Ready to dump my dial-up connection - any suggestions

[mom2boys]

I really need to have faster download/transmission times than dail-up can provide (business reasons). First of all - what is the difference between DSL & cable? Is one superior? More reliable? More economical? More readily available? What else do I need to ask?

 

[pumba]

thru Verizon and we love it.....have had it for three years and never been bumped off or been slow........I love also the fact that my phone line is always available to talk on at the same time

 

[jennyl772003]

Firstly-I am not an expert by any stretch of the imagination!

We have DSL. DSL actually uses a portion of your phone line that you do not use for calls. It is not "always on" like cable. It is a bit slower, but also cheaper. You need to be within like 2 miles of the phone station to be able to get DSL. Compared to dial up, DSL is VERY fast and Cable is Very Very fast. We have had no problems with our DSL.

 

[Pooh67_68]

I know nothing about it, that is my husbands job. LOL

We have cable and I love it. We have never been booted off and are always on, of course we have digital cable too so I don't know if that makes a different or not. We pay $35.95 a month for cable internet.

According to the commercial DSL is cheaper

 

[katerkat]

I love my cable connection. I don't know much about DSL, but DH's friend works for a national Internet connection company help desk and he said DSL is not a good choice unless you're really close to the source.

 

[shelbyjosh]

I have Comcast and can't fathom going back to dail-up! Yes, we do have our slow moments, too. Download time is almost nothing compared to AOL, Att, etc. The only other cable internet around here is WOW.

 

[jrydberg]

DSL is generally cheaper but not as available (gotta be within 15000 feet of the central exchange for your area). As for speeds, cable has the potential to be faster, but in my experience, they're about the same.

With cable, you're essentially on a LAN with other cable subscribers in your area. DSL speeds will not vary (as long as there are no external internet issues). Cable speeds will vary depending on the number of users.

DSL is actually, always on. Had Bell South DSL for 2 years and only had 30 mins of downtime in 2 years. I have cable now. I'd get DSL if I could, but the main reason for that is price. I'm happy with either

 

[Dan Murphy]

Comcast cable here, for quite a number of years, VERY happy, no problems, fast.

 

[Bichon Barb]

DSL through Verizon at home. It's always on.

T1 line at work.

Gotta love that T1 line (whatever the heck it is). Faster than a speeding bullet!

 

[Eeyore1954]

I have Earthlink DSL at home -- much better than dial-up, but not as fast as cable. However, it is cheaper for us and I don't do much with downloads, so for me DSL is fine.

 

[Lewisc]

http://www.dslreports.com/prequal

Will tell you if you have DSL available in your area AND if your close enough to the CO.

DSL is usually cheaper and slower than cable modem. Many of us don't have a choice, although DSL is available in my area I'm much too far from the CO and have no choice but use cable modem.

 

[got2lovedisney]

I was paying about $60 for AOL DSL. I switched to Comcast cable because I get it for $42 since I also have digital cable for the TV. I don't do much downloading so I haven't noticed any speed differences. I Do think that we do get bumped off more often now though. Not convinced that's not because we're wireless but it SEEMS to happen more often with Comcast.

Either choice is much MUCH faster than Dial-up!!

 

[SyracuseWolvrine]

My parents have had DSL from speakeasy.net for several years, with a total of about an hour's worth of downtime in 4 years. They could have gone with cable, but they didn't like our cable company (MediaOne at the time), and didn't want to give them any more money than was required for basic cable (tv)

 

[edcrbnsoul]

You can get faster speeds with DSL it would just cost more, like anything, and in a few years read now to 10 yrs (now in Keller Texas) you will be able to get FTTP (fibre to the premises) right at your house which will bring unreal speeds over fibre optic cable.

Quotes:
FTTP is moving from field trials and the lab to the real world, and it's happening in Keller first," Network Services Group President Paul Lacouture said at a news conference with city officials in Keller today. "This technology will transform our network and the products we will be able to offer to consumers and businesses. Once deployed, for example, the slowest broadband connection we'll offer customers will be three times as fast as broadband speeds commonly available today. In short, we are building a new network that will make us the broadband leader in the 21st century."

Bob Ingalls, president of Verizon's Retail Marketing Group, said, "We expect to initially make available a range of broadband access products that will feature download speeds of 5 megabits per second, 15 megabits per second, and 30 megabits per second. These services will be provided at substantial value over anything that's in the market today -- highly competitive pricing because we know that's what customers will expect."

Just to compare 1.5(t1) is 1 1/2 megabits per second

 

[Carl]

I have DSL and the newest rate is supposed to be $24.95 plus taxes, etc. All those rates for cell phones, DSL, cable, etc. are PLUS fees. I am happy with the speed of my DSL. In my experience, the speed is more dependant upon the websites you are accessing than upon your connection speed. Sometimes the DIS is very slow and has nothing to do with my connection speed.

 

[Deb & Bill]

Cable modem from Earthlink. Beats telephone lines everytime. By disconnecting the direct phone line, our cable modem costs about the same as the telephone line plus AOL (which I hated, but was the only one that I could get to work).

I love my cable modem.

 

[emmagata]

Go here

http://www1.us.dell.com/content/topics/segtopic.aspx/internet?c=us&cs=19&l=en&s=dhs&~ck=mn

if you sign up through Dell, you can get up to a $100 rebate.

 

[Pin Wizard]

Originally posted by katerkat
I love my cable connection. I don't know much about DSL, but DH's friend works for a national Internet connection company help desk and he said DSL is not a good choice unless you're really close to the source.

How is that different than cable? You'd have to be right where the cable is, right? Hmmm...

I was going to try Verizon's DSL. I was told I would have a trial period. Fine. When I got the thing I had to call them. The guy said I would see a charge on my phone bill. I told him I was informed of a trial period. He kind of mumbled that it was possible. Okay...so I asked how much it was a month. I sent the modem or whatever the thing was back to them without ever even opening the box. End of that!

 

[emmagata]

Originally posted by Pin Wizard
How is that different than cable? You'd have to be right where the cable is, right? Hmmm...

I was going to try Verizon's DSL. I was told I would have a trial period. Fine. When I got the thing I had to call them. The guy said I would see a charge on my phone bill. I told him I was informed of a trial period. He kind of mumbled that it was possible. Okay...so I asked how much it was a month. I sent the modem or whatever the thing was back to them without ever even opening the box. End of that!

PW, check out the link in my post above yours if you're thinking of DSL.

Anyways, obviously both DSL and cable customers have to be near (actually attach to it) the cable.

The difference with DSL is that the longer the wire is from what they call the CO (central office) the lower the speed gets to the point that the wire is too long to get a good signal.

A good analogy would be to compare getting local TV from an antenna on your roof versus a satellite dish. The farther your antenna is from the TV station, the worse the picture will get to the point where you won't get any TV at all.

Satellite doesn't have that problem because as long as your dish can "see" the satellite, you'll get a signal.

The other difference between DSL and cable is that with cable, you, your neighbor and the guy down the street all share the same cable wire. The more people on it at the same time, the slower the connection will be. Think the monorail system at Disney (either the MK line or the EPCOT line) as all those monorails share the same track.

DSL customer don't share a wire. Each house goes back to a switching station. Think the airport monorail system at the Orlando airport. There are several monorails running at the same time on different tracks

 

[ZacinIndy]

For true speed, cable is the thing.

It really depends on what you want to pay, in the Indy Metro area, DSL is quite cheaper and seems to have better service, since good customer service has always been a problem with Comcast.