Additional details of Earthlink's speed upgrades are popping up in our Earthlink forum. From an e-mail making the rounds among subscribers, it looks like new Earthlink subscribers in Covad territory will have access to 3Mpbs speeds starting today, provided they're within 10,000 feet of their CO. Existing customers in Covad's service area won't be seeing the upgrades until later this year, and they're not thrilled about it.

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On April 8th, 2004, EarthLink will have the ability to offer download speeds of up to 3 mbps to New EarthLink High Speed subscribers. This will only be available to subscribers that are within the Covad footprint and within 10,000 feet from the CO.

The 3.0 product will provide the customer a download of up to 3 mbps at the same price as the current offering of 1.5 mbps. Upload speed remains at 128kbps. This is still a “best effort” service, so speeds are not guaranteed.

Product Attributes: Available to New EarthLink High Speed subscribers that are in the Covad footprint and within 10,000 feet from the Central Office.

Monthly fee: $49.95

Early Term Fee: $149.95 -12 month commitment

Setup Fee: based on promotion offer

Due to system limitations, we will be unable to offer the 3.0 speeds to existing Covad customers at this time, but should be available later this year. If a current broadband customer calls in requesting this promotion, please advise them this is for new customers only.
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Offering the upgrades to existing customers allows them to stress test the system. Oddly, though many Earthlink/Covad customers currently see 384kbps upstream speeds, these two Earthlink promotional pages make references to 128kbps being the upstream speeds of the 3Mbps packages. Employees indicate upgrades for users provisioned with BellSouth lines are in the works.