables. This means that for U-Verse to work properly, these problems must be fixed. If these problems are going to get fixed anyway, then there is no "technical" reason to leave cable for U-Verse. It ends up being the same thing. U-Verse uses a special adapter in the telco box outside to connect the telephone lines to coax. My concern becomes engress.
We've all heard static in the telephone. This is usually becuase of a bad connection where the wire gets attached to the screw terminals at any one of the points before it gets to the phone itself. This often happens at the connection point in the box attached to the outside of the house. I wonder how this will affect U-Verse.
There are just several areas of their service I question as to how well it will continue to work over time and how their problems and service call fixes compare to the cable company.
I can understand Customer Service issues, but I question this on a technical level.
Score: 0
|AT&T's U-Verse sounds promising, but the internet speed packages suck!! They should have FiOS speed packages, then they could blow Verizon out of the water. Verizon just plain sucks balls. I know.. They liquidated my job and sent it to India. They call it budget cuts.. I call it f*cking over an American worker.
Score: 0
|They can not do the speed of FiOS since they are not fiber to the door.
Score: 0
|please don't pretend to know what you are talking about.. Fiber to the door and Fiber to the curb is NOT that big of a deal. DOCSIS 2.0 over coax was doing speeds over FiOS before FiOS ever came out of the R&D labs. The fastest FiOS is doing as far as in a package is 50Mbps down and 20Mbps up. They could do 100Mbps on DOCSIS 2.0, but the infrastructure upgrades would be ennormous. AT&T U-Verse is fiber to the curb, then they run coax to the house. You aren't loosing bandwidth over a couple hundred feet of coax. wait til DOCSIS 3.0 comes out and see how it whips FiOS ass.. I'm all for Verizon getting their a** handed to them. They are SH*T!!! Verizon has borrowed so much money from failing banks to push FiOS that they are hiding the fact that they are cutting their workforce to save their a$$es...
Score: 0
|"please don't pretend to know what you are talking about.. "
LOL. you obviously have no idea what you are talking about. AT&T does not use _any_ version of DOCSIS. I love clueless people making statements that are totally inaccurate.
AT&T deploys DSL, namely VDSL for the "last mile".
"They could do 100Mbps on DOCSIS 2.0, but the infrastructure upgrades would be ennormous."
Again, you have no clue what you are talking about. DOCSIS 2.0 tops out at ~38Mb/s download. DOCSIS 3.0 will allow for up to ~152MB/s as it bonds more channels.
"AT&T U-Verse is fiber to the curb, then they run coax to the house."
Again you are wrong. U-Verse is fiber to the node. that node then runs over the copper phone lines to your house. AT&T is taking the cheap route versus Verizon running fiber to your house with FiOS.
"wait til DOCSIS 3.0 comes out and see how it whips FiOS ass.."
LOL. Again, you have no clue. Verizon FiOS can easily top 152Mb/s download speeds; it is fiber to your house. And best of all, it is dedicated to you, not share by all your neighbors like DOCSIS based cable deployments.
Score: 0
|It's nice to see correct information come out one way or another. I've been digging around trying to find out more and what I've discovered thus far corroborates with what you've said.
I found these two resources the most helpful:
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/uverse
http://www.uverseusers.com/
Score: 0
|Gotta love competition, the consumer wins. I've got Comcast by the balls right now as I'm ready to ditch them for Dish Network. Too bad AT&T doesn't provide TV in my area, I'd take a look at them. Just Comcast, Dish Network, DirecTV and FiOS here.
Score: 0
|