Internet broadband providers Internode and iPrimus have announced that they have successfully connected its first customers in Tasmania to the National Broadband Network.According to Internode, IT technician Robert Pettman, who lives at the suburb of Midway Point, saw the lights come alive on his fibre modem about 5pm yesterday. He is Internode’s first customer on the NBN Tasmania trial network after applying for a 50 megabit-per-second fibre optic broadband service at the start of June.
“It’s awesome. It’s a major speed increase on what I had before, which was a 1.5 megabit per second ADSL service. Since it went live about 5pm, I’ve done speed tests and have seen a few peaks of 80 megabits per second, although it mostly hovers around 50Mb/s, which is what I ordered,” said Pettman.
Internode product manager Jim Kellett said the company had received strong demand from people living in the three areas covered by the NBN pilot program. “We’ve deliberately offered a service that is better priced than ADSL so that people have a real incentive to test out this new service,” he said.
Besides Internode, iPrimus also announced that its iPrimus Extreme 100Mbps service was installed during the day at the customer premises and a successful connection to the internet was made by the customer yesterday afternoon.
Mark, the first fully operational iPrimus customer said: “We have a PC, two laptops and a few gaming consoles, so having everything online at once and all working fast is critical to us. We are definitely looking forward to streaming TV and movies in the future. We have been with Primus for eleven years and the customer service we receive has always been excellent.”
iPrimus General Manager of Marketing and Products, Andrew Sims stated: “This is a fantastic and significant milestone for Tasmania and iPrimus. The installation, set-up and coordination went well which is a testament to the hard work and effort of everyone involved.”
