Covad added 9 cities to Telextend T-1-based Internet access servi...

total markets to 14, company said. Telextend replaces symmetrical DSL that often couldn’t be deployed to small businesses due to distance constraints or technical problems such as bridge taps on line, it said. Covad has signed Internet service providers Speakeasy and DSL.net to sell service. Telextend also is available from Megapath Networks or directly from Covad, it said. Unlike company’s core DSL services, Telextend is T-1 Internet access similar to services long available from Bells, CLECs and long distance companies, Current Analysis senior analyst Rob Carlson said. Pricing is competitive for T-1, he said, “but at $449 per month it is not really in the ballpark with DSL services.” Telextend allows Covad to fill “coverage holes” in national network with service that avoids large build-out cost of extending DSL network -- major concern as company currently is in bankruptcy, he said: “T-1 access loops are a good hole filler because they are not distance sensitive and they do not suffer from distance-related performance degradation -- as do DSL circuits.” Other advantages of T-1 are 1.5 Mbps throughput in both directions, static network addresses, ease of supporting multiple users and applications. “The same cannot be said of all DSL services,” Carlson said. Advantage of DSL is inherently low access cost. “It’s a POTS line,” he said, “it’s cheap and that alone makes it popular” in contrast to T-1 circuits that add “significant monthly operating expense” for both Covad and customer. Telextend service “is priced way out of the reach of prospective DSL customers.” Companies that want T-1 for Internet access will purchase it from more stable provider “and probably have already done so,” he said.