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Bright House Announces Very Limited Deployment of 1 Gbps Fiber

Joining the race established by Google Fiber and a few key municipal broadband providers, Bright House Communications now says they too will start offering 1 Gbps connections to select Florida customers sometime this year. According to a Bright House announcement (pdf), Bright House is working with Metro Development Group to deploy 1 Gbps service to very select MDS housing developments.

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In addition to 1 Gbps broadband, these homes will also feature pre-wired "advanced home automation and security services."

The joint project will be dubbed Ultra-Fi. The announcement itself doesn't specify, though the companies tell me this should involve roughly 6,000 MDG homes, most of which aren't currently built.

The media attention received by Google Fiber has resulted in an industry phenomenon I affectionately call "fiber to the press release," where limited deployments of 1 Gbps speeds (usually to high end developments) are dressed up to appear larger than they actually are for maximum media impact.

There's no indication thus far that this fiber-fed EPON-based 1 Gbps service will be coming to any of Bright House's 2.4 million coaxial-based subscribers in Florida, California, Indiana, Alabama and Michigan anytime soon.

The first available Ultra-Fi homes should be livable sometime this summer, with the entire project taking about three years to complete.
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mixdup
join:2003-06-28
Alpharetta, GA

mixdup

Member

Yawn

So in other words, the developer is paying for the fiber connections that you could get as a business for their residents. Wonder how much it will actually cost, and what the rent will be in these developments.

ptrowski
Got Helix?
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join:2005-03-14
Woodstock, CT

ptrowski

Premium Member

Re: Yawn

A wise developer would pay for it as to use it as a selling point. You say it like that is a bad thing.

mixdup
join:2003-06-28
Alpharetta, GA

mixdup

Member

Re: Yawn

said by ptrowski:

A wise developer would pay for it as to use it as a selling point. You say it like that is a bad thing.

It's not a bad thing, but it's not a good thing either. This isn't BHN saying "hey, we're going to start (slowly) building out FTTH", it's simply a developer buying a very high speed connection for their residents. They could have easily bought this from tw telecom or AT&T or anyone else who does business internet connections.

ptrowski
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join:2005-03-14
Woodstock, CT

ptrowski

Premium Member

Re: Yawn

said by mixdup:

said by ptrowski:

A wise developer would pay for it as to use it as a selling point. You say it like that is a bad thing.

It's not a bad thing, but it's not a good thing either. This isn't BHN saying "hey, we're going to start (slowly) building out FTTH", it's simply a developer buying a very high speed connection for their residents. They could have easily bought this from tw telecom or AT&T or anyone else who does business internet connections.

You can't please everyone I guess.
iansltx
join:2007-02-19
Austin, TX

iansltx to mixdup

Member

to mixdup
It's a new infrastructure build. The cost to BH is minimal over coax, so why not build in FTTH?

For the automation features, more expensive appliances are needed, so that'll affect rent. But the rest of the package will probably be standard-priced.
amungus
Premium Member
join:2004-11-26
America

amungus

Premium Member

Stop it with the "-fi" stuff

"Hi-fi" made sense. It stood for "high fidelity" in reference (usually) to audio.
Wi-fi is fun. It's can also make a roundabout kind of sense, as you can stream "high fidelity" audio wirelessly (one of the great applications of it). But seriously, marketing people. Please stop it with the "fi" added to anything and everything. There is no "fidelity" concerning internet service.

Definition of "Fidelity" from: »dictionary.reference.com ··· fidelity

fidelity
Use Fidelity in a sentence
fidelity
[fi-del-i-tee, fahy-]
noun, plural fidelities.
1.
strict observance of promises, duties, etc.: a servant's fidelity.
2.
loyalty: fidelity to one's country.
3.
conjugal faithfulness.
4.
adherence to fact or detail.
5.
accuracy; exactness: The speech was transcribed with great fidelity.


telijah
Premium Member
join:2013-04-22
Brandon, FL

telijah

Premium Member

Re: Stop it with the "-fi" stuff

How long are people going to mistakenly think it was Interbrand's intention of WiFi being short for Wireless Fidelity...

voipguy
join:2006-05-31
Forest Hills, NY

voipguy to amungus

Member

to amungus
"Wifi" may have originated as "Wireless Phy(sical)", as in the "phy" layer of the OSI stack.
silbaco
Premium Member
join:2009-08-03
USA

silbaco

Premium Member

EPON

EPON? Don't see that very often in the US. I wonder why they opted to go for that over Active Ethernet.

whfsdude
Premium Member
join:2003-04-05
Washington, DC

whfsdude

Premium Member

Re: EPON

said by silbaco:

EPON? Don't see that very often in the US. I wonder why they opted to go for that over Active Ethernet.

Because they are a cable company. Active ethernet seems to only be really popular with telcos.

My guess is they are using their metro ethernet infrastructure and it will only be available in new developments/new construction.

The question is, will they even bother with coax in the plant for those who don't signup for the 1 gig tier?
Joe12345678
join:2003-07-22
Des Plaines, IL

Joe12345678

Member

Re: EPON

don't the cable boxes need coax? and Bright house is big with sdv loaded with alts in HD and out of market HD. How well will SDV work over some kind of IP TV system? Or even some thing like fios?
yyzlhr
join:2012-09-03
Scarborough, ON

yyzlhr

Member

Re: EPON

They will likely install an ONU that converts converts the signal to coax for television service.
buckweet1980
join:2011-12-31
Saint Petersburg, FL

buckweet1980 to silbaco

Member

to silbaco
Mainly its because they don't want to put electronic components out in the field, except at the CO and the customer prem.. The only thing needed in the field for PON are optical splitters and cabling, which are all passive.
tmc8080
join:2004-04-24
Brooklyn, NY

tmc8080

Member

stick it to Verizon

I hope some of these geographies overlap with Verizon... so they'll be forced to get their rear in gear... so far, nada for about TWO YEARS!!

Astyanax
Premium Member
join:2002-11-14
Melbourne, FL

Astyanax

Premium Member

Show Me the Money!

Ok, how much per month? That's the $100/month question.

rebus9
join:2002-03-26
Tampa Bay

rebus9

Member

Meh....

I'd be happy with more competitive pricing on their higher tiers. And they REALLY need to increase the upstreams speeds. Our office with 100/10 service frequently suffers on only 10 Mbps upstream, which is the highest biz class tier BH sells. (50+ employees on-site, VOIP phones, and 3 meeting rooms with videoconferencing units that get used frequently. We really need at least 20 Mbps upstream to adequately handle our peak loads.)

To Brighthouse's credit, their biz-class support is fantastic. (I have more than a dozen locations on biz class so that is my primary experience.) Biz class phone reps are friendly, empowered, and there's almost never a wait to speak to a live human. Their biz-class field techs always go the extra mile for us, and genuinely seem to care about their workmanship.

A+++ for support, but pricing is BLAH for the speeds offered.

I sure hope their "competitive" gigabit service will spark an upward performance trend on their coax service-- sooner rather than later.