This came in email from our Charter rep and may be of interest to you if you have not already seen this:
Charter Ups Broadband Speeds Again, Bumps Top Tier to 100 Mbps –
DiGeronimo says DSL is Basically Archaic
Original Publication Date: 12/1/2011
Original News Source: Multichannel News
By Todd Spangler — Multichannel News, 12/1/2011 3:00:00 PM
Looking to kick more sand in the face of DSL, Charter Communications is increasing connection speeds of its three top broadband tiers — Express, Plus and Ultra, which will now provide downloads of up to 100 Megabits per second — at no additional cost for subscribers.
The speed boosts are the MSO’s fourth in the last three years. The faster speeds will take effect in markets with DOCSIS 3.0 technology deployed, which represents approximately 95% of Charter’s service area.
“As customers share multiple devices on a single connection, we want to send a very strong message: DSL is basically archaic,” said Rich DiGeronimo, Charter’s senior vice president of product and strategy.
Charter is increasing Internet Express downstream speeds from 12 Mbps to up to 15 Mbps, and increasing upstream speeds from 1 Mbps to up to 3 Mbps. Internet Plus downstream speeds are being increased from 18 Mbps to up to 30 Mbps, and upstream speeds are being increased from 2 Mbps to up to 4 Mbps.
In addition, Charter’s fastest residential offering is increasing from 60 Mbps to 100 Mbps — with Ultra100 providing 100 Mbps downstream and 5 Mbps upstream. Charter’s Internet Lite tier will remain 3 Mbps down.
The midlevel Plus tier, at 30/4, is now faster than the fastest AT&T U-verse Internet service available. Charter’s footprint overlap with AT&T is 60%, although U-verse is not available in all of those areas.
“We believe we have an advantage in this space,” DiGeronimo said. “The thirst for speed is only growing.”
Charter is offering Express for $19.99 per month for 12 months to new customers, Plus for $29.99 per month. Ultra100 is $40 more per month than the Express tier.
“We’re not asking for more money. It’s really about differentiation,” DiGeronimo said. About 90% of Charter’s broadband customers take either Express and Plus service.
Charter’s broadband services are subject to different usage thresholds. Customers with Lite and Express tiers are allotted at 100 Gigabytes of bandwidth usage per month, while those on the Plus and Max services have a threshold of 250 GB per month. The Ultra100 tier will be capped at 500 GB per month; previously, the Ultra60 tier did not have a maximum usage limit. Charter currently does not charge overage fees for those who exceed the thresholds; however, users’ accounts may be suspended for repeated violations.
Charter also is increasing speeds for business customers, bumping up commercial Internet speeds at no cost for two of its most popular services, Charter Business Internet Essentials16 and 25. The speed increase will take place in approximately 95% of Charter’s service areas nationwide.
Specifically, the speed increases are: Internet Essetials16, with download speeds of 16 megabits per second (Mbps) and upload speeds of 2 Mbps, will increase to up to 20 Mbps download and up to 3 Mbps upload; and Internet Essentials25, with download speeds of 25 Mbps and upload speeds of 3 Mbps, will increase to up to 30 Mbps download and up to 4 Mbps upload — which the MSO notes is at least 6 times faster than 5 Mbps DSL service and 20 times faster than T1 lines. Charter’s fastest commercial offerings, Pro50 and Pro100, remain the same, providing up to 50 Mbps download/5 Mbps upload and up to 100 Mbps download/5 Mbps upload, respectively.
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Homeland Secure IT loves Charter! We help Greenville & Upstate South Carolina individuals & businesses get connected with high speed internet all the time and Charter, especially Charter Business, has the highest customer satisfaction of any of the ISPs we work with. If you are feeling the need for speed, email us at info@homelandsecureit.com or call 864.990.4748 and we can assist you in the search for the best service and the best price!
Whatever you do - Don't panic...
You’ve been hearing about it for a while now, but the time is has finally come for the first nationwide Emergency Alert System (EAS) test.
It is scheduled for November 9th, 2011 at 2pm Eastern and will last a few minutes.
You can get the full scoop on this event on the FCC site.
Of course, many conspiracy theorists can give you other reasons for the test, my favorite of which is that the Government is testing their ability to control of all media outlets, even phone lines, cell phones, and the internet itself. (As has been done in other countries).
The following letter comes from Charter, and while their email distribution from them is normally marked with a non-disclosure, this one was specifically authorized FOR distribution:
INTERNAL NEWS ALERT
Re: Charter to Participate in First Ever Nationwide EAS Test
This Wednesday, November 9, 2011 at 2:00pm EST, a nationwide test of the Emergency Alert System (EAS) will be conducted. Similar to local EAS tests conducted on a regular basis in our area, the national test will also include all broadcast TV stations, radio stations and video providers, including cable and satellite operators at the same time. As a result, all Charter systems nationwide will be participating in the test.
However…unlike the local EAS tests that usually last approximately 30 seconds, the nationwide test may last up to three and a half minutes.
This national EAS test will be conducted jointly by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) through its Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) National Weather Service (NWS), the three federal agencies that have EAS management responsibilities.
Although the EAS has been in existence for over 15 years, there has never been an end-to-end, nationwide test of the system. The nationwide test is being conducted to verify the reliability of the EAS system and its effectiveness in alerting the public on a national scale.
The upcoming national test is critical to ensuring that the EAS works as designed. As recent disasters here at home and in Japan have reminded us, a reliable and effective emergency alert and warning system is key to ensuring the public’s safety during times of emergency.
Charter is currently in the process of preparing for the national test on November 9. We are providing a message to our customers in their bill statement (see below), and will utilize Weather Channel crawls, DCT messaging, .com and .net posts and cross channel TV commercials to provide our customers with awareness of the test. We will also be training our customer care team to effectively manage any increase in the number of calls we receive as a result of the test.
OCTOBER CUSTOMER STATEMENT MESSAGE:
The first nationwide test of the U.S. Emergency Alert System will occur at 2:00 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on November 9, 2011, and it will interrupt programming on all channels from all service providers for a few minutes. Visit www.fcc.gov/pshs for more information.
FCC Test My ISP Study
I have been participating in the SamKnows / Test My ISP program that the FCC has undertaken in an effort to better understand what internet providers are offering, and what consumers are ultimately getting.
The first report has been released and it sure doesn’t look good for DSL technology! If you have DSL based internet (AT&T U-Verse included), then you may want to consider cable because you are very likely NOT getting what you are paying for.
The report can be found here http://www.fcc.gov/measuring-broadband-america
The cable providers did well, in many cases providing better service than you are paying for, and Charter Cable held its own. Verizon fiber was the clear winner, give MORE than 100%!
Again, DSL fell flat in throughput, both up and down and latency was so high that it would make using VoIP (Voice over IP), and other packet intensive two-way communication means almost unusable.
If you would like to participate in this study, you can sign up at http://www.SamKnows.com.
How does it work? You will be sent a “whitebox”, which is a little router you replace your current router with, and it does tests throughout the day, measuring upload and download speed, latency, etc. You won’t even know it is there. For the paranoid types, yes, it COULD be sending some of your private data out to some centralized monitoring facility, but, that is highly unlikely. I did some packet captures on mine and didn’t see much data being sent at all.
If you are in the Greenville or Upstate SC area and would like to discuss how your business or even your home can use Charter home or Charter Business to save money and get faster internet speeds, phone and cable TV, then please email us at info@homelandsecureit.com or call 864.990.4748
The FCC wants you to signup to shape the future of broadband in America
The FCC is looking for about 10,000 good men and women to help test their broadband connections in certain markets and from certain providers by installing a piece of equipment to meter the throughput at their home.
If you are interested in participating, you can go to https://www.testmyisp.com/ and fill out the application. You must meet certain requirements, such as having a high speed / broadband connection like cable or DSL from prividers such as Charter, AT&T, Cable One, Cablevision, CenturyLink, Cincinnati Bell, Clearwire, Comcast, Cox, Fairpoint, Frontier, Hughes, Insight, Mediacom, Qwest, RCN, Time Warner Cable (Roadrunner), Verizon, WildBlue/ViaSat, Windstream, or “other”, which will allow you to write in your broadband provider.
Apparently, they will place a simple device onto your LAN, and you must agree to the terms of usage, such as leaving it on 24/7, not trying to reverse engineer the device, etc.
Conspiracy theories are already out there that this device will be doing more than watching your throughput, such as watching your browsing habits. Possible, but unlikely. The company that has partnered with the FCC would probably not want to get that kind of bad press if this were found to be true.
I signed up our home and will let you know if we are selected…
Found out about www.Broadband.gov and tested our speed. Only 21MB down and 1.5MB up. Feeling a little slooooooooooow =)
