DSL or Broadband? Question.

[woofless]

I am expecting a marked increase in income and one of the things I can now afford is a faster internet connection. What are the pros/cons of each? I have cable running to the cabin, but it is unused. We have Dish. Are there privacy issues, traffic issues, any issues to watch out for? Your opinion is solicited and appreciated.

Thanks,
Woof

[Liberal Veteran]

1. Um...DSL IS a kind broadband.

Broadband is just a way of saying "high speed internet".

It includes DSL, T1 lines, Cable, Satellite.

Although broadband is meant to say cable a lot now.

[woofless]

3. Thanks,

that's my ignorance showing. Guess I am asking is there any upside/downside to using the cable as opposed to phone line.

[Kierkegaard]

6. DSL requires you to filter conventional phone use. That can be

a problem if you have Tivo. It doesn't like it, even filtered at the audio freqencies. Cable access won't inconvenience you in that way.

[Selwynn]

10. You're only supposed to put a filter on the line going to the computer

EDIT - at least with my DSL

Yeah, if you've got like a single jack, and your computer is on the same line as other stuff, I've heard that can make problems. I've got my computer on one jack with a filter and phone and everything else on another jack, no filter needed.

This however, I think depends on the kind of DSL -- I'm no expert but when I had different dsl I had to have a filer on all lines to use phones, etc. I don't now.

[Deja Q]

4. Check the upload transfer rates...

Especially if you play online games or move files from your PC to elsehwere.

Comcast doesn't offer more than 256Kb upload speed.

Qwest DSL has a 768kb upload, though the download speed is 1.5 (half that of comcast, but uploading means more to me and download speeds are quite fast at 1.5 anyway)

[bvar22]

7. Hi, liberal_veteran

I posted the same question.
I'm really looking for someone who uses Dish access since I already have the equipment, but am uncertain about the performance.
I have used DSL, but I want to avoid installing a land phone access.

Good Luck

Bob
Minnesota

[ogradda]

2. i like dsl

but i hear cable is good too. altho i've heard it said if you live around a bunch of people with cable connections it slows you down.

[PoiBoy]

5. Here's a link...

c-net is a very reliable source, IMO... hope it helps... :hi:

http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-6536_7-726601-1.html

[woofless]

8. Thanks

Aloha

[Selwynn]

9. DSL is broadband - but here's a comparison

broadband essentially means non-dial up. Comparing DSL to cable really depends on your needs. Cable is going to have much larger downsteam, meaning if you do a lot of large file downloading you'll do that a lot faster. Cable quality for things like gaming really varies from place to place - in some places cable has very high latency, meaning you get a lot of nasty lag in games. In other places, it works fine.

I have 1MB DSL and its plenty fast for my needs. As a gamer, it is also consistently good with low latency. My downloading transfer rate hange around 128/sec - that's as opposed to say max 3.5/sec with a 56k modem. If everything goes perfectly, I can sustain somewhere around (I think) 160/sec. Now, cable will (or can) give you a lot more than that but again, latency varies.

As I said in the other thread, Satellite is something I've steered clear of as a gamer.

[Liberal Veteran]

11. Here is my take on the question.

I would probably avoid satellite just because of the expense and latency that can be involved.

DSL and cable have similar pricing schemes.

With DSL you and you alone have the pipe from you to phone company which means everyone in the neighborhood can have DSL and get pretty much the same speeds. You also usually have more ISP options and are not locked into having your cable company as your ISP if you are unhappy with their service (such as crappy email service or usenet servers or no storage space at the ISP to host your own web page).

Cable tends to be faster for the download rates, but that can be affected by the fact that you are gonna share the pipe with everyone else in the neighborhood. I have heard it is pretty rare but your speeds can be influenced if EVERYONE is active on the internet that is sharing the pipe to the cable company. And you are locked into having the whatever kind of ISP service the cable company offers.

Hope that helps.

[Maiden England]

12. We have DSL, and TiVO and no problems

We have DirectTV, so we weren't about to pay for cable on top of that, the Sat Internet is so stupidly expensive, but DSL is no much more than we were paying for 2 dial up accounts. So DSL it is, we are very happy with the speed.

[woofless]

13. Thanks all for the input.

One can always count on DUers to help out.

Woof

[charlie]

14. You're in a cabin?

Is it remote? Most DSL services are still limited to a certain distance from the telco, roughly 3 miles. DSL might not be available for you.

I chose DSL over cable because I didn't want to be slowed by congestion at peak hours. My download speeds are phenomenal, the chokepoint is more often the speed of the server I'm connecting to, rather than my connection. When someone posted the trailer for the Fahrenhype trailer the other day, it got blasted to me at over 600K per second, my desktop was rocking from the data torrent (I guess I was the only one accessing that piece of crap) :)

[no name no slogan]

15. I've had DSL and cable, and cable is better IMHO

However, I must note that my DSL was from Qwest Communications (nee USWest), possibly one of the worst telecommunications in history with such a horrible customer service record that they were fined by the government for it.

I was an 'early adopter' of DSL in my area. I had it from 1999-2002. During that time, I experienced numerous outages, most for no apparent reason. I had to reboot the modem several times due to connection issues, and to get any help I had to wait on the phone for 30+ minutes to speak to a human.

I've had cable since 2002, and I have NEVER had any problems with it EVER. Every time I've had questions, I've been able to get through to tech support in five minutes or less. The connection is more stable, download times are 10x as fast, upload times are comparable (maybe a little faster with cable), and the cost is slightly cheaper.

DSL is okay, but IMHO cable is better.

[hyphenate]

16. I went with DSL

Because it's only $30 a month, which is $7 more a month for an AOL dial-up. I even keep my AOL account with a BYOA (Bring Your Own Access) plan for $15 a month.

I'm a big downloader, and I chose DSL over cable because where I lived in California, the cable company (Charter) was probably THE worst cable company in the world. (They wouldn't even carry the Schi-Fi channel!!) I wouldn't go with them for TV access, so there was no reason I would go for their internet service. I also lived in an apartment complex, and knew that the cable would be much slower.

I've had no problems with the DSL at all--I believe my connection is pretty fast--10mps. I can download a 7MB file in about two-three minutes. As I said, I download a lot, and it's been great for me.