Cable broadband ISP NTL, are in the latter stages of preparing for the launch of a range of services that will enables users to temporarily "boost" their service upto a possible 3Mbit (yes, thats right .. THREE Mbit) - all with the click of a button, raising fears that the unmetered era of broadband has started its demise.

Trialing in Guilford, Hants at the moment, three of the four packages will vary in their downstream speed by use of a "boost" button adding that bit of 'nitrous' to the connection, increasing potential download to a whopping 3Mbit per second dependant on package. One of the ISPs new offerings entitled "HomeWorker" will vary the downloading rate according to the time of day. A couple of the products are based on a "pay as you go" plan, made popular by mobile phone companies.

The new offerings are :

Pay As You Go 150 & 150+

Fears of the end of a unmetered free for all on broadband connections could become a reality with the introduction of these packages. Based on a "credit token" concept, users will be able to continue to use their connection, providing credits remain. The "+" varient will provide the "boost" button that we previously talked about. Built into the ISPs connection software, this will as the name suggests boost the conection upto 1Mbit for as long as the user chooses - or credits remain.

Pay As You Go 600 & 600+

As the 150 / 150+ packages, except with the obvious increase in default downstream rate, from 150kbs to 600kbs, with the noticable exception being that hitting that Nitrous button will mean you can beat even those Golf GTIs with your downrate boosted to 2Mbit, again, until credits remain, or your decide that the ride is just to scary (or costly !)

1Mb Xtreme

Probably NTLs killer package this one. Normally permitting a downstream rate of 1Mbit - itself not slow by any means, hitting that boost button, will give you VW Golf R32 like power - giving downstream rates of 3 (THREE) Mbit/second. Caveats apply however, with the boost button only being active during certain times of the day, and more than likely, download caps vigerously imposed

HomeWorker

Appealing to the, as the name suggest the Homeworking society, packages will vary in downstream rate from 150Kbps upto 600Kbps depending on the exact package chosen. However between the hours of 8am and 6pm all varients of the HomeWorker family of packages will benefit from an increased downstream rate of 1Mbit.

No pricing has been set for any of the above plans and neither has availability been set. It is also expected that whilst services will benefit from increased downstream rates, all services will retain the commonplace 256k/sec upstream rate.

Subscribers use of the NTL broadband service has been a hot topic of recent times, with the company issuing warnings to users that according to the ISP are deteriating the service for other subscribers in the area. More recently we've reported how some sources are citing that the popularity of internet applications such as Peer2Peer will see the end of an unmetered service, and force the introduction of metered service, apparently just like what NTL are planning.