High-speed Net link comes with hefty price

By Richard Braddell

WELLINGTON - On the face of it, Telecom's new Jetstream internet delivery service is going to be too expensive for the average household, with its $300 connection charge and $450 for a modem enough on their own to discourage many.

Modems can be hired for $30 a month. But combined with ongoing charges of $69 a month on Telecom's cheapest usage plan, plus internet service provider charges on top, of perhaps $20 a month, Jetstream positions itself firmly at the premium end of the market.

However, blistering speeds capable of supporting top quality multimedia ensure that it is an offering that many small businesses, teleworkers and internet addicts will be hard pressed to overlook.

Launched two weeks ago, Jetstream is the brandname applied to the long-awaited commercial delivery of DSL, a revolutionary technology which Telecom has been testing in Wellington that multiplies the bandwidth capacity of traditional copper wires.

Bandwidth is critical since it defines the size of the "pipes" delivering data. Without DSL, ordinary dial-up internet services are defined by the sluggish response times standard with the 56 kilobytes a second maximum on today's dial-up modems. DSL changes that.

The New Zealand Herald's graphically heavy web front page comes up in a second. And while Radio New Zealand News' delivery begins to falter after a minute or two when received through a standard 56K modem, it has impeccable quality when delivered over Jetstream.

Even so, not everyone will care whether they can download in seconds and play the trailer for the movie Babe while five minutes later a 56K modem is still struggling to get halfway through the download.

Nevertheless, for small businesses, the staff time saved through high-speed internet browsing may more than compensate for Jetstream's higher cost, while architects, for example, wanting to transfer large CAD files to and from clients will simply love it.

Furthermore, the ongoing cost looks less of a burden when it is remembered that the second internet line now commonplace can be dispensed with because Telecom's Jetstream runs quite happily on the same line as is used for voice.

But fast though Jetstream may be, it has its drawbacks. For a start, not everyone will be able to get it. So far only 35 exchanges in Auckland, Wellington, Hamilton, Christchurch and Palmerston North are Jetstream-enabled.

And even then, it will not be available to everyone in those centres. DSL has a limited range. Its high frequency mode of operation that enables it to travel comfortably on the same wires as voice also restricts its range to a maximum of 3.5km from the nearest DSL-enabled telephone exchange.

That rules out service in most rural areas. Furthermore, much will depend on the condition of the copper network between the subscriber and the local exchange.

Some of Jetstream's 350 early adopters have also complained of service problems, a fact conceded by Telecom's communications manager, Glen Sowry, who says technical problems resulted in some instability, but they have been resolved.

So far Jetstream is being provided by three internet service providers, Telecom's Xtra, Paradise and Worldnet.