Verizon reveals FiOS Quantum with speeds up 300Mbps
updated 08:10 am EDT, Mon June 18, 2012
Verizon FiOS Quantum offers even faster connections
Verizon has revealed its latest high-speed Internet service, FiOS Quantum. The latest update to the service offers users on the top plan or service speeds of up to 300Mbps down and 65Mbps up. On a two-year contract, the price for FiOS Quantum is $205 a month, or $210 without a contract for what Verizon is calling the ‘the fastest mass scale residential service in the US.’
According to Verizon, users on the top plan can download a 2-hour long high definition movie in just 2.2 minutes. Its fiber optic connection allows up to 14 devices in one household to share the connection. Users choosing the 150/65 plan will still be able to download the same 2-hour high-def movie in 4.4 minutes, while users on the 75/35 service ($145/month) will get it in 8.9 minutes. Users on the entry 50/25 service ($120/month) will have downloaded the movie in 13.3 minutes.
Some early adopters of the original fiber optic service will need to have their hardware upgraded, while others may end up paying more for their current plan without any speed boost. For example, users on a 15/5 service will now pay $10 a month more without any benefit in a move no doubt designed to encourage customers on to the next tier.
Junior Member
Joined: Jul 2006
Pay to play
This won't do me or my neighbors any good. Verizon has FiOS service a few miles north of me on the very street on which I live, but Seattle's politicians aren't going to let it move into my neighborhood. It'd compete with their great darling, Comcast. So our only alternative to Comcast are:
* Century Link DSL, whose data rates are grossly overpriced unless paired with a equally overpriced phone plan most of us don't need or want. As I told one of their sales reps, their business model seems deliberately intended to fail.
Clearwire, whose cellular like wireless system chokes when more a few people are using it at the same time. Their tower for this part of Seattle is just across the street from me, so I've thought of taking advantage of that, since my signal would stomp of that of anyone else. But that'd be behaving like a jerk.
It's not the technology that's creating access problems. It's a crony capitalism that creates cozy little deals to enrich the few that buy off politicians. It's pay to play.
Verizon's pricey but speedy scheme seems to make little sense of a single household, but it'd make a lot of sense either for an apartment building or for all the houses on a block. Splitting the cost ten ways would cost each household only about $20 a month.