By Ben King, 16 January 2002 11:39
NEWS BT has quietly released its DIY broadband product, which is designed to cut DSL prices by allowing customers to install it themselves. Rather than having an engineer round to install a system, self-install customers receive a small box in the post called a microfilter. Stick the microfilter into the wall, plug a DSL modem or router into one socket and your telephone into the other, and hey presto: you have broadband (though some behind-the-scenes configuration has to happen too). Self-install comes with a wholesale installation price of just £50, while engineer-installed DSL costs £150. The wholesale monthly rental price is £25, compared to £30 for engineer-installed DSL. However, with self-install the user has to get hold of their own modem, which costs around £50 or more. ISPs have already started offering the new service. PlusNet, for example, is offering self-install DSL for £75 installation and £50 per month. BT Wholesale reassures us that the service is as easy to install as plugging a socket into a wall, but participants in discussion groups in recent days have expressed doubts about whether this can really be the case.
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