WORK STOPPED
CableModems.com
NTL offered Cable Modems in the UK
Well, Broadband Bob has a decent site, slanted as much towards cable modems as this is towards DSL. According to the man himself:
For extensive market information on the cable industry [ www.catv.org ] CATV CyberLab was the place to go. Redirects now to [www.iptelephony.org ]
News from 1999
NTL LAUNCHES FASTEST INTERNET ACCESS IN THE UK -
NTL, one of the UK's leading communications companies, today launches NTL HiSpeed Internet,
a pioneering new internet service which harnesses NTL's broadband cable network to a new 3Com
cable modem - to offer internet access at up to four times the speed of the fastest service currently
available.
3Com cable modem £149.99 3Com cable modem plus 3Com Ethernet card £169.99 3Com cable modem plus
3Com Ethernet card plus installation £199.99 £40 per month flat rate plus £8.87 for telephone line
rental plus internet access.
NTL HiSpeed Internet launches in Guildford on 4th May 1999 and then rolls out across the NTL CableTel
regions throughout the summer.
Cable Modems FAQ's: How fast will the service be?
This depends upon the level of the traffic on the cable network at one time, but we will be able to offer speeds of up to 512Kbps. We will also address some of the delays incurred when trying to access sites on the other side of the world by having caching servers in our network
behind the cable modem access point.
Is high speed the only benefit I will get from NTL’s Cable Modem service
January 25, 1999: Microsoft invests $500M in NTL
Companies to jointly develop advanced Internet, telephone and cable TV services in the U.K. and Ireland.
Thursday, April 29, 1999 : Casema selected COM21 for cable modem pilot
Europe's leading cable modem supplier, today announced that Casema Kabeltelevisie N.V., the largest cable operator in The Netherlands, will begin a multi-phase cable and voice modem pilot using Com21's ComPORT(R) cable modems for high-speed Internet access over cable...
March 1999
Cable modems? Indeed only three companies were approved, but bear in mind that
lack of standardization does not seem to stop @Home and others to have deployed
some 600,000 modems.
I can't remember which posting I got the following (1999) story from so apologies to the author, but I've left it is for posterity.
(This continues to kill me. We see it over and over and over again. When will AtHome and Comcast wake up?)
Internet subscribers angry over accusations of cable theft REDWOOD CITY, Calif. (AP) -- Getting high-speed access to the Internet through a cable modem can be hazardous, according to some Comcast customers who have found themselves accused of stealing cable TV service as well. A Maryland woman was even charged with cable fraud after discovering that she was mistakenly provided with free cable TV service when the cable modem she got through AtHome Corp. and Comcast Cablevision was installed.
Comcast also accused a New Jersey customer of stealing the cable TV access even though he also told Comcast that he hadn't ordered it.
Comcast and the Redwood City-based AtHome company did not immediately return calls seeking comment Wednesday. But Richard Rasmus, vice president for Comcast Online in Philadelphia, told the San Francisco Chronicle that such problems are isolated.
Computer scientist Judy Sammel of Baltimore was charged with four fraud counts, punishable by up to two years in jail, eight months after she warned Comcast that she was getting TV she hadn't ordered.
AtHome Corp. was not involved in pressing the charges, which Rasmus blamed on different billing systems used by Comcast's cable and online businesses.
"She was in an unfortunate situation where the planets aligned and everything that could go wrong, did go wrong," he said.
Ms. Sammel finally got the charges dropped after threatening a lawsuit of her own, but still has a temporary mark on her record indicating she was charged with a crime.
A cable modem allows users to connect to the Internet via cable TV lines at speeds up to 100 times faster than traditional dial-up modems. AtHome provides the cable modem service through agreements with various cable providers around the country.
While the AtHome service uses a cable TV wire as its "pipeline" to the home, a customer does not need to get cable TV service to be an AtHome subscriber. Cable subscribers pay an extra $40 a month for the AtHome service. People who don't subscribe to cable, like Sammel, usually pay $50 a month for AtHome.
Steve Susman, a Comcast/AtHome customer in New Jersey, said he had his cable modem service disconnected three times by Comcast cable workers who noticed the cable line going to his house and said he didn't show up as a Comcast subscriber.
"The day of the third disconnect, my service was reconnected by AtHome, and that night, a Comcast representative showed up at my house remarking, "I see you hooked your cable up again. Do you really want to go to jail?"' Susman said.
Rasmus said the company is merging the two billing systems so the problems don't continue.
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