From: "Glenn Meadows" 

Not a problem, there are a bunch of ins and outs with DSL, which for me,
made the cable choice more logical.  When I moved in with Shelley, all she
had was Dialup NetZero, which using Dialup to do remote network admin, and
all that I needed to do, was not going to work.  She only had the
bare-bones cable installed, 12.95/month.  So, she said as long as I paid
for the cable going forward, she was fine with adding cable internet.  Went
to CompUSA, bought my own modem, added a splitter or two, got it hooked up,
added a wireless router, never looked back.

One of the staffers here had Bell South DSL at their house, their
"Lite" package (minimal speed), and it's just pokey, as far as
I'm concerned. Seems like it always has to do an initial connect/login if
you've not had any network traffic in some period of time.  Once you've hit
an initial website, it's just OK, but that first webpage sometimes take
10-20 seconds to load.

I guess it's a cost balance with your needs, vs. what is available at the
various price points.

Different strokes...

--

Glenn M.
"Ellen K."  wrote in message
news:m0vnp21sioav0dbnvrn3b1rtnp3i3vp0u2{at}4ax.com...
> Hmmm.
>
> Definitely food for thought.  I really appreciate your taking the time
> to explain all that.
>
> On Wed, 3 Jan 2007 11:29:30 -0600, "Glenn Meadows"

> wrote in message :
>
>>DSL is a high frequency signal that rides on the wires from the CO to your
>>home, and is distance dependant.  The farther away you are, the weaker the
>>signal is, to the point where if it's too weak, you don't get any service.
>>That will also determine the maximum speed you can get on any connection.
>>Also the condition of the wiring in your house, on the way to your house,
>>etc.
>>
>>If you have noisy phone lines when it rains, you'll have poor DSL service,
>>typically.  Also, you're going to have to install filters on EVERY device
>>that connects to your internal phone wires, at the wall jacks.  That
>>includes wall mounted phones, fax machines, answering devices, and all
>>phones.  Typically you'll get a set of filters as part of the install kit.
>>This blocks the DSL signal from entering those devices, which will degrade
>>the signal, since those devices all are wired to the same phone line.
>>
>>In My Opinion, while DSL claims "no shared service",
that's true, as far
>>as
>>it goes, which is just back to the central office, where you data needs
>>are
>>grouped into all the other subscribers, and are aggregated together.  If
>>the
>>provider has bandwidth X from the CO to the internet, and sells 20 times X
>>(or higher) in subscribers out of that CO, then if everyone is online, and
>>doing downloads, then you're sharing that X bandwidth to the internet
>>among
>>all other users that connect thru that CO.
>>
>>George can talk about "oversold DSL" upstream.  It's a
balancing act.
>>Same
>>as phone service.  There are models as to how many people are typically on
>>the phone at any given time, and that's what the system is designed to
>>handle.  On holidays, like Mothers Day, you used to get the "I'm sorry,
>>all
>>circuits are busy" message, simply because 3 to 5 times (or more) the
>>number
>>of people were trying to use the phone at once.
>>
>>On cable, you are "shared" at a much closer point to you,
but current
>>cable
>>system improvements really allow for much higher bandwidth, both at the
>>user
>>end, as well as the aggregated local users.  Comcast is now offering
>>normal
>>speeds in the 6 mb range, with "premium" services almost
double that.
>>Those
>>are download speeds (headed to you, not upload (sends)).  Typically, sends
>>are capped in the 256-384kb range.  Comcast offers a business class
>>service
>>that allows higher upload speeds, as well as higher download speeds.
>>
>>In NYC, one of the cable companies is now offering 10mb/sec both ways to
>>the
>>internet, with a fiber cable feed into the building, for $1500/month.  If
>>you need the bandwidth, that's a cheap price.
>>
>>You may find that while you can get DSL from DSLExtreme, the max speeds
>>may
>>not be what you might expect, since you could be on the fringe.
>>
>>And, it's not a 3 mile distance "as the crow flies", it's
"as the wires
>>fly"
>>from the CO to your house that matters.
>>
>>With Cable, the data runs in several of the high cable channel
>>frequencies.
>>Recent cable improvements now allow some really high speed data transfers.
>>I think for some time, the cable people will be 1 to 2 steps ahead in data
>>speeds from DSL.
>

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