Cablevision Goes for Speed

In an effort to attract high-speed Internet customers, Cablevision Systems Corporation has announced a significant speed upgrade for its entire Optimum Online customer base. In addition, the company has added a new premium package - Optimum Online Boost, which allows customers to surf the Web even faster. A unique approach in the ever-growing high-speed Internet rivalry, the company has chosen to upgrade their service package rather than slash prices, as some of their competitors have done.

In a press release issued by Cablevision last week, Patricia Gottesman, Cablevision’s executive vice president of product management and marketing stated “This is a significant moment for the company and for our customers, because we are building on our leadership position in high-speed Internet by delivering a very meaningful speed increase to all customers at no additional cost.”

What the Speed Increase Entails for Optimum Online Customers

All of Cablevision’s Optimum Online customers will benefit from the speed upgrade. Core service customers will now be able to download information off the Internet at 15 megabits a second, up from 10 Mbps. The upload speed has doubled from 1 Mbps to 2 Mbps. This Internet speed increase is at no additional charge to the customer.

For customers looking for even faster Internet speeds, Cablevision is now offering Optimum Online Boost to its entire market of 4.5 million homes and hundreds of thousands of businesses. With this increase, customers can surf the Web at 30 Mbps, a speed that is 39 times faster than DSL service offered by many phone companies. Other features include, up to 15 e-mail addresses with 1 gigabyte of storage per address, Web hosting capabilities, with tools that enable customers to build and maintain their own Web sites, and advanced configuration that include DDN, Port 25, and Port 80.

Optimum Online Boost is available for an additional cost of $14.95 per month, $9.95 per month for residential customers who also subscribe to Optimum Voice – the company’s home phone service.

Other Cablevision Services

In addition to upgrading its high-speed Internet options, Cablevision is exploring the possibility of linking its Internet phone service with a wireless carrier. This would allow customers to transfer wireless calls to their home phones and possibly allow businesses to transfer wireless calls to a main switchboard, virtually eliminating the need for office landlines. A time frame for this project has yet to be established, and the company has not chosen a wireless carrier at this time.