The Cupertino Courier

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AT&T continues rollout of cable system in Cupertino

By Cody Kraatz

AT&T has 47 permits that would allow it to install equipment across Cupertino as part of its continuing rollout of U-verse, its cable TV offering, according to city documents.

The company is tight-lipped about its rollout for competitive reasons, so it is difficult to determine where exactly U-verse is available now. But customers in western and southern parts of the city are signed on and a buzz is building on a U-verse user website.

"We have every intention and every reason to reach more customers as quickly as possible," said AT&T spokesman Ted Carr. In December, AT&T said it wanted to serve 50 percent of Cupertino within two years.

The company now has 18,000 U-verse subscribers nationwide and is averaging 2,000 U-verse installations per week, five times its rate in January, said Carr. A map of the United States on the U-verse user website shows concentrations of service in the Bay Area, Southern California, the Great Lakes area, Texas and several northeastern states.

Cupertino resident Gregg Jackson has been posting comments about the quality and availability of the service in the user forum under the name NJJax.

He has had U-verse at his home near Prospect Road and S. De Anza Boulevard, on the border with Saratoga, since March 15. He is trying it out, but has kept his basic Comcast service, too.

He was attracted to U-verse by the advanced digital video recording that can record four programs at once, better than his TiVo recorder, and by the selection of high-definition channels that complement a new high-definition TV he recently purchased.

"I have a lot of faith in AT&T's ability to improve the service. If I keep it, it will be because I expect it will get better. My wife is ready to give it back when the two-month trial is up," said Jackson.

But he said that glitches and mistakes are par for the course with a new offering like U-verse.

"Smart people don't buy version one of any tech product, and that's where we are now. I feel like we're kind of late beta testers of this," said Jackson, a software engineer.

For more information about U-verse, go to uverse.att.com or call 1.800.288.2020.