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DSL upgrade results in outage

March 10, 2000 BY HOWARD WOLINSKY BUSINESS REPORTER

Ameritech Corp.'s efforts to upgrade its high-speed Internet service in anticipation of a major expansion resulted in a two-day service outage for early adopters in the southern and western suburbs.

"It happened with the best of intentions," said Ameritech spokesman Brian Kyhos.

During a low-traffic period early Tuesday, Ameritech technicians began upgrading software to accommodate expected growth of the digital subscriber line service, called DSL. Kyhos said the techs noticed that service was being disrupted in the 708 and 630 area codes.

He said, "The software started to cause routing glitches," affecting the handoff of data between Ameritech Advanced Data Services and the DSL service.

The outage affected about 100 customers, or 10 percent of the customers for the new service in the Chicago area.

The upgrade was halted to prevent the problem from spreading. DSL service was restored at 5:15 a.m. Thursday, Kyhos said.

Though the number of customers affected was small, the outage occurred at a critical time in the roll-out of the new service. SBC Communications Inc., Ameritech's corporate parent as of last year, is spending $6 billion to develop DSL services in competition with cable companies' high-speed modems.

"We're expecting this to be a boom year [for DSL]," Kyhos said.

Residential DSL delivers data up to 50 times faster than conventional modems--and costs $40 to $50 a month.

Kyhos said customers affected by the outage can have their bills adjusted by calling (800) 910-4369.

Ameritech currently is offering a special for DSL installation, waiving the $200 charge for the modem and the $150 for installation.

-- (Dee360Degree@aol.com), March 11, 2000

Answers

..."We're expecting this to be a boom year [for DSL]," Kyhos said.

Residential DSL delivers data up to 50 times faster than conventional modems--and costs $40 to $50 a month.

Absolute rubbish. $40/month gets you only the minimum guaranteed speed of 384Kbps downstream and 128kbps upstream, which ain't hardly 50x a 56K modem. The RBOCs have priced DSL all wrong and the cable companies are currently eating their lunch.

Unless they get with the program, the only "boom" the RBOCs are going to hear is the sound of the door slamming behind all their customers as they leave to go sign up for @Home or Roadrunner.

-- DeeEmBee (macbeth1@pacbell.net), March 12, 2000.