New modem will speed up Internet access
October 4, 1996
Web posted at: 6:20 p.m. EDT
ATLANTA (CNN) -- Home Internet users frustrated with the slow
speed on the information superhighway may be in luck. A new
type of modem technology is turbocharging access to the
Internet and World Wide Web by using an ordinary phone line.
The modem created by Alcatel Telecom, a French-owned company,
can download information at 4 million bits per second, more
than 100 times faster than the current 28,000 bits-per-second
standard for home computer modems. The company says its
equipment is also significantly faster than other new types
of lines like ISDN and much-hyped cable TV modems.
The cost of the modem service to users could be as low as $50
per month, including a regular phone line, Alcatel says.
Alcatel's modem is the size of a CD player and uses two types
of technology: Asymmetrical Digital Subscriber Line, ADSL,
and Asychronous Transfer Mode, ATM, which together divide
copper phone lines in two, providing a path for on-line
connections while retaining room for simple phone calls.
The split also ends one of the top complaints of on-line
users -- slow access to the Web and Internet -- by opening
lanes and tremendously increasing surfing speed. Downloading
pictures can be done in seconds, and video and film clips,
which are notoriously time-consuming to download, can be
accessed in minutes, Alcatel officials say.
Alcatel says regional phone companies are jumping at the
opportunity. It requires a file cabinet-sized box of
switching equipment and servers installed at each phone
company. Commercial trials of the super-modems are expected
to begin by the middle of next year, with full-scale consumer
testing by the end of 1997.
CNN'S Brian Nelson contributed to this report.
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