50 Mbps Symmetrical Access From SureWest

SureWest Comms. soon will offer a 50 Mbps Internet access service (up and down!) for residential customers with access to the company's FTTH network. The company has been selling 10 Mbps and 20 Mbps symmetrical services for some time. SureWest is bundling the 50 Mbps offering in its newly-created “Ultimate” quadruple play package, which includes the 50 Mbps access service; a 250-channel digital TV service; National Unlimited local and long distance telephone; and Unlimited wireless with 1,000 travel minutes each month. The package costs $415.18 a month. If it were offered on a stand-alone basis, SureWest says the 50 Mbps service would be valued at $259.95 per month.

So think about it this way: A DS3 service should cost less than $300! And we can only hope that Verizon is able to stick to, or increase, its own FTTH deployment. Not that all that many residential customers need symmetrical 50 Mbps access today, at least not for any purpose within the scope of "acceptable use" policies. The problem is that at such rates, about the only application that really benefits is hosting of video servers inside the home. And that typically falls outside a service provider's notion of acceptable use. Still, it's an awesome advance in access bandwidth.