Internode first to market with ADSL2+

Stan Beer
Wednesday, 20 April 2005 05:00

IT Industry - Development

Adelaide-based broadband ISP Internode has beaten its rivals to market with the delivery of full production ADSL2+ broadband services. The Internode roll out comes more than 12 months before Telstra's announced kick-off date.

 Internode calls its new service Extreme Broadband claiming peak speeds up to an 24 megabits per second.

Internode has upgraded its current ADSL2 customers to ADSL2+ plans for free. The ADSL2+ plans double the download speed of ADSL2 at the same cost.

To access Internode's Extreme Broadband services, you must be in an Agile Communications ADSL2+ DSLAM coverage area. For the highest possible speeds, you need to use an ADSL2+ capable access device. Internode Extreme Broadband is currently available for customers in Adelaide, Melbourne and several rural South Australian towns. The company has a published schedule to deploy its ADSL2+ services throughout the eastern states in coming months. Details can be found at http://www.agile.com.au/data/service-area.htm.

Internode managing director Simon Hackett said the real win from ADSL2+ was delivering the 'triple play' of Internet, voice and video. 'With ADSL2+, you can run two high definition video channels and still have 10 megs left over for blisteringly fast Internet access,' he said. 'Our network is built to handle these amazing speeds. We run our own fibre to the exchange. We're launching our NodePhone Voice over Broadband service in May and we'll launch video services after that. ADSL2+ was the last network enhancement needed to make that triple play possible.'

In early March, Internode became the first broadband services provider in Australia to offer full production ADSL2 broadband services, capable of download speeds as fast as 12 Mbps. Internode's entry-level Extreme Broadband services for home customers start from $59.95 with a 15GB download quota. The $79.95 HOME Extreme-Pro service has a 30GB quota. For $119, the quota is lifted to 60GB. SOHO ADSL2 services start at $99.95 with a 30GB quota while for $139.95, there is no download restriction.

Internode has also extended its Tier 1 broadband network to the west coast of the US to ensure its ADSL2+ customers encounter no bottlenecks. The company has established fully redundant connections between two data centres in Sydney and facilities in San Francisco and Los Angeles.