New AT&T VoIP Service Coming Soon

I was thinking about getting Uverse (or at least price comparison), and the local AT&T store reps told me that its POTS or no POTS, and they never heard of CallVantage. POTS phone makes U-Verse too expensive ($39.99 + $4.95 Canada = $57/month after unfees). CallVantage is $25/month.
I can only hope that AT&T doesn't do the TimeWarner/Comcast style and charge $40/month for their 'new' VoIP service

The "AT&T don't say anything bad about us Triple/Quadruple Play"!

Wonder if you'd get hung up on if you complained about your DSL or U-verse service over your Cell or VoIP as a TOS violation?

Maybe ATT was just taking the idea from Sprint ( excessive complaints to Sprint would get you disconnected). But you live in BI, can you honestly see a quality VoiP service from ATT?

By the way, Sorry that we in Beverly stole Calabria from you!!!

Oh, please. These guys are just beating around. Bundle CV with DSL and Uverse and be done with it.

I've had flawless performance with CV. Although, I have cable at 8/768. Still you should get great quality with 5.5/1000 that Uverse and the various DSL packages delivers.

5.5Mbps/768k is not needed to get great quality VoIP. Heck, even a 128k/128k is more than adequate for it!. VoIP generally requires around 70k for a good, clear call. Some cheap providers compress this (and you can tell) to around half of that, and thats how people can use VoIP with dial up. ANY solid connection above around 100k (both ways) will give you quality VoIP.

I, for one, only want POTS and fast Internet access.

Then you have to go for plain DSL and POTS.

He said fast Internet.

In my area, AT&T DSL is 768kbps in/384kbps out maximum. (DSL distance limitations.) I had "8mbit/s" Comcast, which often burst to over 20mbit/s download and it would usually eak out between 500kbit/s and 1500kbit/s outbound. Yes, I measured, before, during, and after large FTP, VPN, SSH/SCP, BitTorrent, Gnutella and similar, etc., and experienced pretty much the usual full range of bursting and high use rate limiting, and never dropped below 50KBytes/s outbound and 600KBytes/s inbound (yes you read those right). I would have definately kept it until the "too much use" letter, except my girlfriend complained about all the extra cables (no comm closet here) and I couldn't afford it anyway. My DSL at $13/month was still connected to my lifeline POTS anyway because of a darned AT&T-required ISP contract so that was cool.

True, in my other house I had DSL 6mbit/s inbound and 768kbps outbound, and only cancelled that because of budget. That cost more than my faster cable modem in my house that only gets fast cable modem (no fast DSL) by about $40 a month, but its terms of service were way better (static IP#s, etc.) so it was actually better for my needs.

The above poster could try out POTS and "cable modem" (RG6 DOCSIS modem) depending on their definition of "fast" and "Internet", and depending on those definitions, it would either be cheaper or more expensive, and better or worse.

A new line on your bill "Non-qualifying Bundle recovery cost fee $5"

Except they don't call it that.

Once, I used to be in an Insight service area, and I did use cable Internet through them. However, I didn't subscribe to their cable TV, since I'm one of those people who don't watch TV. I remember that if I had subscribed to cable TV as well I would've gotten a $5 "discount" on the cable TV package.

they're worried about everything "old" when it comes to this..but when it comes to uverse itself..what the heck.
Let's give it to them via their old copper instead of doing it the RIGHT WAY..

AKA..FTTH.

AT&T..when the he** will you ever learn that this time around..it will just PAY to do it the RIGHT way the FIRST time?

At some point in the life of everything, it simply pays to replace it with the latest and greatest instead of all this beating around the bush band aide fixes you're trying to apply to it to freaking save a buck.

MR AT&T CEO..
STEP UP TO THE PLATE.

TELL YOUR SHAREHOLDERS YOU ARE A LEADER>>AND NOT A FOLLOWER.

Tell them that you MUST proceed now with doing this job the RIGHT way.

Or cable Docsis 3.0 is going to kick your ever loving A$$ to the Stratosphere!

IT IS COMING AT&T. THE CABLE MONSTER IS COMING.

COMCAST CEO ROBERTS ALREADY DEMO'D IT..
150 to 200MB CABLE HSI.

It will NOT take them long..nor all that much money to do this.

They are taking ALL your phone customers as it is..and you will have NOTHING to compete with this.

They are going to triple play you right into the business failures of the century history books.

Verizon ALREADY knows this!
And is doing the right thing.

Why not join them?

Before it is..

just too damn late.

I don't think they really care.
They've committed (and deployed) VRADs.
At some point, the last mile will be replaced with FTTH or other technology.

The other reason that it hasn't really concerned them:

»Comcast Houston Hikes Broken Down [28] comments

Why should they join them on the price hikes ?
Why should AT&T be pushing for +200Mbps to the home ?

Since this service (Uverse) is based primarily on TV service (I.e. its a requirement for Uverse), they NEED to make sure that they can drive multiple HD streams. This will cause more issues to Uverse deployment than not having +6Mbps service, IMO.

delaying the inevitable fiber system = dangerous business.

i guess they know what their doing though, huh?

It would be the 'last mile'. There are few FTTH buildouts on new housing builds. This is their gamble.
On the good: millions can be passed in relatively short time period
On the bad: its not the end product that AT&T should be delivering - requirements such as multiple set HD, higher bandwidth _should_ be on AT&T's goal list (wether or not they sell it).

Management will have to deal with this.
Costs are already starting to come down.
»gigaom.com/2007/10/01/ma ··· cheaper/

Verizon has a much smaller physical coverage area, and typically serves higher density markets (east coast) vs. AT&T's typically midwest/south/west coast regions. What is feasible in one area, is not always feasible in another.

yes, but the last mile is the freakin' problem! that means connecting every home and wiring every dwelling to the new system.

Why do you think they have opted to use existing twisted pair.
Until they can do it at a more reasonable cost, they have brought fiber closer to be able to deliver the _basics_ over existing copper.

I couldn't disagree with you more. Despite what they've committed to, I'd suspect that a uverse adoption rate of 100k customers per 2.5 million homes passed so far has them tossing and turning bigtime at night these days.

Whether they continue to add some to that or not isn't the point. The point is that for this next generation service to have such a dismal showing so far doesn't bode well for the future at all IMO.

What about when they hit 18 million homes passed?
Does the 100k number simply become 700k people instead?

That barely covers 2 quarters of their loss of landline customers..never mind anything else.
Uverse will be the biggest flop they've ever seen if that is the case.

I think you miss a real key point with your postion.
It is NOT easy for any company to move into another ones territory..especially when they're as long term and entrenched as they have been for decades.
It's not easy for Comcast to take voice customers..nor the telco's to acquire video customers.

If you are going to do it..and if you're going to even try..you'd better be armed with something that is really new and revolutionary.

Are you aware that AT&Ts subsidiary..formerly known as Ameritech..DID try to enter the tv business?

In fact, they did it with cable lines even.

For all intents and purposes..it was a flop..and only revived because WOW took it over.

But now, they'd like to not only get in the tv business..but the HDTV one at that. PLUS compete on the HSI front..PLUS compete on the Voip front apparently..as of today anyway.

They are going off to an ENORMOUS battle with no weapons at all if they stay on this copper course..and are going to lose that battle BIG TIME.

What you and others seem to keep proposing is that..at some point..they will go with FTTH.
My point is that they need to do it ...NOW.
Because there might not be time later on.

This will take them years to complete. It's a longer term strategy..not one that you decide overnight you just want to be in..when it's too late.

And, IMHO..they do themselves even MORE harm by continuing to try to modify and change things around.
The way to do this is NOT to put up hundreds of VRADS in an area..with the intention of taking them down if it doesn't work out. And, what Uverse is today is what is going to stick with people..in their minds..for a very long time.
It will make another transition very hard to accomplish because once people have shopped your service..it's tough to get them back for another look.

Obviously this has been well thought out by Verizon. And..they saw it this way.

Who's right and who's wrong?
It sure looks like they are on the right track to me..while AT&T is heading over a cliff.

FWIW..i also think that AT&T WILL go with FTTH.
It's not a matter of if..but when.

I'd find it really hard to believe that they're going to find these numbers acceptable for too much longer.
Imagine being their CEO..running a company with that many customers..and seeing these reports rolling in after all this time.

It would be suicidal to stay on this course.

100k customers is NOTHING to AT&T..compared to their size now.

Nothing at all.

Uverse..is a flop.

Sorry to have to be the bearer of the bad news.

It was easy for Comcast and Vonage to take telco customer... why ?

Lets see: POTS unlimited (in L.A.): $39.99 + $4.95 (Canada) = $57/month including 'unfees'

Vonage: $24.95
Comcast Voice: $45/month

As I've said many times... people do NOT want to pay for something they can get for a lower price.

I might try out Uverse once my DirecTv and DSL Extreme contract is up to cut costs (i.e. POTS).
Since I've had coworkers here in Valencia that have had (and still have) issues with their HD service on Cable since the Comcast/TW migration, I have no real interest, unless their service is at a better price point than the competition.

Wether its twisted pair copper, RG59, wireless (WiMAX, HSDPA, EVDO), smoke signals, I do not care, as long as the service does the following:

1. Is not overly expensive, or force me to pay for expensive service I don't want or need.
2. Is reliable.
3. Does what I want. TV, Phone, Internet, Wireless phone
4. Doesn't nickel and dime me with BS items such as 'remote fee', 'modem fee', 'outlet charge', 'installation fee', 'USF unfee', 'franchise fee'

What ever happened to RG-6 wiring, you say RG-59?

Well, running RG-59 would be a better solution, and more profitable investment than upgrading their existing (crappy) infrastructure.

Many of my customers use AT&T BUSINESS GRADE DSL.... and to this day, have shitty SNR on the line, intermittent outages, and just a roller coaster download speeds. At least here in Chicago and outlying region....

How many buried cable lines +30 years old are RG6 ?
Inside my house, its primarily RG-6, thanks to DirecTv and their free install service.

One of the major issues with DSL has always been SNR. I could have +4Mbps (sync rate will allow it), however, having SNR a desired stable line has kept me to the 2-2.5Mbps range.

I've had less issues with my DSL than my coworkers on TimeWarner/Comcast.

If I were AT&T, I'd move forward with better codecs now rather than later, since it would solidly position themselves better.

Anyway, even though U-Verse is sucky, they will have lots of ready customers for when they improve last mile with something besides legacy limited copper, so I see that possible strategy of theirs. They just have to succeed upon getting and keeping those ready customers.

They are doing a pretty good job by using the lock-in. It causes the customers to not switch to cable (according to information I got from cable salespeople). But they also do much better on price: they charge much much less with their low end bundles than the cable company. Of course, there are lots of differences between the two: satellite companies are notorious for horrible video bandwidth (really crappy images), and they really suck at bringing you your local channels. But when it comes time to renew, what will the customer do? In my area a lot of people have AT&T DirectTV lockin or Dish! But a lot have cable with cable modem and telephone, too (much lesser amount though).

Talk about using a simplistic forecasting model. Scaling up in a linear fashion is a fairly foolish way to forecast, especially given that data points at a linear forecast being wrong. The number of subscribers added weekly continues to grow at a very fast rate(7000-8000 a week). This quarter they added around 75k new subs, next quarter they will probably add 100k-150k subs. Barrons thinks they will add 750K new subs next year and somehow doubt installs will slow down much going past 2008 for a while.

The overall market penetration number is impossible to derive from current sub count and total passed as there is no data on how long the market has been open to marketing.

I think we would both like seeing what the market penetration is on a sections that have been open for 6 months or more...

Who says cable is going to UTILIZE said docsis 3.0 upgrades? It seems that cable is only "upgrading", raising speeds and rates in areas where telco competition is increasing. Be it Uverse or Fios. How many markets have remained speed/price stagnent or worse? Line share DSL costs have consistently dropped since its inception in my market. Any and all moves cable has made has been in response to telco moves. The recent Hawaii upgrades seem to be an obvious example of telco/cable competition.

To suggest Docsis upgrades are being done out of the kindness of CableCo.'s heart is dumb. These are all competitive moves, obviously. So lets say cable does do their upgrades. And they are always 50% faster speed wise. If they are more expensive, then they are at a disadvantage market wise. If they are same price then advantage cable. Cheaper; cable. If they are the only show in town and they know it....he he he.

FTTP overbuild is definitely expensive. FTTN is a less expensive buildout. But as you mentioned, as the latest and greatest technologies come around, they will be appropriately utilized I'm sure.

Bottom line, something is being done. Open market competition is increasing. That's always a good thing.

A-FUCKIN-MEN to that!

Let's not burst the Comcast shill's bubble by injecting logic into the discussion here.

All DOCSIS 3.0 will mean to end users is hitting those data caps earlier in the month.

And what, pray tell, is DOCSIS 3.0 going to do for the average user? Don't you understand that the VAST majority of internet users don't give a rat's a$$ about 30, 40 or 150MB download speeds? All they care about is that when they click on a link a page comes up in a reasonable time or that when they send or receive an email that it actually goes.

The majority of homes in this country STILL don't have an HDTV much less 2 or more so how many people actually care that they only get one HD stream?

I really don't get all your ranting about the "older technology" twisted copper. Right now the service works as advertised. I get crystal clear video, flawless 6Mb service and never fail telephone. Do I think I need more - NOPE!! I had Comcast and dropped it as soon as I could.

Firmware Upgrades are already being pushed to the RG to enable VoIP:

»www.uverseusers.com/comp ··· c,3273.0
»www.uverseusers.com/comp ··· _updates

just a dog gone second..

Is THIS story saying what I THINK it's saying?

That AT&T plans on having VOIP REPLACE POTS?

»money.cnn.com/news/newsf ··· 9029.htm

I intially read Karl's article to mean THIS voip was going to replace CallVantage.

But in reading the story itself..it sure doesn't sound that way.

Another milestone here is AT&T now apparently saying that VOIP is EVERY BIT AS RELIABLE as Pots?
Is THAT what they're now saying?

And, they'll be bundling ALL this together for 99.00 bucks a month?

Jeesh..they're starting to sound just like they'd like to be Comcast.

AT&T, here's some real bad news for you though. People don't want it via those old copper lines either.
In fact, way too much about what comprises your company is just way too old for todays standards.

Now, you want to be in the HDTV business.voip..HSI...you need the lines to carry it all properly to the consumers.

Or, they're going to choose the cable co's.

To give you credit..you ARE on track with the VOIP but he**..any first grade BBR member could have told you that a year ago.

Pots..is dead? VOIP..Lives?

Say hello to Comcast..TW..and the other cable co's.

They're coming for you.

They may be coming for you, but in Putnam the big cable guys aren't available, so I would love to see U-Verse in our area.

Rick, don't you mean YOU don't want it over old copper lines. The majority of customers won't care what "pipe" it's over as long as it's reliable and priced decently. Comcast (at least for me) was very UNRELIABLE and WAY over priced. I'm eagerly awaiting U-Verse deployment in my area, and I could care less what type of cable it comes to my house on...

Yep, plenty cheapskates out there like me.

I pay just under $40/month for POTS & 768KB DSL.

Fine for web surfing, and both POTS and DSL over those "antiquated" copper lines are FAR more reliable than any cable connection.

$8/month for cable, but I'll probably drop that in favor of OTA digital.

I'm busy switching everyone I know from $45/month cable broadband to $10/month 768KB DSL

I'm with you... if I could get decent OTA, I wouldn't have DTV. Now that TimeWarner offers broadcast basic here (Comcast wouldn't ), I might go to TimeWarner... just for cheap TV service.

quote:

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AT&T, here's some real bad news for you though. People don't want it via those old copper lines either.
In fact, way too much about what comprises your company is just way too old for todays standards.

---

And just how many people don't want it over old copper lines ?
I have +30 year old copper (RG59) at my house, by 1 year old POTS wires to the house from the breakout box.

quote:

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Now, you want to be in the HDTV business.voip..HSI...you need the lines to carry it all properly to the consumers.

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I agree on that. Uverse will possibly lose its primary targeted customers (TV). If people can't get what they want on the 'base' package (TV), then there's no Internet or VoIP through Uverse. Basic TV, HSI and VoIP work.. it just isn't the 'high end' product that some will want.

Come on, do you REALLY think people care about what medium they get their dial tone on? Do you think Grandma even KNOWS where dial tone comes from? They pick up the handset and hear a buzz, then they push some buttons and they hear their sister in Peoria. That's it!

this is AT&T's wet dream: switch everyone from pots to voip, keep the bundles to make it seem like it's a sweet deal!

anything to keep the cash-cow pots payments coming in!

What if there is a major power failure?
The pots lines will work for 2+weeks.
How long will VOIP work without power?

The same way that Cable VoIP, Vonage or others work without power... IT DOESN'T.
Unless you have a UPS plugged in, AND the VRAD doesn't lose power, you'd better have a cell phone around.

Supposedly AT&T will be offering a battery backup. I would imagine this gives something like a day or two of backup for the phone and internet depending on usage. The VRADs should have better backups, as long as they don't explode . I have no idea if this backup will cost extra.

what about the fact that AT&T just told all their techs and managers that if they dont take a "premise tech" job 1/2 pay cut and no bene's in 2 years they wont have a job? what will customer service be like when the guy who comes to your door is making 1/2 what he used to make. I smell a strike, i alsp smell some seriously disgruntled employees!

LOL- Where'd you get that from?

I was concerned though until I saw the "Planned to shut down old network in the long run."

Everything else is going digital, I see no reason why POTS can't. I just hope they'll be able to work on the 9-1-1 bugs beforehand. Of course something like this probably won't happen until AT&T's network is completely upgraded to U-Verse. If they find a way to at least get DSL to unlit areas, maybe they can beforehand, that'd be the only other way IMHO.

Quoted from the corresponding CNN article:

"In the long run, AT&T plans on [completely] shutting down it's old voice network."

We've had DirecWay/HughesNet service for about 2 years now...about every month for that two years I've checked availability of AT&T Yahoo! DSL. I called one time and I was told that the only way I could possibly get DSL is if fiber was laid in my direction from the CO.

Well, a WISP has come my direction. I'll be getting that soon, and we'll be getting a VoIP line. (I've been looking at Vonage.) It would seem AT&T has put absolutely no thought to it's loyal rural customers...ATT over POTS has been quite reliable here.

I think I'll be sending some letters to AT&T corporate about this. See what they have to think about it...

I thought American Thieves & Thugs (at&t) said that there were reasons why you HAD to have a POTS line with any DSL service.. I thought they claimed technical reasons why they couldn't sell DSL with out dial tone.. I thought that no one would want it..

Ironic how they can slam in their pennies-on-the-dollar VoIP service, charge a premium price for it, bundle it, and call it "a value" to the customer when it's convenient for them!

Now they claim that CV "struggles with capacity issues"... WTF?! IT'S THEIR PRODUCT! I guess they are too incompetent to expand it? .. and somehow they will magically come up with another service that won't have the same issues? If they can offer their new service with out "capacity issues" then why can't they improve CV at the same time?

I love when the truth comes out and they are caught with their hands in the cookie jar.

This has GOT to be THE-WORST-COMPANY in the history of the United States. No, wait.. that award still goes to the Federal Government.

(Disclaimer: I can trash AT&T all day long because *I* personally will NEVER have their product of ANY kind in my home ever again.. I've been AT&T free since 2000.)

Any phone phan-bois out there STILL loving their AT&T?

Are they smoking CRACK!?!?!?

Give up collecting (and earing interest on) taxes, fees, because we told you to pay more's, and surcharges???????

Gawd damit! The telcos have WON, raise the white flag!
The cable companies surrender

/Sarcasm

The day when AT&T totally gives up POTS for VoIP is a long, long way off. So no need to start getting all wound up about it.

When that day arrives, it's obvious they'll support their customers that use their telephone service (POTS) alone. Such customers will still just have telephones, but obviously the calls will be handled differently. I can't see them requiring an internet bundle for that. I think they're restrained from even doing that, with the universal telephone service requirements.

This is good news for both consumer and investor. I never bought the argument that POTS was the only revenue model for AT&T. It took almost 30 years, but I think they now have a CEO who is willing to make the necessary changes to keep their company competitive.