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CenturyLink's new service - and the ongoing prospect of Google Fiber jumping into the market - will put growing pressure on all the region's telecommunications companies to improve performance and offer alternatives to huge, expensive bundles of channels.

(Express-Times photo (2010))

CenturyLink is launching cable TV service Wednesday in parts of Portland, giving residents a choice of local cable provider for the first time ever.

The new service, called Prism, creates an alternative to dominant cable operator Comcast just as the subscription-TV market is opening up with the advent of new, Internet-based streaming services.

CenturyLink Prism

What it is

: Cable TV service

Channels

: Dozens of channels including the major local network affiliates (ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC and PBS), major national cable networks (AMC, Food Network, the History Channel, HGTV, MTV, TBS, TNT, The Weather Channel, TBS, TNT, WGN and Univision), major news networks (CNBC, MSNBC, CNN and Fox News) and major sports networks (ESPN, ESPN 2, ESPN Classic, Fox Sports 1, Golf Channel, Comcast SportsNet Northwest, Root Sports Northwest, NFL Network and PAC-12 Oregon.) Networks available on premium tiers include BBC America, ESPN U, BBC World News, HBO and Showtime.

DVR

: 1 terabyte DVR, capable of strong more than 200 hours of high-definition video. Prism can watch or record up to four channels simultaneously.

Availability

: Unspecified number of Portland households. Check the map above for a sense of the neighborhoods where Prism is available.

Pricing

: Introductory prices start at $67 a month for a standard package that includes all the most popular news, entertainment and sports channels. More complete packages run up to $82 a month. A package of premium channels including HBO and Cinemax is an additional $12 a month. CenturyLink also requires an Internet connection, which adds at least $35 to the price.

Prism Q&A

:

CenturyLink isn't likely to set off a price war in the cable market. Its prices, in fact, aren't much different from Comcast's advertised rates: A full slate of high-definition channels, plus a DVR, run a little more than $60 for the first 12 months, with prices rising as much as 50 percent thereafter.



Still, the new service - and the ongoing prospect of Google Fiber jumping into the market - will put growing pressure on all the region's telecommunications companies to improve performance and offer alternatives to huge, expensive bundles of channels.



"It has the potential for improving customer service, because people will now have a choice," said Mary Beth Henry, director of Portland's Office of Community Technology. And competition does give subscribers some leverage when one company boosts rates.



"It can have an impact of at least dampening price increases," Henry said.



CenturyLink serves Portland, Vancouver, Lake Oswego and parts of other cities in the metro area. It doesn't serve most of Gresham, Beaverton or Hillsboro, which are in Frontier Communications' historical territory and already have an alternative to Comcast with Frontier's FiOS service.



In addition to the Portland launch, CenturyLink has begun talks with local officials on expanding Prism service in Vancouver and Lake Oswego. It hasn't, though, set a timetable for beginning service in those markets.



A competitive cable market has been a top priority for city officials in Portland dating to the 1990s. But prospective competitors have been frightened off by the cost of building a rival network, which could run in the hundreds of millions of dollars.



CenturyLink is taking a half step forward, conserving cash by gradually building a fiber-optic network to parts of the city. High-capacity fiber lines enable hyperfast Internet connections and the new cable service as the company works to reduce its dependence on its fading landline phone business.



Unlike Comcast CenturyLink's cable franchise in Portland doesn't require the company to serve the whole city. And CenturyLink, wary of its competitors, won't talk about its fiber buildout.

The company plans to market Prism directly to customers in neighborhoods where it's available. For a broad sense of CenturyLink's market, The Oregonian built its own map (above), mining data from CenturyLink's website to give an indication of where service is available.

Though the Prism service is new to Portland, CenturyLink has offered service in other markets as far back as 2008. So the company has had time to develop a robust service that includes most of the features cable subscribers expect - and a few custom features other services don't offer.



"It looks to be very user friendly," Henry said.



Prism subscribers can expect a full channel lineup, including the Pac-12 Networks and Comcast SportsNet Northwest, which carries most Portland Trail Blazers games. The absence of Blazers games from satellite providers has been a sore point for sports fans in the state.



Like most cable operators, CenturyLink also includes a DVR for recording programming. Prism's can hold more than 200 hours of high-definition shows and can relay that video to as many as four TVs in a household.



Comcast knows it's heading for a more competitive market and isn't standing pat, either. The company is upgrading it's clunky old cable box for a sleek, new service called X1 with a vastly improved user experience for customers, and making its video service and subscribers' recorded shows available on mobile devices.



Last week, Comcast committed to hiring thousands of new customer service representatives to improve its service reputation.



Mark Farrar, a Comcast spokesman in Oregon, said CenturyLink's arrival adds to a market already crowded with satellite TV companies and new streaming options.



"We're going to react just like we would to an offer from any of the other competitors that we already face," he said.



For viewers, CenturyLink's arrival brings more complexity along with more choices. Neither Comcast nor CenturyLink offer fixed prices or standard rates, so what customers pay depends a great deal on what they can negotiate.



In that context, having a second cable TV company in the market shifts more power to the viewer. But it also requires those viewers to be more savvy, and to work harder to find the best prices.



-- Mike Rogoway

mrogoway@oregonian.com

503-294-7699

@rogoway