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Verizon upgrades IP network in major cities, blames your bandwidth guzzling
Big Red's finding its pipes cluttered with all of the young people's streaming video, audio and cloud services. That's why it's busting out the credit card to order a fresh new 100G IPv6 network for Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York and Seattle. It'll need Cisco's CRS-3 Carrier Routing System to help the network scale to areas of highest demand, but since it's already using CRS-1, it should be a simple matter of swapping out the old kit. FiOS customers will also see network improvements when the upgrade is finished in the first half of next year, just be on the look out for repairmen huddling 'round your nearest junction box.
Comcast testing pay-per-package, still afraid of a-la-carte
Charleston, South Carolina might be famous for the eponymous knee / hand dance, but this week sees it become the second location in the US to get Comcast's MyTV Choice. Rather than buying all the channels, or paying á la carte for just the ones you watch, you pick a platform and then bolt on a package of channels, grouped by theme -- you get "Entertainment & Lifestyle," "Movies," "Kids" or "News & Info." These smaller, cheaper bundles are in response to being forced to carry channels owned by the same group, if you're paying for MTV, you're also paying for TV Land, for example. Still, those in the city (when not dancing their knee joints away) should be interested to know that the Get Started platform costs $25, Get Started Plus $45 and each additional package is $10.
New DirecTV Cinema Connection Kit hits FCC with wireless in tow
A new version of DirecTV's Cinema Connection kit has just sneakily hit the FCC filed under its OEM name of Wistron NeWeb Corporation. Unlike the current model which required a direct Ethernet connection to work, this unit can act as wireless receiver to connect your individual DirecTV DVRs or an entire whole-home network. That gives users the freedom to access the company's online CINEMAplus library of 4,000 movies and TV shows at no additional cost for the service (we're sure DirecTV will find someway to ding you at least for the kit though). To get a glimpse for yourself, check out the gallery below featuring internal and external beauty shots of the device included with the filing, along with key pages from the user manual. Otherwise, let's all give DirecTV a nice slow-clap for entering the world of wireless streaming at its own leisurely pace. %Gallery-115419%
