PE> ROFL!  I'm getting better connects to David Drummond than Dave Hatch.
PE> With David I just got a 33600 connect, which ATI6 then decided was
PE> 33600/33600, yet with Dave I got a 31200 connect, which ATI6 said
PE> was 31200/28800.  BTW, does this absolve *my* phone line?

BG> Dave lives about 20 metres from one of Brisbane's most up-to-date
BG> exchanges, but essentially, anything less than a 33600/33600 connect
BG> is due to the bandwidth of the line not being up to scratch.

Nope, anything less than 33600/33600 is due to NORMAL phone line
bandwidths and 33600/33600 is due to EXCEPTIONAL phone line bandwidths
that you have no right whatever to demand your lines must achieve.

BG> It basically can't be anything else anyway. Even if you made
BG> several successive calls to the same number, you'd likely never
BG> get the same physical path, so line conditions will even vary
BG> between similar calls. It's just another unfortunate fact of life.

Well, even thats distinctly arguable too. If you have one of those
extremely special situations at each end, as far as the exchange and
the line from the phone to the exchange is concerned, you may well
get that almost all the time if you have modern fibre optic digital
links between the exchanges. Essentially because, while in theory the
path does change from call to call, in practice the vast bulk of the
bandwidth limit is in the subscribers line, the phone exchange and
the line card etc. Once its digital, at the line card, nothing much
can happen to it till it gets to the other end.

--- PQWK202